what if i copy an article or content from another site. and paste it in my site, along with thier site name in the bottom of the article. is that illegal or any problems with it ? & how far will it effect my site ranking and other things.
eg:
article 1 …blah blah blah
source : ezine
article 2 …blah blah blah
source :articlestar
etc…
Hello Mr ms market
It is not legal copying content from others site without the permission of owner.And off course it will effect the ranking of site.
<snip/>
It’s interesting that the blah, blah examples you quote may be fine in terms of copyright infringement. Remember that ezine and similar article directories actively encourage the reprinting of articles from their sites provided the terms and conditions are followed and the bio with links remains intact.
As others have said, though, this doesn’t mean you can get away with not doing your homework or nicking content willy nilly.
There is a query on Google’s support regarding this matter without any answers: http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Web+Search/thread?tid=3734996837f96e4a&hl=en
Now, i came up to a question if article directories is consider a spam, since ou have to submit the publish content in them?
There is a very simple solution to this sort of question - ask the copyright owner for permission.
If you have permission to use it then it can’t be a breach of copyright. Just by asking and getting permission you can avoid the entire issue. The only reason fair use provisions exist is that it is impractical for those producing newspapers, magazines, training material etc to track down and ask several hundred people if they can have permission to copy a sentence or two from their work.
Usually if you don’t know if copying something will breach copyright there is a 99.99999% chance that it will be.
all in the name of the almighty seo
isn’t there anything we can do to prune the threads that are ~obviously~ intended to pollute the web with garbage?
i realize that there is a (small) portion of seo that deserves discussion, but i would like to see threads like “where are the do-follow health forums” deleted… with extreme prejudice
Oh Steven… your last line is so much to the point I would have liked to make. Why even bring up about fair use? (I know you didn’t). This question has been asked and answered in this forum at least a dozen times.
Although most western nations are in accord with the Berne convention, it is my belief that, unfortunately, those who ask “how much can I use” have no intention of following the law of any country. They may just as well ask, “How much can I steal before I get into trouble.”
I’ve yet to see a post that specifically asks about “commentary, criticism, news reporting, and scholarly reports”, just as I see few posts about how to give attribution to the author and fewer about how to contact the author of a work and ask for permission to use it or a passage from it.
As D’Crux said, it’s all about “writing avoidance”, IMO, from a bunch of lazy, unskilled hacks that want to fill up the Internet with rehashed, copy/paste, day-old, already-been-chewed writing.
So why even HINT that they can get away with it? Just say “NO” to plagiarists and to those who aren’t – be specific in your posts if you don’t want to be branded a thief.
Last night I was looking for a recipe for chili dog sauce and I found six of them at very popular recipe sites. Funny, though – every single one was exactly (to the letter) the same as the next.
To the op: Why don’t you go look at the terms and conditions of use at the original site? They are often different depending on who owns or manages the domain. How on Earth could anyone here know all of them?
Where is the law stating every third post has to be about writing avoidance.
It must be there.
Australian law dictates a maximum of 10% or one chapter (if it is broken into more than ten chapters) and then only where the person works in an industry where they can be expected to need to copy that much. Most people would have a difficult time justifying a copy of anywhere near that much.
The laws differ between countries. There are even some countries that don’t have copyright laws.
The law that will be applied will be that of the country where the copyright holder takes you to court for breach of copyright.
oh ic cool. thank ya guyz for ya reply . thank u
Any copying without the permission of the owner is illegal. The only exception is if you are a teacher or journalist and then you are allowed to copy a small fraction of the material (generally under 10%) under fair use.
It’s not legal without getting permission, and it may affect ranking badly, as Google (from what I understand) tends to ignore duplicate content.
This is tiring 
How much of someone else’s work can I use without getting permission?
Under the fair use doctrine of the U.S. copyright statute, it is permissible to use limited portions of a work including quotes, for purposes such as commentary, criticism, news reporting, and scholarly reports. There are no legal rules permitting the use of a specific number of words, a certain number of musical notes, or percentage of a work. Whether a particular use qualifies as fair use depends on all the circumstances.
Yes but only a sentence or two at most (and even then you have to be able to justify it). You can’t get away with anywhere near the 10% that those in appropriate jobs can
Actually, you don’t have to be a teacher or journalist, you can copy a small amount for fair use no matter your status. But the amount which qualifies as legal is very much a grey area. It’s not worth swiping other peoples content, even giving them credit doesn’t make up for the fact it’s copyright theft plain and simple. 