In March of this year Seidler spoke at Canadian Music Week’s Global Forum on the issue of piracy and has produced a new video based on that talk (embedded below).

Though much of the information is the same from Seidler’s first video, this talk is much more in depth with updated statistics and stories. Specifically, Seidler outlines who is profiting from piracy, specifically film piracy in her case, what she has done about it and what she feels needs to change.

According to her, the DMCA process, at least for her volume of piracy, is “useless” and she is calling on Google as well as other players to do more to protect the rights of artists, musicians, filmmakers, etc. She also says the notice and takedown system is “backwards” as it requires copyright holders to spot and report infringement rather than having the sites that are profiting from the piracy do their part to vet the authenticity of the content that is being uploaded.

Siedler is especially critical of Google, which she accuses of accepting a counter-notice that wasn’t even translated (and was in fact a confession) and of heel-dragging on copyright matters, a complaint I hear routinely from other content creators.

If you’re interested in piracy issues, the video is well worth a watch, even at nearly 30 minutes in length.

Who Profits from Piracy? from fastgirlfilms on Vimeo.

Ellen Seidler is an independent filmmaker who, after spending $250,000 of her own money, made the lesbian romantic comedy “And Then Came Lola“.

However, even before the movie was officially released, it was leaked on a variety of pirate sites, often times hosted at various “file locker” services that would offer the video for download.

Seidler then began to defend her work on the Web, filing DMCA takedown notices by the dozen against file locker sites and advertising networks.

But Seidler noticed something she considered disturbing. Nearly all the pirate sites had advertisements on them, but they weren’t for companies with poor reputations, but rather, were for mainstream companies, many of which were in the U.S. These companies included Netflix, Microsoft, Network Solutions and many others.

In early July, Seidler was features on All Things Considered on NPR, where she talked about these issues and a representative from Netflix said that they try to avoid pirate sites but some simply fall through the cracks.

Shortly after that podcast, Seidler launched her own site and blog about her ordeals, PopUp Pirates, where she highlights the companies who advertise with pirates, in particular Google and vents her frustration at the time and energy spent enforcing the film and how all parties involved, the pirate site, Google and the advertiser, make money from the film but she does not.

She also produced a YouTube video, embedded below. that showcases the process the goes through to file a DMCA notice and deal with just one pirate site.

The site and the video are an interesting look behind the scenes of an independent filmmaker, without the legal team of a major Hollywood studio, trying to defend her work. Most people reading this will either find it an interesting look at how independent enforcement is handled or see it as something they can relate to.

Personal Thoughts

Seidler’s enforcement efforts, from what I’ve seen, have been at least fairly effective. Though working links to her film can be found, most of the first ones I ran across were disabled and there were far more scam links than real ones. Anyone actually seeking to download the film will, most likely, be pretty frustrated and, considering that it is available as a “Play it Now” on Netflix, there are much easier ways to see it.

I also understand her frustrations with Google and with the file locker sites. I’ve written many times before about issues with Google Adsense and the artificial roadblocks thrown up there. In fact, I was the one who filed a 17-page DMCA notice with adsense regarding one site that was widely scraping content.

However, I think her frustrations with the individual advertisers may be misplaced. Most of these advertisers use third party services, like Adsense, to place their ads. It is these services that choose which sites they run ads on and which ads appear there, not the advertisers. Though Adsense provides tools to block domains, they can only work AFTER the ad has appeared and they have been alerted. If these sites were not admitted into the networks in the first place or if they would enforce their TOS, it wouldn’t be an issue.

Many of the issues Seidler raises also relate to the Dear Google letter I covered previously. Though that letter deals mostly with Google search, it’s easy to see how the issues apply to Adsense as well.

All in All, Seidler’s site highlights the strange and gray relationship between Google, file lockers and pirate sites. Advertising networks and file locker sites attempt to maintain legitimacy while accepting money and traffic from pirate sites, there’s a definite balancing act between doing too much and doing too little.

Seidler’s experience raises a lot of difficult questions without easy answers, making her site well worth a look.

Video

Sometimes, no matter how good you are at dealing with misuses of your content, a case finds itself stuck.

You’ve sent a polite letter asking for the content to be removed, then gotten more stern with a cease and desist and then filed a takedown notice with the host, all as appropriate, and yet the infringing material is still online.

Whether you’ve gotten stern rejections from both the infringer and the host or heard nothing back from either. It is time to take a moment and retool your strategy, Clearly, something isn’t working in this case and it’s time to figure out what, if anything, comes next.

With that in mind, here are five steps you should take if you find yourself hitting up against this wall and how you may still be able to move forward.

1. Evaluate Your Claim

The first step is to take a look at your claim objectively and see if it is as valid as you think it is. If you received letters of rejection from the host or the alleged infringer, take a look at the reasons and try to give them some weight with a clear head.

