The Ugly Side of Bead Blogging
Cute, isn’t she? She looks like a nice young woman who probably loves jewelry. Maybe she even makes beaded jewelry too. But, unfortunately, she is not as pretty and innocent as she seems. In fact, it’s hard to say if she is really a “she” at all.
Why the suspicion? Because when I found her blog through Technorati, I also discovered loads and loads of my own posts from this site, and I’m not talking about linking to a section of my content or commenting about how she might feel the same way or like a pair of earrings I made. I’m talking about lifting it word for word.
After further looking at this blog (called My Jewelry Weblog, but I won’t give him/her/it the honor of a link), I notice there is no name for this girl pictured, no email, no way to really comment because the comments are not working correctly. So, what else am I supposed to think other than that in actuality, this is really a splog, not a blog at all, created probably by some fat man who smells like sausage and has crumbs from yesterday’s egg McMuffin stuck in his nasty long unkempt beard. He doesn’t like jewelry at all, but he does like to steal my ideas and those of many other wonderful bead and jewelry bloggers so that he can make money off of the ads on his pathetic excuse for a blog.
Now, Mr. Sausage Man is not the first or the last to do this, but he is representative of the ugly side of bead blogging, of all blogging really. While the whole idea behind blogging is sharing, community, and cooperation, people like this prefer to use our creative energy and ideas for their own gain.
So, what can we do about sploggers like Mr. Sausage Man? Other than email and ask them to leave us alone, there isn’t much. RSS feeds have a double edge to them it seems. They can be used to bring people to your blog (and, please, always be kind enough to click on a link if you read an article through one of these) or it can provide a way for Mr. S&M to take advantage of you.
So, I declare here and now, that Mr. S&M is not one of us. He is not a member of the blogosphere. He can’t even write is own thoughts down, so must rely on auto feeds to steal the ideas of others.
Have you also found yourself splogged before? If so, what have you done about it? Vent here now.
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POSTED IN: Wearable Art
11 opinions for The Ugly Side of Bead Blogging
William Lehman
May 8, 2007 at 3:08 pm
Yeah it’s frustrating. Almost as frustrating as comment spammmers. Because in this particular instance links are generated back to you, there isn’t much you can do. Write a post declaring her a fraud which ends up aggregated on her site…lol Nice touch. Sometimes you just have to grin and bear it. Yes, that stinks I know. Other times, a simple email does the trick. Either way, I hate dealing with things like this though it’s probably right up there with weeding out the real posts from the akismet spam cache.
Tammy
May 8, 2007 at 3:21 pm
Yup, exactly. I’m so hoping this shows up on her splog. I almost thought of giving it a title like, “Why This Blog Sucks,” but I had to restrain myself :)
Cyndi L
May 8, 2007 at 4:25 pm
Been splogged? Yup, by “her” among others! I’ve left comments on this particular blog, asking that she at least get the link right if she’s going to scoop my content. No response.
No surprise.
When it’s a blogger.com blog, I flag it. That’s probably about all you can do.
Tammy Powley
May 8, 2007 at 6:51 pm
Other than call them out like I just did and don’t plan to do for everyone - that would be like posting about it every day - yup, nothing to do but get mad. Bad bead karma on them all!
Filipina Soul » How to make bloggers hate you
May 10, 2007 at 1:12 am
[…] site. It’s a fast way to earn some buck without the work. What can the blogger do? Take this case, for example. Would you email the splogger if there’s no real address? Will you link to that […]
alicia
May 10, 2007 at 6:48 am
Eek! I don’t think I’ve been splogged, but I’ve never really looked, either. Maybe I shouldn’t, it will only enrage me.
alicia
May 10, 2007 at 6:49 am
P.S. Heard of this site? http://www.splogreporter.com/
Tammy
May 10, 2007 at 7:32 am
It is probably best not to know. This particular slogger is still stealing my posts, though of course not this one. So, he’s very aware of what he is doing and is doing it on purpose, not just automatically pulling things from feeds without looking at them.
Anne Wayman
May 11, 2007 at 11:36 am
Splogging! Is that what you call it? I didn’t know the term, but I sure recognize the problem… I simply don’t have time to deal with it often… so I ignore them… I suspect some of it just trying to get paid for google adwords… sigh.
Anne
http://www.thegoldenpencil.com which gets splogged.
Cyndi L
May 12, 2007 at 9:01 am
Alicia, the splogreporter site is still up, but it’s not being monitored any more. They’re looking for someone to take it over. Bummer…
alicia
May 12, 2007 at 12:25 pm
Ah, man :( Well, thanks for the heads up on that. I found this site (http://www.splogspot.com/) when I posted about splogs over at WritingSpark.com, but to be truthful I’m not quite sure how it works.
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