March 7, 2008

Protect Yourself from Plagiarism ©

Lately you may have noticed I've been changing up the blog again. Widening the margins, playing with html, adding an index. Hey, it's a woman's prerogative.

One of the latest things I found hopping around to different blogs is Copyscape. Copyscape is a plagiarism deterrent tool. I saw the badge clicked it and checked it out because I'm just curious that way.

Notice the © symbol next to the title? The html for it is & copy ; of course the spaces have to be removed between the &, copy and ; for it to work for you.

You may have also noticed the pink banner and the little badge:

Page copy protected against web site content infringement by Copyscape

Now for the badges, banners, and a variety of choices for your blog, go to COPYSCAPE to get your code. The basic stuff is free, you know how cheap I am. With the free service you get 10 lookups for your pages per month. For unlimited lookup service you must pay.

For Blogger users, once you pick your individual page badge, copy it and go to "Customize." Click the "Settings" tab. Hit "Formatting" and scroll down to "Post Template" and paste the code you picked up at Copyscape there. Remember to save your changes.

Now every time you go to create a new post you will see the badge in your blogger editor. You can keep it at the top of your post or hard return it to have it on the bottom.

You may also want a banner for your main blog page as I did. For inserting one there, go to the "Layout" tab and select "Add a page element." Select the "HTML/Java Script" and paste your selected banner code there. You can keep the banner on the side, on top or bottom of your posts.

Using Copyscape is easy. You just copy the address for your blog page from the URL and paste it in the block on the main page at Copyscape. Hit search and you will see if your page has been copied anywhere. You can then check the page to see if there is a link back to you for credit.

Pretty useful tool and a good deterrent against plagiarism.

As the Internet grows it is important that we protect our work. Would you leave your house without locking the door? You should consider your efforts here the same as you do your home and protect them.

8 comments:

  1. Good point, muse and a good idea to value your own writing.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Looks like an interesting concept. Will it work if someone copies the work and pastes it into a new document, say as text?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Yes Conda, it is.

    Max, as far as I've seen so far, and what other's have said about it, you can see what's been copied from you. For me, I'm only just starting on this. I can only say that the badge would be a deterrent. And let's say the badge would be a big deterrent. Would you want to copy from someone who had one. I would think, hmmmm, how far have these guys gone with this.

    I do know of a 'do not copy' html that I have not yet been able to install here. Something Blogger has blocked for whatever reason. Of course, as with everything, there are ways around it. Once I figure it out, I will share.

    For now, let's say if you have a particular page you want to protect, you can use this.

    Take Care!

    ReplyDelete
  4. I tried the html again and it will not work...It's Java script, perhaps that's why. So I'm going to look around, Max got me thinking. You can c&p at will and use the information outside of the Internet. If that could be blocked in addition to using the badge, then whose going to take the time to mess with it.

    I discovered another downside of the html, if you highlight it, and do ctrl c, you can copy. The only thing it prevents is right click copying. What the heck good is that?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Great post. I went to Copyscape and grabbed a chunk of code and slipped it into my sidebar.

    So you've been working on your site. You know, I use an iMac, and your page shows up with a light green background, a little bit darker green for the writing, and then for the sidebar text you use white against a light green background. I have to keep the room dark to read your pages. How do they show up on a PC?

    Have a nice one.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Hey Swu, I did not know that. I can see it just fine. It is light green with a dark green, but the colors look okay to me. I'll change that today...I really only did that for St. Patty's day and that's almost here. So it can go, go, go...

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  7. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  8. Hi, Muse - thanks for the info. I actually want people to be able to copy and paste my stuff, because I'm hoping they'll quote my work and link back to me. But I can certainly see the benefit of checking to see if they indeed did link back to my site(s).

    ReplyDelete

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