Many times claims of infringement are rejected because they are either outright wrong or simply too gray. If you’re filing a claim about a use that could be seen as a fair use or might not involve any copyrightable material, it’s best to take a step back and seek an outside opinion.

Technically, if you’ve already filed a takedown notice on a dubious claim, you’ve already exposed yourself to some legal liability but there is no use in making things worse by pressing on.

2. Recheck the Host

Once you are sure that you are in the right on your demand for removal, it is then worthwhile to recheck your information on the host, especially if you didn’t hear anything back from the host at all.

One of two things could have happened:

1. Incorrect Host: You may have simply contacted the wrong host. Check your host information with both Who Is Hosting This? and Domain Tools (under the “Server Info” tab). You may find you simply contacted the wrong company or contacted a reseller that doesn’t actually control the server or know what to do.
2. Wrong Contact Info: Many hosts will simply not respond to DMCA notices not sent through the proper channels so make sure you got the correct contact info for the host. Look at the U.S. Copyright Office’s list of designated agents and check the host’s TOS or legal page.

Check those two things carefully and, if needed, try contacting them again.

3. Adsense DMCA

If the host isn’t willing or able to help and the infringer isn’t responding favorably, then the next step may be to try alternative means of resolution including contacting Google Adsense if applicable.

Google Adsense accepts DMCA notices and responds fairly swiftly to them. They do not, however, respond to copyright complaints sent via their regular abuse reporting system.

If the infringing site uses Adsense, or any similar advertising network, this can be a powerful tool for bringing about a swift resolution to the problem.

4. Search Engine DMCAs

Since all four of the major search engines are located within the U.S., they all accept DMCA notices and they all comply with them. This can be a very powerful tool but only should be used sparingly and in cases where the host and the infringer are not cooperating.

Though a search engine DMCA will not remove the content from the Web, it will remove it from the search engines and prevent it from competing unfairly with your original work. It’s not a complete victory by any stretch, but it prevents the person misusing your content from gaining much benefit from it.

5. Get Help

Generally, I frown upon taking cases of plagiarism and copyright infringement public for several reasons, most important two being that it only draws more attention to the infringer, which they likely want, and mobs have a tendency to go too far and create other issues out of otherwise straightforward cases.

However, if there are other copyright holders involved, contacting them may be worthwhile. Where a host or an infringer may be able to ignore one or two upset copyright holders, it gets harder and harder to tune out a chorus of frustration.

It is best to build this campaign without linking publicly to the infringement, however and, if you must, being careful to “nofollow” all links as it may cause the search engines to treat the infringement as the original work.

Bottom Line

The unofficial sixth step in these cases is to simply drop the issue. If the site is not doing any significant harm to you, especially if you’ve filed DMCA notices with the search engines, it is likely best to not invest any more energy in the case.

Though I understand well that we get emotionally invested in our work and, when someone takes it without permission, especially when they plagiarize it, there is a strong emotional response, sometimes one just has to put things in a rational context and move on.

The good news is that these cases are very rare. If you follow the usual steps for dealing with a case of plagiarism or copyright infringement, you’ll most likely find that about 95% of all cases, if not more, are resolved quickly and easily.

Still, it is best to be ready for the few that may need more work. As rare as they are, they can make up the bulk of the headache when protecting your content.

However, unlike most victims of scraping, she knew exactly why her blog was being targeted heavily, she had recently read an article about the highest-paying AdSense keywords and knew that “Austin DWI” was commanding, at that time, well over $80.00 per click.

The results were predictable. As the term rocketed up in value, scrapers and other spam bloggers settled in to try and lure visitors for lucrative clicks and, along the way, ended up grabbing her keyword-rich content.

Her story illustrates a strange problem when dealing with spam blogs, that it is impossible to predict exactly where and what they will seize upon. They are, like anything else on the Web, highly prone to trends and changes in the climate making it virtually impossible to guess what will and will not be targeted tomorrow.

EBay on Steroids

According to Spencer, the spike in the price of the keyword was caused by a “bidding war” between attorneys in the Austin area. Since many lawyers in the region use Google to promote and they each wanted to be number one in the bidding, like any other online auction, they kept raising the price for the keyword until the cost they paid was far higher than what the term was actually worth.

The keyword, according to CyberWire, has come down in price, to approximately $55, still well above the average keyword cost and still in the top twenty.

However, these kinds of bidding wars can happen anywhere to almost any keyword. All that it takes is for two or three well-financed advertisers to seek out the top spot and keep trumping one another until they drive the price up past what the keyword is worth.

Though these bidding wars usually flare up and flame out quickly, they can last more than long enough for spammers to target the term and start scraping related content. This means that, if you happen to have a blog or site in the area, while your AdSense revenue may go up if you run ads, your content is likely to be scraped and reposted much more than usual, putting your search engine ranking in jeopardy.

