If you got a chance to visit SocialMarketingExpert.org late yesterday (8-27-08.) you would’ve seen articles posted by Chales Heflin, noted SEO2020 brainiac. Boy I blew it — I accidentally did a Joe Biden!
I have read Charles’ writing for a few years and bought his The Master Plan ebook when it first came out. I appreciated (and still do) his no nonsense approach to SEO. In the deep sea of hyping ‘guru’s” out there, it’s nice to hear a still calm voice in the IM world…mine being Charles.
It’s refreshing to know that I’m not going to get the latest product launch offering from Charles when I see his latest email or read his current posts.
So what happened you ask? Well we installed a piece of software recently to assist with the content management between all the websites we run (currently over 89.) This little piece of software probably caused me more heartache and pain within the short time of its installation than what I have experienced in 9 years of being online.
What did it do? Well, this little piece of x’s and o’s did, along with the energetic enthusiasm of an assistant, grabbed the RSS feed from Charles site and then posted the article on ours. It showed him as the author, but it was still done without the explicit permission of Charles.
When I arrived at the office today I was greeted with a few emails from Charles, who wisely monitors his name and articles. It told what had happened and advised me in not so many words what else would happen if the situation was not corrected.
My reaction? After yanking my tongue back up through my throat, I logged into the server and deleted the articles. After assessing what the situation might be I realized that others might find themselves accidentally in this type of situation…so here’s a quick guide on what you should do.
1) Immediately take down the offending content. If you can not do so immediately, at least send an email informing the content’s originator of when you will, and what happened to cause this snafu.
2) The next step you’re already doing…send them an email with an apology (should be real) and a short explanation as to what happened.
3) Maybe make a phone call to follow that up. If the person of the original content was attending a seminar, saw the articles, shot you off a Cease and Desist email, then went back to the seminar, they might just sit there stewing over the incident. A simple phone call with the apology and information update might calm their fears and anxieties.
4) Contact your ISP. If they happen to file a complaint with your ISP – like file a DMCA request — then make your ISP aware of what happened and the corrected actions. They are legally required to do something and better to give them the head’s up on the incoming complaint than wait for them to send you out one of their nasty form emails threatening digital castration.
5) Look at your software and make sure the settings are correct. Lord knows business is tough enough without having to take the time and hassle of software gone wild.
I did all 5 of the above stated steps and hope that “forgiveness” is the Word of the Day on Charles calendar. Although mine was an innocent mistake, unlike Joe Biden, I do not want my name associated with plagiarism, copying over someone’s shoulder, or for that fact staring to long at a pretty girl. All are pretty creepy.
