Thread

I’ve just discovered that my website, bluecherryzing.com, has been completely ripped off by someone else. My graphics, html/css code, layout, logo… basically the entire site has been (rather poorly) duplicated! This company has even gone so far as to hotlink to my images, so they’re also hijacking my bandwidth.

There is currently no contact information on their site - it actually looks half-finished - so I found the owner of the domain name through a whois search. I have written to him asking that he either remove my material or compensate me for its use, and I’ve also blogged about it. I’ve threatened further action, but I’m really hoping it won’t come to that.

Has anyone here had a similar experience with copyright theft? If so, how was it resolved? I’m quite new to web design and have never encountered anything like this personally. If anyone has any advice or suggestions, I’m all ears.

Try contacting their hosting company (Netfirms) and ask them to take the site off line.

Try contacting their hosting company (Netfirms) and ask them to take the site off line.

Hi Efraín! I’ve told them I’ll do that if they don’t remove my material in the next 5 days. I feel I should give them a chance to remove it themselves first.

Fiona

Hotlinking, you say? Here’s one guy’s story of revenge.

Hotlinking, you say? Here’s one guy’s story of revenge.

:lol:

Wow that’s fairly bad alright. Their hosting will have to remove it and it’s not even working properly. Very strange on their behalf. They are stealing a very nice design I have to say!

Not sure how helpful this rant is but it is to the point: Airbag

And you should post it here: Pirated Sites

I would give 24 hours, not 5 days.  It’s not like taking a site down is labor intensive.  Just my personal opinion with no consideration of legal basis.

I agree - 24 hours maximum. This happens way to often. Let me know if you uncover an email address - I’d like to give them a piece of my mind.

That is a beautiful design!  If your using cPanel you can enable the hotlinking protection. That still doesn’t stop anyone from stealing the graphics but it will help a bit.

I would give 24 hours, not 5 days.  It’s not like taking a site down is labor intensive.  Just my personal opinion with no consideration of legal basis.

I agree with Derek… you are being to nice with them.

Thanks for all the advice! After reading people’s comments, I think I am being too lenient by giving them 5 days to take it down - 24-48 hours would have been reasonable. But since I’ve already told them 5 days then I’ll allow them that. My next step, if it hasn’t been removed, will be to contact their hosting company and notify them of the violation.

That is a beautiful design!  If your using cPanel you can enable the hotlinking protection. That still doesn’t stop anyone from stealing the graphics but it will help a bit.

Thanks so much for pointing this out! I am using cPanel and had no idea I could do this. It looks like I can allow hotlinking on a per-domain basis too, which is handy as I often need to be able to hotlink to my images from MySpace, etc.

My next step, if it hasn’t been removed, will be to contact their hosting company and notify them of the violation.

There’s no reason (moral, legal [I am not a lawyer!], or otherwise) to wait to contact the hosting company. Contact them now and get this taken care of. You’ve given the deed-doers 5 days to voluntarily take down the offending content. Fine. Their host, on the other hand, is under no obligation to be so generous. Inform the host of the violation and insist that the copyrighted content be removed “immediately”. Skip any threats of legal action or that sort of thing; it’s not necessary to appear combative. Just keep your letter short and firm. But do it today.

Not legal advice in any way, just a helpful link, but a DMCA take down request will get the hosting providers attention a bit faster if properly filled out:

DMCA Information

Edit: This of course only applies if the web hosting company is located within the US, other countries may have similar regulations/guidelines, so your mileage may vary.

Best of luck with this. And for the record your design is really cool, and the Whooray Records site is a beaut!

Considering it’s now the 27th, and their site is still up, where do you stand so far?  Mr. Wilson had the best advice as well.