The end result, your site can, almost overnight, go from experiencing only a minimal amount of content theft to being a prime target.

All it takes is a bidding war between a couple of advertisers in your field.

The Good News

Fortunately, while these bidding wars seem to be fairly common, they rarely lead to increased scraping.

The first reason for that is that the bidding rarely reaches heights that would attract the attention of scrapers. Though a leap in price from one dollar to four dollars per click might quadruple your AdSense revenue while the bidding war is going on, it will not attract many new spammers as there are still many keywords that are much more valuable.

The second reason is that spammers do not base their decision on what to target by keyword cost alone. If you look at the list of most expensive keywords, you see that the vast majority are for attorneys. But while spam about legal issues is present and common, it pales in comparison to gambling, pornography and other traditional spam targets.

The reason for this is that high-paying keywords are worthless if the terms are not regularly searched for and visitors are not likely to click the ads. A spammer can make more money off of fifty $2 clicks than just one $80 click.

The keywords that spammers target will have a balance between price, search frequency and click ratio. A bidding war may motivate spammers to target a borderline term they wouldn’t have otherwise, but only in the most extreme conditions would cause them to take heavy interest in a keyword that was, previously, completely ignored.

Conclusions

The bottom line for bloggers is three-fold.

1. All Blogs are Scraped: All blogs, regardless of their content and popularity, are going to be scraped at some point. It is an inevitability.
2. Some Blogs Will Be Targeted: Some blogs, such as those in traditional spam fields, will be heavily targeted as their content is more appealing. They may see many times the scraping of blogs in other fields.
3. Price Fluctuations Can Impact Scraping: Finally, price fluctions, both up and down, can impact the amount of scraping your site sees. Though the price is not the primary determiner of whether your blog will be targeted or not, it can cause problems in some circumstances.

As a Webmaster, even if you do not advertise, you should probably be at least somewhat aware of the value of your keywords and at least understand if they would pay well or not. Doing so may not help you prevent scraping but it at least gives you an idea of how much you should be on the lookout for it and how much time you should dedicate to it.

After all, knowing your enemy is half the battle and there is no better way to understand how they might respond than by knowing what they want and how they plan to obtain it from you…

In recent months and years, Google has made some attempt to push back at spam. They’ve worked to remove spam results from their search results, fought back against Blogspot spam and have shuttered some Adsense accounts. But despite these efforts, Google remains one of the largest hosts, financiers and promoters of spam on the Web.

It is easy to attribute these issues to the overwhelming nature of spam, to say that there is little Google can do when an rookie spam blogger can create tens of thousands of spam blogs at the click of a mouse. However, a closer look at Google’s practices shows a culture favorable to spam. For proof of this, we just need to dig deeper into a recent blog posting claiming that Google plans to stop domain tasting, a practice used by spammers to test out a domain before buying it.

Though the rumor itself is positive, when one looks at Google’s current practices, and the practices that will continue, one sees that Google violates their own rules regarding spam and actually goes out of its way to enable spammers.

Domain Tasting

Domain tasting is basically a trial period for domain names. By tasting a domain, you register for a short period, under five days, see if it works out and then release it at no cost if it doesn’t.

This was originally designed to prevent legitimate customers from being held hostage by typos or other honest mistakes when registering a domain. However, it is more commonly used by spammers and professional domain speculators to register a domain for free, and see if its traffic is worthwhile, all without any risk to them.

However, monetizing domains that are less than a week old can be a great challenge. Though you could set up a spam blog and simply take it down if you decide not to keep the domain, that might not be very time effective, even with automated scripts.

Fortunately for those spammers, Google has a domain parking service that not only makes it easy to park your domain, but earn money against ads sold on it, even if you have no content on your site.

For spammers, this is a dream come true and represents a chance to make a profit without taking any financial risk.

The Ethical Problem

The idea behind Google Domain Parking is fairly simple. Rather than parking your new domain in the traditional manner, by having it point to a generic “domain registered” page, you point it to Google. Google, in turn, creates a temporary site comprised of nothing but ads for keywords related to your domain name, ads both Google and yourself profit from.

The pages, a sample of which is pictured to the right, look and act very similar to spam content. Though there is no scraped material on the page, there is also no content at all.

The problem with this is simple. If you were to create this kind of site with your regular Adsense code, Google would call it a “Made For Adsense” site and likely terminate your account. However, if you do it through their domain parking program, not only is it legal, but you can do it on domains that you haven’t paid for and have no plans to.

This gives spammers the ability to receive payment from free domains with free hosting and free monetization. It is a guaranteed profit. Further, if the domain performs well, it can be kept and then turned into a more long-term project. This often includes converting it into a spam blog or selling it at auction.

