In February, I was working on a relationship advice website.  Not all of my pages on my website were indexed yet, and just for fun, I decided to check my site against Copyscape.

Of course I got some random dude on elance trying to pass my writing off as his own “fluent English” and win a job, but there was one other instance where a trashy celebrity blogger decided to do a cutsey Valentine’s Day post by stealing one of my articles.  This really pissed me off for some reason.

I read a bit of the subject and most people said that this stuff happens all the time and that it’s a waste of time to fight it.  I’m vengeful and spiteful though (some of my more charming qualities), so this wasn’t a good enough answer.

I developed two plans to deal with Mr. Michael Wheeler… er, I mean the unnamed trashy celebrity blogger.

Plan A:

Ask him to remove the article since it is in violation of my copyright.

Fortunately this worked.  He took the article down.  But what if the webmaster doesn’t do this?  How can you kick someone in the balls over the internet?

Plan B:

1. Contact the offender’s hosting company and tell them that they are hosting a website that is in violation of your copyright.

2. Contact the offender’s hosting company’s bandwidth provider and tell them that they are providing bandwidth to a hosting company that is hosting a website that is in violation of your copyright.

3. Contact Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc. and inform them that the offender’s website is contains stolen content that you produced.  This will get the offender banned from Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc.

4. Contact Google AdSense, Clickbank, other affiliate merchants, etc. that the offender is using to monetize the website and inform them that the offender has violated your copyright in an effort to promote their product or service.  Suggest that they terminate their relationship with the offender in order to maintain the quality of their brand.

5. Contact any “friends,” partner blogs, or clients that the offender may list on his website and inform them that their buddy has some serious issues with copyright laws.  Advise them to end any relationship with the offender in order to keep themselves from looking bad and stop the offender’s toxic reputation from spilling over onto them.

If you particularly petty and vindictive (like me) and enjoy watching someone self-destruct like a dying star collapsing on itself, feel free to cc the offender on all e-mails you send out.  There is nothing quite as rewarding as making sure your enemy watches as you systematically destroy them.

Whether you choose Plan A or Plan B, the stolen content will be removed one way or the other.  Congratulations!  I hope you didn’t have too much fun.

In 2007, I was applying to get into grad school.  I sent out applications to a bunch of schools.  There were about three that I REALLY wanted to get into.  They were perfect for me!

Unfortunately, they did not see things the same way.

I got rejected from all three of the schools that I desperately wanted to get into.

So, figuring I had nothing left to lose, I decided to play the “smart ass” card.  I wrote rejections letters to their rejection letters.  I wrote something to the effect of:

Thank you for submitting your rejection to my application for admission to your school.  However, I have received many rejection offers from other universities, and it is my regret to inform you that I cannot accept all rejections submitted to me this year.  I will be attending your school this autumn.  Please send all relevant enrollment materials to me at [my address].

If you feel particularly strongly about rejecting me, I highly encourage you to submit another rejection application next year.  I often favor applicants that submit a second time.

-Clayton

I got an exciting sense of glee out of sending these letters out.  I must be honest, that a part of me hoped that they would be impressed by my unconventional nature and reconsider my application.  That didn’t happen though.  In fact, nothing happened.  I got no responses what so ever.

So, logically, I decided to send out another letter.

I have not received a response from you regarding the letter I sent you on March 3rd.  I can only assume that you have fully accepted me into your graduate program and that I will receive all relevant enrollment materials at the new student orientation meeting this August.

Thank you, I look forward to my time at [university's name].

-Clayton

Now things started to get fun!  Two of the schools continued to ignore me.

But one responded.

It was clear that the director of admissions was uncertain about whether or not I was joking around or just an idiot.  Using every ounce of tact that he could muster, he explained that he had indeed received both of my letters and that I could not attend the school.  Then he just gave the usual lines about “limited space in the program” and “you are strongly encouraged to apply next year.”

Content at forcing them to respond to my asinine letters, I decided to throw in the towel and keep this from becoming a running gag.

Moral of the story:  Have fun with things, especially if you’ve already been rejected.  You’ve got nothing to lose.  The worst that can happen is you get a laugh out of it.