Stolen Tutorials

I created a site with photoshop/illustrator tutorials not too long ago. They are all original and were made by me. However, there is a user on Google's Blogger service that copied mine and other's original tutorials. There is no contact info on the site that stole the tutorials. The Google Blogger TOS says I have to send them a fax prepared by a legal specialist concerning copyright infringement. The site is obviously a rip-off site. I don't have money for a lawyer right now. Do you think there's anything else I can do? It's very frustrating to see someone else getting my traffic when I worked very long on the tutorials/screenshots.

 

Well I am not sure what you could do legal matter wise but why not watermark your images or something in the tutorial? So everyone that views the copyright's site sees your URL in the bottom of the image or something like that. He would probably stop copying quickly.

 

If he hotlinks to your images, have a little fun with him(like replace the images).

 

Good idea michael but instead make it videos... disturbing videos lol!

 

I just realized he does, what a great idea!

 

Thanks! Glad you like the idea.

 

I don't want to be unprofessional and put something obscene so I just made an image linking everyone to my site. Hope it will work.

 

Forget that--just because the TOS says you need a "legal specialist" that doesn't mean you need to do it. The DMCA contains absolutely no provision whatsoever that a copyright infringment notification letter needs to be from a lawyer. Read my DMCA article and then at the bottom is a link to a sample "DMCA Copyright Infringement Notice to Service Provider." There is also, in my article, a link to the copyright office's list of designated agents--you sent the infringement notice to the agent." My site has articles that are stolen all the time, so i send out a batch of these notices monthly. I am 99% sure this will work.

The DMCA primer is here and there's a link to the article there too...

 

Who do I send it to, Google Blogger ?

 

You can send it to them. Getting contact information for anything Google can be hard sometimes though. The best place to send it would be the Google's agent for DMCA notices.

One alternative would be to send a cease and desist to the owner of the blog. He might take down the stuff faster than Google would.

Can you post the URL of the blog here?