Worst of all, the domains parked by Google do not contain any clear indication that they are parked domains nor that Google is involved. The traditional “Ads by Google” icons are removed around all of the blocks and only a mention of “Sponsored Links” indicates that the content contains nothing but advertisements.

In short, with this service, Google goes well beyond the mere hosting and monetizing of junk content, and steps into the creation of it.

What the Rumors Mean

If the rumors linked above are true and Google is looking at the possibility of no longer allowing users to monetize domains within the free grace period, that would certainly be a huge step forward.

Users would have to actually pay for the domains they park with Google and that would prevent spammers from registering and parking thousands of domains at a time. Even with heavy discounts and automated tools, the process would be too expensive.

However, this doesn’t mean that Google is getting out of the junk content business, just that they will not allow you to use it for free. As long as you pay for your domain, you can still have a free “Made For Adsense” site without violating any of Google’s terms of service.

Though this might hurt domain tasters, it will not impact domain those that engage in other questionable practices such as snatching up recently-expired domains, registering typos of popular names as well as other domain extensions. Though domain tasting is probably the worst practice of its kind, it is not the only evil that Google’s service can be exploited for and certainly not the only underhanded practice that can be tied to spam.

Conclusions

Google’s motto is supposed to be “Don’t Be Evil”. With other aspects of the spam issue, one could argue that Google was not deliberately being evil, but was instead a target for evil doers. However, in this case, it is Google itself that is taking the action, Google itself that is posting the junk content and Google itself is just now, after several years, looking to lock down the service so that it is not as vulnerable to spammers.

Though I doubt Google’s decision, should it come to fruition, will actually stop domain tasting because other companies will rush to fill the void, it is not acceptable that Google, considered by many to be the most powerful company on the Web, is or ever was a partner in what can only be called an underhanded practice.

However, this practice has largely gone unnoticed by general public. Though many of us have seen the pages, few have connected them with Google due to the lack of clear identifying information, the service itself is only a small portion of its Adsense offerings and finding a link to it is very difficult. By in large, only those who would want to use it seem to know about it.

This has kept the public silent on the issue, even though it has been going on for at least a few years.

Hopefully though, the rumors will be true and Google will step up on this issue. Though I would strongly prefer Google to not be in the junk content business, at least distancing themselves from domain tasters would get them away from the worst of the spammers.

But it is still sad and frustrating to find that the highest hopes I have for Google is that they will be less evil than they were before.

Adsense has its own DMCA policy and follows it very strictly. Though results can be obtained through that means, few bloggers actually use it.

Not only is the process unnecessarily complicated and time consuming, but a great deal of confusion is being spread about the nature of their policy.

However, the cause of the misunderstandings are very easy spot. If you follow Google’s abuse process, the confusion is very apparent as Google itself says never mentions its DMCA process when filing a complaint. Instead, it intentionally allows visitors to finish the entire process, certain the matter is in good hands, before letting them know the truth hours or days later.

It isn’t that these bloggers didn’t do their research, just that they were misled by a company who’s motto is supposed to be “Don’t Be Evil”.

Adsense Abuse 101

In theory, reporting Adsense violations is as simple as a few clicks of the mouse.

When you see a site breaking any of Adsene’s rules, you are supposed to first click their “Ads By Google” link at the top or bottom of one of the ad blocks. You are then taken to a page that tries and sells you space on the site or get you to sign your own site up.

However, at the bottom there is a link reads “Send Google your thoughts on the site or the ads you just saw”. If you click that link, a form appears below asking you what you thought of the ads. Below that is a link to report a violation. Click that link and a subform appears asking you to choice between a violation with the ads or the site itself.

If you choose the Web site, you get a question with the options below:

The third option reads “The site is hosting/distributing my copyrighted content” (emphasis in original) and seems to be perfect for reporting scrapers and spammers. If you hit submit from there, you get a thank you page and a promise to look into the matter.

Then nothing happens.

If you provided your email address, which is entirely optional in the form, you get an email some time later telling you that Google can not process your complaint without a DMCA notice. It then links to the Adsense DMCA policy (found above) and offers little else.

In the meantime you’ve lost hours, possibly days worth of time waiting for a response from Google and now have to start all over again.

Frustrating, yes, but entirely avoidable.

A Double Standard

Even if we discard the facts that Adsense is not protected under the DMCA and that Google’s DMCA policy is likely illegal in and of itself, there are several problems with this method of handling things.

The biggest is that Google knows that they can not and will not act on such complaints without a proper DMCA notice. They wrote the policy and they stand by it, for better or worse. Yet they keep that option available, even though it only leads to confusion.

Of course, the presence of that option would not be so bad if Google would actually notify submitters of the requirement to file the DMCA before they left the page.

Strangely, Google actually does exactly this one of their other sites, YouTube. If you use the “Flag” feature at YouTube to report a video for copyright infringement.

