I like stories and movies where there is a really good guy/gal and then there’s the ‘dark side‘. Oh, is that phrase copy-righted? Can I use it without citing someone? Do I need permission from whoever wrote it in Hollywood to use it? I’m a little sensitive about the topic of sourcing right now.
Will I be accused of plagiarism or ‘scraping’? I’ll get into that later.
I guess, at the age of sixty-eight I’m still a little naive about some things in the world (actually, could be a lot of things). Like thinking that out there in the real world there’s no true ‘dark side’. It just exists in the minds of those movie types in Hollywood. Right? Right.
Until my website got hacked a number of times. It’s still happening. It’s affecting a lot of what I do, and want to do on this site. Then it dawned on me. When it comes to the cyber world there is a truly dark side. It’s a world where bad people do evil things to your material without ever having to face you or an adversary.
Material for this post was generated when I wanted to monetize my site. That’s right. Run a few ads and make a few bucks to cover my costs. Should be no big deal. Right? Right.
While in the process of attempting to monetize this site, I was accused of two nasty things:
Plagiarism and Making Stuff Up
In my world, either when I publish an article in a journal or post a story, those are pretty nasty accusations.
A Few Ethical Issues With Blogging
The use and publication of other peoples’ or organizations’ material is a serious matter. If you look at the literature written about the code of ethics for bloggers, it states you should always cite your sources or get permission to use the material you post. It’s almost impossible not to use other peoples’ information. It’s essential when writing that the topic being written about be given some context. And context often means citing other people who have researched or written on the topic previously. And, it’s not always simple to cite them properly.
If I use the following quote from the Hudson’s Bay Archives (HBCA), for example, I should credit them for it. Like this:
April 6th, 1822. “The advantages of this place are very few over any other except it is that ground is tilled for our gardens and being a critical place for the Natives to bring their find.” (HBCA B.224/e/1)
There. As far as I’m concerned that’s done. In academia when we use other peoples’ material, or historic material, to either support, refute, or move our research or story along, we simply cite them and that’s the end of it.
If it’s a historic painting, or quote, and you know the source, cite or credit the source and move on. I always try to do that in my posts. Sometimes I forget, but rarely. Sometimes sourcing stuff is really hard. There are grey areas.
As an author who has published considerably, I’m always flattered when someone uses my material and cites me (unless of course, they trash me). Actually I get more pissed off when they don’t cite my work when I think they should.
This brings me to my little problem. I’ll let you be the judge. Guilty or not? It all comes down to my credibility as a blogger, and how I present my material. Maybe I have to be more careful or thorough when posting in the future.
So I Wanted to Monetize My Site
The trouble all started the other day when I wanted to install a monetizing plugin called ‘Google Adsense.’ This program searches for relevant advertising for my web site and then puts those ads on my pages or posts.
The catch with Adsense is you have to qualify to install it on your website. So, I applied and was rejected. Twice. The first time early on in my blogging days for not having enough site content. Fair enough. One post won’t do it. Fixed that.
The second time recently I was accused of plagiarizing and not backing up my facts. Or ‘making stuff up’, as one reviewer commented. After trying to find out what the source of this accusation was all about, I finally got some of the following comments from Google’s ‘experts’.
Here’s what one so-called gold product expert (according to Google) had to say about my website:
” Corona virus infection has lost millions of lives in the world” I won’t be accepted. You are copying a lot of news reports (and images) from other sites and/or just making stuff up.”
“Hi heinz pyszczyk,
A reply was marked as a recommended answer to a subscribed question:
Your posts are far too short to be usable by Adsense, and you cannot have ANY copied stuff if you want to monetise a site.
As for making things up – the quote above is untrue. The current corona virus hasn’t lost millions of lives. Hopefully it won’t. I didn’t see that particular quote, but I saw one very short post giving figures that were mostly wrong. The post said (if the translation system is correct) that some countries n Europe had more than 90,000 deaths. Not true. It said that 5 million people have recovered. Where did you get that from?? Although it’s likely that large numbers have recovered without ever being tested, there is no reliable information. Of those tested and quoted on the worldometers site, which is probably the most reliable for information, around 560,000 have recovered.”
Well, folks, as most of you know, I’ve never written a word about the corona virus on any of my website posts. And my posts are too short? Are you kidding me? Too long, if anything. And I don’t support my information? Really?
Yet, Kukana (above), whoever the hell she is, judges my website as being unreliable, citing this shit. Kukana, if you understand English, which I doubt very much you do, then listen carefully. Please go to my website and actually read the content before making stupid statements like this. If you even exist.
Here’s another one. From busterjet. Now, I’m new to this stuff, so his comments were a bit of an eyeopener:
“Hi heinz pyszczyk,
A reply was marked as a recommended answer to a subscribed question:
You have a “new scraper” site, a common form of spam, so there is no chance AdSense advertisers will sponsor this content even if the information is factual.”
But, the corona virus stuff is not my information. I didn’t write it. A ‘new scraper’ site? What is that exactly? Is he suggesting I’m the ‘scraper’? After talking to my computer people, it’s likely that I’ve been hacked. Someone’s doing shitty little stuff using my website name. Thanks busterjet.
In the cyber business this stuff happens. More people from the ‘dark side‘ (sorry, don’t know who to cite here for use of this phrase) are visiting my site, than actual readers. But what gets me is that Google and their so-called experts judge my site, never having read my content. How could they have? Not a post or word ever about the corona virus is on my website.
And now I’m probably on their permanent shit list. After this post, probably forever. You’ve read many of my posts. Anything on corona virus? Is this fair? I’m thinking Kukana is probably some kind of ‘foreign’ bot. Or, someone’s ‘making this stuff up’.
Based on these statements, as it stands that’s what I’m accused of. Plagiarizing and ‘making stuff up’. At least in Google’s eyes.
The most frustrating thing is, you can’t engage these experts long enough to get to the bottom of this pile. They’re like phantoms. Here now, and then gone mysteriously into the Ethernet. I’ve emailed them back requesting more information, but nothing. It’s all so automated and impersonal. Sickening.
I hope you’re listening Google. How can you not be? You snoop into everything else on line. If I started showing interest in crocheting, suddenly a lot of articles and advertisements would pop up on the computer about crocheting. And you judge others about ethics? Your little bots are running around right now watching my every key stroke.
And to you my readers, sorry (a very Canadian response). Maybe not quite the Canadian story you expected, but a very Canadian reaction!
Yours Truly Pissed Off,
Heinz W. Pyszczyk
STAY SAFE (Even you Kukana)
Heinz, if you search for “CanEHdian Stories” mostly your material comes up but also an entry on a site called Slashdot dated last July. I did not open it lest it contain malware but there were references to James Bond fighting robot sharks in New York’s sewers. It sounds like a wacko chatroom and the author of the piece was CanEHdian Stories.