17 May 2009

Couples [and the RSS Question]

Cycling Makes You Smile
Cycling makes you smile.
Twosome
Girlfriends chatting.
Trenchcoats
Duo in trenchcoats cycling together.

Bad Day at Cycle Chic
On occasion, we have a bad day at Cycle Chic. Fortunately it's rare.

Regarding the RSS feed question that many people have mentioned, I would prefer to put it back on full feed. There is, however, one website that lifts the whole feed and blogs it almost everyday. I'm just looking for a way to restrict certain websites from doing so [have had no luck yet]. If anyone knows a clever bit of code for blogger, let me know. Or any other tips. It's the whole feed being nicked and this website is starting to appear in certain search results, instead of Cycle Chic, which is why I got miffed.

I've contacted the 'webmaster' who runs this automated 'blog'. He's in India and 'promised' to stop, but hasn't of yet.

Please send any ideas along if you have them so we can rectify this situation.

15 comments:

Murk said...

If someone is determined to lift content, they'll do it anyway with a screen scraper.

Put it on RSS feed, but add a footnote in the RSS feed (which can be done automatically on playforms like wordpress - possibly feedburner, though I'm unsure) which specifies refers to the original.

See http://weblogtoolscollection.com/archives/2009/05/10/i-am-sick-of-splogs-copying-our-content/

See the comment from 10th May (unfortunately dates are the bizarre US style of mm/dd/yy - as opposed to the more logical dd/mm/yy or the even more logical but hardly ever used yy/mm/dd!)

Murk said...

That's Jono's comment, 10th May, 8:08pm

SteveL said...

There is a trick you can play against a malicious site. Publish content with an image in it as the RSS Feed, then change that image to something malicious/embarrassing, so that whoever embeds it ends up looking bad.

Alternatively, embrace it: insert a link back to your site on every entry, and celebrate the extra links you are getting.

townmouse said...

Annoying. Can you contact the ISP directly rather than the webmaster? If the Pirate Bay case is anything to go by, they're as liable for the breach of your copyright as the splogger is, and should get the site - or the content - taken down.

Anonymous said...

You're not the first blog I read that has had to change the way content is shown to prevent republishing. What would cause a person to do that in the first place is beyond me. It's pretty sad.

Adrienne Johnson said...

I am sorry to hear that. I found a site, recently, that has been publishing my shots without permission. Fortunately, it is a beautiful site and he credits me and links back. I am still ambivalent about it, simply because he has never asked.

tristan said...

I'm sorry to hear your content is being stolen but I'd urge you to return to allowing the full RSS feeds. There are thousands of people around the world who have brighter days because of your photos.

Anonymous said...

Google up on hot linking. I believe there are ways you can disable hot linking from specific IP addresses or domains. It can even be done by regions if you wish.
Good luck with it. And I have no problems going to your site from my feed reader. Keep up the wonderful photos and posts!
- anonymous coward

Colville-Andersen said...

i've put the rss back on full.

the funny thing is there are over 3000 subscribers on short feed but only just under 500 on full... :-)

danerik said...

I'm with Murk on this strategy. Merlin Mann from 43folders.com does this, and would be my choice to handle it. Check out his reason/response here :

http://www.43folders.com/feedfooter

Cycle-fan Dan;

Country Fuckin' said...

Thats a bummer and Thank You! for responding to questions and giving an explanation.

Jonno! said...

Please please go back to the full, I hate clicking the link and opening a new browser tab for every post of yours.

Colville-Andersen said...

i've put the blog back on full... is it not getting through?

Andrew said...

Mikael -

I have tried both versions of the feed, and neither is the "full" photo version you used to have.

Colville-Andersen said...

thanks for commenting, andrew. i've set everything back to Full but to no avail. i simply can't troubleshoot this one. no idea why.