You are then given an error message directly you to their help center, which provides instructions for properly reporting the clip.

It is not a perfect system, but it prevents Webmasters from wasting days waiting for a response when one simply isn’t coming.

Bad Behavior

Questions about why Google does this is entirely up for debate. The most obvious reason, however, is that Google has much less motivation to be cooperative with Adsense than YouTube. Adsense is Google’s main money maker, is not technically protected under the DMCA and is not the subject of a billion dollar lawsuit.

But no matter what the reason is, this is just another artificial hurdle to Google’s already obstructionist DMCA policy. Google already mandates you send a physical signature, though the law clearly states that it is not necessary, refuses to accept email notices and often takes weeks to respond to a perfectly legitimate notice filed using their own policy.

Google could probably fix this problem within the space of a few hours but, for whatever reason, it has not been a priority for them. Instead, there are countless confused bloggers who believe that Google simply doesn’t respond to complaints about scraping doesn’t care.

The result is not only a damaged reputation for Google, but that thousands of spam blogs continue to thrive because content owners were thwarted in reporting the problem. They either never got the email requesting the DMCA notice, likely because they didn’t fill out their email as it was optional, or had simply moved on in the days that had passed.

The side effect of that is, of course, that Google gets to keep making money on the spam blogs. Considering they provide the hosting, promotion and revenue stream with their Blogspot, search and Adsense products respectively, Google seems to be a spammer’s best friend. Sadly, this “do the absolute minimum” policy when dealing with scraping seems to be a mere extension of that.

Even worse, it doesn’t seem to be getting any better in the near future.

Conclusions

Google is a company like any other, with responsibilities to share holders and employees. The bottom line for a corporation is, quite simply, the bottom line. Money doesn’t have an ethical or political stance and companies know that.

We should not expect companies like Google go act quickly on something that is not in their best interest. Instead, we should make it in their best interest to act by voting with our dollars. Doing anything else will have no effect.

The quicker we realize that, the quicker we can start to see some real change from Google in these and other areas.

Even though no company is perfect, a company should at least attempt to live up to is motto. Otherwise, it should expect its customers to demand better and then seek it out elsewhere.

However, advertising networks are not covered by the DMCA. Since they are not hosts and are not information location tools, such as search engines, they don’t fit neatly within the paradigm of the law. Their liability for infringement is, at best, untested.

Despite that, many advertising networks do accept DMCA notices and rely on the notice and takedown provision for handling complaints of copyright infringement. However, since the legal status of these networks is different, we are bending the rules a bit and judging the sites on their general abuse reporting procedure if one specifically for copyright does not exist.

Show how do they fare? Let’s find out.

Format: Fax
Email Address: None
Location of Policy: Google’s DMCA Policy
Registered with USCO: No
Comments: Yet another industry lead by a Google product and thus backed by their shoddy and questionable DMCA system. However, things get even worse when looking at Adsense. Where Google’s other services are clearly registered with the USCO, Adsense is not. Though not a legal requirement, it seems odd considering that Adsense actually has a separate DMCA policy from the rest of Google’s products. Though you might be able to use Google’s regular DMCA agent, I have not tested that since all of the other contact information has also changed including both the fax number and the department. Google makes it a habit of rejecting copyright complaints that don’t meet its standards, even if the site is obviously a spam blog or violates another element of the Adsense TOS. It seems likely that their policy in this area is one of the reasons that Adsense remains so popular with spammers, even after several crackdowns.
Grade: D-

Format: Email
Email Address: copyright at yahoo-inc dot com
Location of Policy: Yahoo’s Copyright and IP Policy
Registered with USCO: Yes
Comments: If you’ve read my previous reviews of Yahoo!, you know that I’m very fond of their policies in this area and their sense of responsibility. As with their other products, the copyright policy is linked at the footer of each page, is very complete and offers a very pain-free means of getting in touch with Yahoo. All in all, they are a leader in this area and, for once, the recycling of a copyright policy is actually a very good thing.
Grade: B

Format: Email
Email Address: jkweston at microsoft dot com
Location of Policy: Microsoft’s Copyright Policy
Registered with USCO: Yes
Comments: We’ve covered the shell game that MSN plays with its DMCA contact information before. The non-clickable link, the unsearchable policy and the buried information. Unfortunately, Microsoft simply rehashes the same policy for their advertising network, currently in beta. In fact, clicking the “legal” link at the footer of the adCenter site will simply take you to the same terms of use that all of live.com uses. Though the policy seems to be robust and well-written, the efforts taken to hide it worry me and frustrate many who have legitimate need to file a complaint.
Grade: C-

