They say mimicry is the most sincere form of flattery. See behind each cloud there really is a silver lining (sounds good in theory...reality seems to indicate otherwise)
Yes, we are actively pursuing takedown of these folks now. We are going through the normal procedure which often takes about 30 days.
That's not a bad idea Freewebspace, but if he gets banned and ever finds out you suggested it he might try and have the same revenge on you. I think an email to him requesting he removes the site is probably the first line of attack. Also keep a screenshot/saved pages of the offending site in case follow-up action is required.
There are not any ways they can grab the directory, but it is very simple to mirror a site using php. I would suggest the site owners themselves also send DMCA notice to the host and the registrar, so that we can put more pressure on taking them down.
I think thats why everyone should create their own template or at least have a unique template or script that no one could just steal...
You can try DMCA, but I would have thought this was more of a trademark infringement issue? I mean, the template and the script are both freely available, and the links and category structure are not duplicated, as far as I can tell. It's mainly the fact that the name has been stolen. It's crappy behaviour, but I think it's more a case of passing off than copyright infringement.
I have seen sites taken down for less. I'm hoping you will see we can be successful in this case. I will try to remember to report back. (If they were in the US or Europe it would be a lot faster)
Yeah click fraud sounds like fun...lets all steal from adwords advertisers to get back at some stupid no traffic directory, what an idiot
One of the first steps should be to file a DMCA notice with Google AdSense. Digital Millennium Copyright Act - Google AdSense It is our policy to respond to clear notices of alleged copyright infringement. This page describes the information that should be present in these notices. It is designed to make submitting notices of alleged infringement to Google as straightforward as possible while reducing the number of notices that we receive that are fraudulent or difficult to understand or verify. The form of notice specified below is consistent with the form suggested by the United States Digital Millennium Copyright Act (the text of which can be found at the U.S. Copyright Office Web Site, http://www.copyright.gov) but we will respond to notices of this form from other jurisdictions as well. Regardless of whether we may be liable for such infringement under local country law or United States law, our response to these notices may include removing or disabling access to material claimed to be the subject of infringing activity and/or terminating subscribers. If we remove or disable access in response to such a notice, we will make a good-faith attempt to contact the owner or administrator of the affected site or content so that they may make a counter notification. We may also document notices of alleged infringement on which we act. As with all legal notices, a copy of the notice may be sent to one or more third parties who may make it available to the public.
I just noticed he put back the link of www.phplinkdirectory.com and www.phpldyoursite.com at redlavadirectory.com.ar, I think the southern american dudey got scared of that thread lol T_T, terrible... I think we all need each other to fix things. Here it's a global issue but in case that people doesn't use properly the templates of Creed, Vegabond, Me, Coolweb, Jeff, Chris and others that do phpld templates , we should all together kick their ass !!
These are great suggestions, and I hope people will even PM each other and work together to stop these people. We can do it, and note phpLD has already sent out documents by fax and email to get the process going.
This is sad. Same thing happened to me during the summer when someone ripped the design of one of my directories. Thankfully, the guy removed the design. Hope you get this solved.