If you have been in content producing market for some time, you have had heard about plagiarism. Plagiarism, this word seemingly funny- sounding word, is in fact illegal. The accused can be sued in federal court for copyright violations. Therefore, it is essential for content producers to understand the gravity of the offense and its consequences.
So what is plagiarism?
Before we can go on to talking about whether or not plagiarized content is beneficial for your website, we should first clarify what qualifies as plagiarism. In general, plagiarism refers to copying or stealing someone’s ideas, thoughts or expressions and presenting them as your own. It is a serious offense amongst academics. However, web content plagiarism is when one article is similar in format, sentence structure and ideas to another article already published online.
Plagiarism is copying someone words, thoughts, ideas without any authorization and representation of that work as your own work. But, one tries to write down content, and searches on Google, most of the website, top-ranked, got the same ideas in different words. Why Google does not punish these websites, as they all are copying the idea of someone. I want to clear one thing, write down the general idea in your own words, without copying the same words do not fall into plagiarized content.
Is plagiarized content good for your website?
Well, mainly not. Initially, spun or copied content can bring your some viewership. However, these perks don’t last long if caught. You can be sued for copying content from another website. Your website can be brought down. Also Google does not like plagiarized content on your website.
Then how can you avoid plagiarism?
If you are writing for your website by yourself, don’t copy paste in the first place. Search online about the consequences of content plagiarism. Make the informed decision of not copy pasting. It is important to understand that not only word to word copy pasting, but even articles with similar structure can be counted as plagiarized. This is called article spinning. If you are looking for ideas to write about on a topic, try not to copy whole ideas and don’t follow the same sequence either.
If someone else is working for you, make sure that the content they provide you with goes through the process of proper plagiarism check. It is important that you do this because the consequences are usually born by the website owner. Buying a highly recommended plagiarism checker is a good idea. Grammarly is one of them. If not, there are many other online plagiarism checkers that can you use for free. But just make sure the content is checked.
A lot of times it is not you who copies the content, but others. What happens is that if you are a highly viewed and ranked website, often your content will be copied. In this situation, it is your job to keep an eye on who is copying your content. Prepostseo is one website you can use for this purpose. All you need to do is put your page URL and the website will tell you if there are other pages online that have duplicated your content. Report such pages regularly.