Format: None
Email Address: None
Location of Policy: Terms and COnditions
Registered with USCO: No
Comments: This line from their T&C really bothers me: “In order to avoid associations with copyright claims, website publishers may not show Paid Listings in areas such as MP3, Video, News Groups, and Image Results.” Of course, the other thing they do to avoid any association is not have any abuse information anywhere on their site. Even their “Contact Us” page simply leads to their support trouble ticket system, not really appropriate for this. The only email addresses I found are the ones in th left-hand column of the site that go to the support team and sales. There is no obvious way to send in an abuse complaint, copyright or otherwise, and it seems that is very much on purpose. Of course, their above limitations don’t stop spammers and won’t stop most content theft. It just keeps the Viacom’s of the world at bay and shows exactly what role Chitika is willing to play.
Grade: F

Format: Fax
Email Address: None
Location of Policy: Copyright Dispute Policy
Registered with USCO: No
Comments: If finding Easter eggs or completing scavenger hunts is too easy for your kids, have them track down AdBrite’s Copyright Dispute Policy. To find it, you first have to act as if you’re registering for an account on the site, then select all of the text in their terms and conditions, because you can’t read it in their tiny textbox, and then paste it into another program. From there, you’ll find the URL buried deep within. Needless to say, the process could be a lot easier and, worse yet, the policy itself doesn’t even include an email address to contact, just a fax number. As bad as the Microsoft shell game with this information is, AdBrite is much worse and the lack of an email address is downright obstructionist. Though the policy seems to be otherwise complete, I simply can not support such an sneaky effort to hide this critical information.
Grade: D-

Format: Email?
Email Address: service at burstdirect dot com
Location of Policy: Terms of Agreement
Registered with USCO: No
Comments: Burst Media is yet another Web site without any abuse reporting procedures on their site. Though they seem to have a pretty extensive registration process, there’s no way for a visitor to report a site that might have gotten through their inspection process. Though their terms forbid the posting of copyrighted material, there is no clear means of reporting an infringer and the above information is purely guesswork. However, it is the account they filter all other contact through so it seems likely that it would work for this purpose. As discouraging as lack of a policy and general distance from the issue is, it seems to be pretty typical for sites in this field.
Grade: F

Format: Form
Email Address: None
Location of Policy: None
Registered with USCO: No
Comments: Finally, though TLA may be controversial among SEO gurus for its link purchasing system, it is also worrisome for me due to its lack of an abuse system. Though their user agreement does forbid the posting of infringing material, it is merely one word in a list of general things that a member can not do. It is not backed up with any meaningful abuse reporting method and the best approach I could find is to contact “Other” using the form. That is hardly ideal for a network that has the potential to attract seedy elements from time to time. All in all, TLA’s policy, or lack thereof, borders on irresponsible and reckless.
Grade: F

Conclusions

If you’ve ever wondered what good the DMCA does, consider these sites. Looking over the results you see that there are three Fs and two D minuses. Five of the seven sites either have no policies or have extremely flawed ones.

Only two, Microsoft and Yahoo, have have decent reporting procedures and when Microsoft is nearly at the top of the pile in this area, there is something very wrong.

What is also clear is that large advertising networks with other hosting products typically just recycle their old policies, for better or worse, and and those without such preexisting policies didn’t bother to create a new one.

It appears as if most of these networks want to distance themselves as far as they can go from these complaints, both by indemnifying themselves from all such infringements and by not easily accepting complaints. This will, without a doubt, only feed the plague of scraping and content theft by making it easy for spammers to stay in business.

All in all, once you get an account with one of these services, unless you commit click fraud or some other crime against the network itself, it would seem to be very difficult to get your account cut.

I’m sure that many spammers will be happy to hear that.

What the Ratings Mean

A – A complete policy that goes well above and beyond what is required. Often shows real innovation.
B – A solid policy that is well-thought out and is very complete. Shows consideration for submitters and users.
C – An average policy, follows the law to the letter but doesn’t go out of its way to help those submitting a notice or its users.
D – A policy that, while mostly complete, still raises severe ethical and/or legal questions.
F – An incomplete policy that fails to follow the DMCA or local laws in a severe way.

Pluses or minuses are used to indicate how the where a host fits in relationship to other hosts in that that tier.

I recently ran across this link on the social news site Reddit. It is a submissions listing for the user “lecoq”, who has submitted hundreds of entries from various Blogspot Blogs. All of the entries that I checked contained content found first on other sites and all were surrounded by different ad units, usually from several different ad networks.

The end result is that these blogs appear to be nothing more than the traditional definition of spam. However, the list, which appeared on the front page of Reddit a few days ago, has not resulted in any removals by Google.

It does appear though, at this moment, that this is the work of a human and not of an automated scraper. There seems to only be about six spam blogs involved and they pull from a variety of sources.

Though this definitely does not follow the typical format for a spam blogger, it is worrisome that, even after all of the attention this list received, that almost none of the blogs have been shut down. It is obvious, given the submission pattern, that the intent here is to spam social news sites with copied content, and spam is a violation of Google’s Blogger Content TOS.

