I was reading a well-written article by FiftyFourEleven on copying content, and another, a review by Tyler Cruz, about a company focused on detecting plagiarism Plenty of good illegal anti-copyright stuff for writers to get caught up in and angry about. But as usual, I got to thinking about the negative aspects in a different light. Copy me, baby!

If words are not precious, being copied is not annoying

I can understand that for most people, writing doesn't come naturally, and even when it is fun, it is inevitably hard work. So, if one day, a non-writer really squarts their ass off completing an article or a story or even a book, (and puts their pen down with that feeling of I couldn't (or wouldn't want) to do that again) I can see they would feel very protective of their achievements. Committed writers should feel different, though.

To my mind, litigation and anger and annoyance are a waste of time and effort for most creative types. When there is a whole world to fill with new stuff, why restrict your thinking to minutiae and silliness? Why be like the music copyright people and spend millions hunting down teenagers, when they could be spending millions promoting the wonders of owning your music? Move on.

Writers and bloggers should look at the bigger picture and forget hunting down the copycats for legal reasons. The way I look at it, if someone copies your work, the more people will probably read your work anyway, and the more you have to write about in your scandals column! Far from being negative, copying creates an outlet for your creative juices. Did you hear about so-and-so? The bastard ripped me off - a great headline to attract readers.

Protection against copying and plagiarism

I don't really care if anyone copies me or not, but if I were smart and wanted to optimize the marketing potential of everything I wrote, I would always include my Pisstakers site name in an article and include a link back to the article on my site, and date the article, and keep a hard copy of the article. To me that sounds like I am pretty much copy-proofed, especially as most copycats aren't prepared to edit anything. Take those steps, and bottom line, the more who rip you off and publish you verbatim around the internet , the better for you.

Use Copyscape out of interest and vanity, not so you can track a copycat down via ISPs etc and make them feel stupid.

When you look around the internet and see ideas identical or similar to yours, think how you can improve on what is already out there, instead of getting all possessive, bitter and twisted.

Write your heart out and press publish with a clear head, secure in the knowledge that nearly all bloggers come out ahead of nearly all copycats - as long as you remember to take the above simple steps every time you write. In fact, I would go one stage further and say that if you follow those simple rules, you should subtly encourage others to take your work as their own. When they do, you win, not them!

What about Google?

Some internet entrepreneurs out there would say that copying is a bad deal if Google get involved, because money is at stake. My view is, I would hope that the smashing folks at Google were reasonable enough to compare your track record as a writer with the track record of a scraper site, and decide not to close your Adsense account or penalise you for duplicate copy. And if they did come down on the side of the bad guys, at least you would have plenty of new material to blog about.

Conconclusion

When you get down to it, a few people get away with cheating in the long run. Copycats like Shakespeare or Microsoft Windows inventors spring to mind, and there are always plenty of cases to disprove the rule, but for the most part, the guys who produce original material day after day end up the winners. Keep on writing, don't be too precious about your work, follow those few "rules" and enjoy your ride to fame. I think therefore I am original.