Beware Copycats, Plagiarism and "Spun" Comments.
I have seen duplicate comments in Site Comments where someone copies a comment on my site, adds a few more sentances and pastes it onto Site Comments. Now I am seeing this in organic comments as well. I always dissaprove these and explain, plagiarism is not allowed! I never know if it is the same person with multiple names or the second person is copying the first. I try to keep the first one and trash the second.
Hopefully these organic copycats have nothing to do with WA or Site Comments. I had a comment from a man who was trying to get a backlink. He wrote a long comment and ended by explaining how the product he was promoting was the solution (why would I approve his comment with a link to his site for a competing product on my post???). I was nice however and edited out his link and approved it. Then I got another comment from a different person (or the same one using a different name) that had altered wording but was clearly copied and had the same link.
"Spinning" Content
As several members here have pointed out, this is "spun" content. There are programs that will automatically change words for this very purpose. It is called "spinning" content. It used to be accepted but is not anymore.
Just For Laughs I Will Show You Their Comments
Just for laughs I will paste some of these comments line by line here so you can see how they compare. I have deleted these comments from my site. (I never approved the second one anyway). The words are mostly identical except for the pairs of words I have bolded below where a word was changed in the second comment. I alternated italisizing them so you can clearly see the pairs of words.
How cheap and spammy!!! I hate this sort of thing. The product they are promoting is a product listed in the Affiliate programs here on WA but I like to think this is just coincidence...
"One of my 2 cats (both neutered males) had taken to painting all of my walls, furniture, and anything else he could reach. I was horrified when I got a UV light. He never did that in all of the 9 years I’ve had him and didn’t when I got him a buddy (they love each other and did so right away) but when a strange black cat started showing up outside both of my cats went nuts..."
"One of my 2 felines (both neutered guys) had taken to painting the majority of my dividers, furniture, and whatever else he could reach. I was sickened when I got an UV light. He never did that in the majority of the 9 years I’ve had him and didn’t when I got him an amigo (they cherish one another and did so immediately) however when an unusual dark feline fired appearing outside both of my felines went crazy..."
Plagiarism is Not Allowed!
This is the sort of thing teachers and professors look for in course papers where a student clearly copies something but changes some words and claims it is their own work. This is NOT allowed in acadamia and is questionable in online business.
Don't do it and don't allow it on your sites.
The duplicate comments in Site Comments were even worse (hard to believe) and didn't even bother changing most of the words. They would just tack extra sentances onto the beginning or end.
A warning to people practicing this: If you are spamming this way by copying others or duplicating your own comments I will delete everything and not approve any part of your comment. You certainly aren't getting a backlink from my site!
Jessica
Recent Comments
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Are people so lazy and/or careless that they can’t spare a few minutes to write something sincere and original? One minute tops to write a short comment. Thank you for the warning.
Yes, people are lazy...I think they don't care about the topic so they don't have anything to say about it. They just pick a topic and start "spinning" content.
Good way to handle it, and thank you for sharing so we can all be aware of it on our sites.
Janelle
Great catch, Jessica.
You know, several years ago when the internet was still in it's Wild West days, there was software you could get that would "write" articles for you by scouring what was out there, running it through a thesaurus, and spitting out a finished -- albeit heavily plagiarized -- result. I haven't seen them in a while, but this almost seems like that is what you have here. At least it reads like those old "articles" did. Either way, it's a pretty lazy and sad way to go.
As much as we place importance on them, to be honest I've been thinking lately about experimenting with a site that doesn't allow comments at all in order to avoid all such nonsense. It'll be interesting to see if it makes a difference is actual traffic numbers.
Hang in there... they can try to steal your site, but they can't steal your heart :-)
These programs are called Spinners ... they are still out there and you can buy the program and use this to create these plagiarized articles ... I have discovered some famous network marketers posting content that is obviously been spun. Often the adjectives are misplaced or out of context or simply don't make sense ... many of the "gurus" use so-called copywriters ... if they are not careful and monitoring these people sometimes use these spinners to create content and then edit it ... still plagiarized though!
Yes, I could not remember the word was "spun" or "spinning" when I was writing this. Thanks!
Dam Gosh!
So time consuming stuff huh. I get spammed all the time from blimmin spellcaster pain in te wringer peeps..
Those comments look like a lazy spin rewrite.
Its great your onto it Jessica.
Cheers Rob
I wasn't aware that this was so prevalent. Thanks for bringing it to my attention. I enjoyed reading the two versions. Very naughty and do they really think you won't notice. 🤔
Lily 😊
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It definitely looks spun, or copied. Good to catch it, first of all. I sometimes worry about not catching them, after there are so many that I can't remember each one. Easy when they come through together or close together. At least we can spam, and hopefully if anyone reading this post did not know this is NOT okay, they do now.
Yes...these happened to be close together and I only copied a small part. They were very long and had the same link at the very end.