Hopefully, the offensive is ongoing and this is just a hiccup in the system, probably caused by the human element in the posting, and that Google will address it soon. In the meantime, I’m going to keep an eye on this list and see about contacting some of the content owners to alert them of the misuse.

I encourage others to do the same.

First, it became clear that the owners of FeedBurner were going to receive a $100 million payday. Second, it was clear that Google would receive access to a berth of statistics about RSS feeds not previously available to them. Finally, it was clear that Google was making yet another foray into the advertising market, buying up the the budding FeedBurner Advertising Network. 

However, many questions have gone unanswered. Though FeedBurner attempted to head off some of the questions with their FAQ on the subject, many of the more difficult questions remain. Will Google integrate FeedBurner into its analytics program? Will the FeedBurner ad network be integrated into Adsense? What new features will Google bring to FeedBurner?

However, possibly the toughest question is what impact, if any, will this merger have on feed scraping and spam blogging? With the largest search engine, largest ad network and most popular spam blog host merging with a company managing nearly 750,000 feeds, it seems only logical to expect at least some changes in how Google fights scraping and spam.

A Wealth of Knowledge

With millions of subscribers, hundreds of thousands of feeds and nearly half a million publishers, FeedBurner knows more about RSS feeds, who is subscribed to them and how they are being used than just about anyone else.

They already offer an uncommon uses feature that tracks non-conventional feed subscribers and offers a feed flare service that can help track feed use.

Google, by purchasing FeedBurner, will be gaining access to all of this knowledge. More than just an RSS platform, FeedBurner provides an bird’s eye view of RSS and, though Google is no stranger to hosting RSS feeds through its Blogspot service, FeedBurner analytics and broad range of users, almost all of which are non-spammers, brings a depth and breadth that Google has not had in this area.

If done correctly, this merger could be more than a strategic buyout, but also a marriage of the minds, combining Google’s dominance in search and advertising with FeedBurner’s knowledge of RSS. That marriage could, at least theoretically, prove very formidable when dealing with scraping and spamming.

A Tag Team

With the purchase of FeedBurner, Google will not only be indexing but hosting the feeds for hundreds of thousands of blogs, including many of the most popular. It will have the ability to know what sites and servers are accessing the feed, which of those are suspicious and where to find sites using feeds questionably.

At the simplest end, this can be used to bolster duplicate content detection. If a site scrapes a feed and republishes it, even if the use is permitted and the scraper is not a spam site, it is still duplicate content and needs to be indexed below the original work.

More advanced than that would be checking to see which sites and networks scrape a large number of feeds. By detecting hidden elements in the feed itself, something FeedBurner already does, Google can see which sites are scraping large amounts of content. From there, they can deindex the worst infringers or even cut the applicable Adsense account if appropriate.

Finally, if feed licensing terms can be better expressed, it might be possible for Google to use this information to automatically mark scrapers as spammers. Not only could they deny access to the feed, but also take action on eliminating the spam from their search engine as well as cut the hosting or advertising for the site if applicable.

The end result of all of this would be that FeedBurner would become more than just a way to track and monitor your feed, but also a means to claim your content and ensure that Google knows you are the original creator of the work, not the scraper that came along immediately after.

It’s a nice dream, but unfortunately it is most likely just a fantasy.

Puncturing the Dreams

The problem with this vision is that Google, already, has proved incapable of coordinating its spam fighting efforts across its different arms. Filing a DMCA notice to Blogspot will not result in any action being taken against the owner’s Adsense account, even if the site was clearly spam. Likewise, a notice to the search engine will have no effect on a Blogspot account and a notice against Adsense will have no effect on either the site or how it is indexed.

Google, it seems, is a true case of the right hand not knowing what the left one is doing.

This is frustrating as it requires legitimate Webmasters to double or triple efforts to ensure that a spam blog and the gains from it are entirely wiped out. It slows down the pace of spam fighting and makes stopping the practice of spam blogging, not just the splogs themselves, a more daunting task.

Since Google has thus far been unable to coordinate its efforts across three areas and there has been no clear push to remedy that, it seems unlikely that the addition of a fourth front will help this matter. Though I am hopeful that will be the case and can certainly see the potential, it doesn’t seem likely.

Still, this could be the opportunity that Google has been looking for to not just battle spam blogs, but to potentially get ahead of them.

Conclusions

Google has an incredible opportunity with the purchase of FeedBurner. More than just a potentially savvy business move, it’s the chance to do some real good and make some tremendous progress in the war on spam.

To do this would take a great deal of effort, likely cost a good sum of money and probably cost Google a significant portion of their revenue stream, however, it would make the Web much better place for all of us.

There is little doubt that Google’s purchase of FeedBurner will imbue them with a lot of new knowledge and lead to some interesting possibilities. What remains to be seen is how they use that knowledge.

Though all of this article is just conjecture and guesswork, it shows that the possibilities for this marriage are great. However, it will be up to Google to determine how this alignment is used and if the potential is squandered or not.

Let us hope that this will be a fruitful marriage, producing more than just extra lining for Google’s pockets…

The initial discussion about the closings centered around the practice of Adsense Arbitrage, buying cheap keywords through Adwords and promoting ads on higher-paying ones, but as more information has come to light, it appears that Google is instead targeting low-quality made for Adsense (MFA) sites.

If this move turns out to be true and effective, it would be great news for legitimate Webmasters, both those using Adsense and not. MFA sites tend to be some of the worst scrapers, using the text to target the ads that display on their site, and they also drive down the prices of ads across the network, meaning their departure could, theoretically, mean more money for legitimate Adsense users.

But as damaging as this likely is to spammers and scrapers, it likely won’t be a deathblow Sadly, the practice will live on and even Google doesn’t seem to be able to stop it.

What is Going On?

Over the past few days, several Adsense users have received letters saying that their account will be closed on June 1st. The letters inform them that they will be able to keep the money the have earned and will have their accounts paid out, but that they will no longer be able to use Adsense after that date.

Though Google’s non-disclosure agreement has prohibited much information from being leaked about the letters, the words “unfit business model” have been cited repeatedly as the reason for the deletion.

Initially, conversation focused on the idea of Adsense arbitrage. Arbitrage, which literally means “taking advantage of price differentials between two markets” usually, on Adsense, involves buying cheap keyword clicks through Adwords, often for a penny per click, and then running more valuable ads on the site. This can be done legitimately, by buying traffic for a blog or other site, or in a more underhanded way by buying traffic for a spam blog, an MFA site or another junk landing page.

By all accounts, Google’s letters seem to be targeted at the latter kind of arbitrage sites. These sites tend to be very spammy in nature, either containing no content, scraped feeds or computer generated text.

It would seem that this is a major blow to scrapers. With a large number of scrapers and spammers having their Adsense accounts closed down, there’s a lot of reason to celebrate. However, any celebration would be, to say the least, premature.

Shortcomings and Misgivings

Though it is great to see some of Adsense’s dirtiest players get their accounts closed, calling this a major victory against either spam or scraping is a major leap, there are several problems that prevent that optimistic prediction from coming true.

1. Focus on Arbitrage: Though the act of arbitrage itself is not the focus of this offensive, all of the people who have received letters seem to have been engaging in it. Since most scraping and spamming is done for search engine optimization purposes, it is unlikely that many of them are also buying traffic.
2. Availability of Other Networks: Adsense is not the only game in town by any stretch. There are many other ad networks that can pick up the slack. Some reportedly have higher payouts than Adsense.
3. The “Nice” Approach: Since it is debatable whether or not the sites did anything that directly violated Adsense’s TOS, Google has shown these sites the door in the nicest way possible,giving them plenty of warning and allowing them to keep all of their earnings. Not exactly a harsh punishment.
4. An Effective Surrender: Google has tried several times in the past to push these MFA sites out by changing their algorithm and making the practice unprofitable. Apparently, those methods failed. Though Google is doing the right thing by kicking these sites out of Adsense, it goes to show that the technique is profitable.
5. Maintenance: Though Google is doing a good thing right now and is removing some major Adsense users, it remains to be seen if they will be able to continue this new rule into the future. Entry into Adsense is notoriously easy and it is unlikely that they will be able to stop new MFA sites as they come in. Hopefully though, this closure will serve as a deterrent.

The end result of all of these closures, in the long run, will probably be more of the same. Though hopefully this is part of a new commitment from Google on this issue, it will have to be part of an ongoing offensive before it has any real effect.

Conclusions

Though I am very happy to see Google taking steps such as these, I’m going to remain skeptical of them until I see what Google does over the long haul. Google is a very dubious ally in the fight against scraping and spamming. They have given hosting to spammers through Blogspot, revene through Adsense and exposure through their search engine and Adwords. Their hand is, literally, in every element of the spammer’s business model.

The problem is that this is a one-time act targeted at a small group of individuals on just one front of an ongoing war. For this to have any lasting impact, Google is going to have to keep up and broaden the pressure. They have been hesitant to do so up to this point and I see little reason to think of this as a major change.

What this is, in view of the larger picture, is a good first step. If it truly is just a first step, then it could easily grow into something wonderful. However, by itself, it is barely a dent in the armor of the spammers and scrapers.

Only Google can decide what good will come of this and that will be determined by their commitment to fight spammers, wherever they might be, and their willingness to make sacrifices to help clean up the Web.

This might be the ultimate test of their “Don’t Be Evil” slogan. Hopefully they can pass it.