Fucked up: aggregated content being used for evil, not good.

I’m going to be going heads-down on both my blogs and Yelp for a little bit. A totally fucked up situation has just happened to me:

A while back I posted a “geek erotica” story on a website under a pseudonym. I’m proud of the story. It’s funny, it’s no more graphic than the story which I submitted to Fray: Busted under my own name… well, a little more graphic. But, it’s tasteful. And, it’s fiction. I wrote it under a pseudonym because occasionally I work with kids. As in I teach them and babysit them. Not to mention that I was just offered a mod job at [Redacted Name.] And, while I have no problem about them reading any of the content associated with my Adorkable Grrl or Starving Student blogs… I don’t want them finding that story.

This story is actually how I became friends with Skid Vis (the dude who’s gonna get free video consulting from me because he surprised me with a random act of kindness.) He read my story off of Digg and liked it. At the time I had an ICQ number associated with the website so that the moderators had a method of getting in touch with me in real time. Skid and I began talking via IM and discovered that we had a lot in common. He’s working on a vlog; and, I’ve been watching his work, commenting on it, giving him suggestions how to punch it up… stuff that people have graciously and willingly offered me about my own work over the years.

Today I found out that a website out of India had aggregated my copyrighted story and published on their website with my pseudonym in the context of it being child pornography.

I am horrified. Just horrified. I am literally shaking and about to throw-up. I feel HORRIBLY violated. Like I’ve been raped, even.

For years I have contributed my piddly two-cents to the proverbial Internet community. Some has been good, some bad, some boring, some brilliant… I love my blogs, I love to write, I love to read, I love interacting with people online and have made friends across the globe by doing so. And, I openly and willingly will give just about ANYONE permission to reproduce a portion or all of my writing/poetry/photography…

Provided they ask. Or, credit me. Like I ask and credit others when I reproduce their work on my own blogs. The Internet is huge community and people are really generous for the most part with with their time, advice and in sharing their ideas. That’s part of why I love it so… it’s open source and it’s conversation. It’s a living breathing entity which has so much good about it… provided people are respectful and honest.

At the very least people cannot use my writing or creative property for illegal purposes.

Which is what this website did.

Thankfully, Skid Vis found it today (he Googled the USERID I use on the website the story is ORIGINALLY posted on) and alerted me to it. From there I emailed Violet Blue, Audacia at Waking Vixen and Amber Rhea for advice on what to do (as, I figured they might have more experiance with this problem than I did. All three are bloggers I really, really, REALLY respect for their honesty and bravery in their personal blogs.) Violet responded right away with a really detailed and comforting email which pretty much laid out a course of action. She also told me that she’d “sick the ninjas” on the offending party if necessary, which made me feel so so much better… I can’t even tell you.

I also contacted my ex-boyfriend (who is a lawyer and I’ve previously characterized in a not-so-flattering way on this blog, for which I’m now sorry) and my friend Brittany (also a lawyer) who have been advising me all afternoon on what to do next. Thus far I have emailed a cease & desist email to the owner of the aggregation website, aka the pushers of child pornography, I have emailed the website on which the story was originally published asking for their help, I have emailed GoDaddy.com informing them of the violation and I have filed an “Internet crimes” report with the FBI.

I am exhausted, shaken and distraught. I cannot blog on either Adorkable Grrl, Starving Student or Yelp.com until more progress is made on this being resolved. I have faith that the individuals advising me are dead on in the course of action and that it will be resolved in the most timely fashion… but, until forward movement is made I cannot allow myself to be open in the way I normally am on these forums. I have an obligation to DollyMix and am confident that their legal department can protect what work I publish on that forum, so you can look for my Femina Potens column as scheduled and the “how to’s” as Cate needs them for the site…

Thank you to everyone who has been supportive of me in the past four hours; and, who will be supportive of me in the days to come. I will be reachable via the normal methods – email, IM, comments – but, don’t expect any blog posts or Yelp reviews from me for at least the next couple of days… maybe longer.

Which sucks. Because I’m a writer and I love to write… I just can’t right now.

UPDATE 11 October: There has been some progress made in getting LemmeFind to remove my work; now we are working on getting Google to remove the listing which associates the story with LemmeFind and illegal activities.

I have not received anything but a confirmation email from the FBI in regards to the report I filed yesterday; but, I am on my way to mail a hard copy of the C&D to LemmeFind (wonder how much a registered letter to India is going to cost me?)

I’m overwhelmed by the amount of support I’ve gotten in the past 12 hours: I really appreciate all the emails and kind words. This is a sucky situation to be in, like I’ve said: I’ve worked much of my life to teach, guide and protect children. The idea that my work could in any way be associated with any entity or organization designed to exploit or harm children makes me feel like throwing up or punching something.

Thank you to Skid Vis for telling me when he found something odd upon Googling my USERID. Thank you everyone who’s given me advice on how to handle myself (especially Violet and Amber,) who have lent me their expertise in helping me to get the situation resolved (Tyler and Brittany) and those who had to listen to me completely freak out about the situation (in particular: Ian, Skid, Mick, Amir and my wonderful roommate, Carla…) Thank you to everyone who’s IM’d, emailed or commented on one of my blogs or sent me a private message via Yelp:

You guys are what make me want to come back to the greater Internet community – it is the people like you who make it worth fighting this kind of egregious violation of my work. For realzie. Y’all rock. Thank you.

One of the best things about the situation was said to me in an email by Amber Rhea: “‘Putting yourself out there’ is your best defense. If people know you, know who you are, know your writing, and TRUST you, then it’s a hell of a lot harder for anyone to try to smear your name.

If I were you I would blog about it. Put it out there, make it known that someone is using your work without permission. This is a much more proactive (and easier!) route than trying to scour the internet for all traces of it… which honestly, is probably impossible. But people have MUCH more of a reason to believe YOU than to believe some weirdo who’s trying to turn your erotic story into child porn.”

I think this is smart and true. And, I do have something to say on this topic… I just need space to process it. I have a lot to say about YOYOW (you own your own words) right now… I just need to think about how to address it without being self righteous and angry.

So, give me a couple of days and I’ll be back with a scathing indictment of people who abuse the communal sense of the blogosphere and steal people’s intellectual property for use in illegal/sketchy purposes; or, those who use other’s work (not under “Fair Use” – we all know what that is) for purposes it was not intended.

I may actually publish the work in question – here, under my own name – just to further illustrate the fact that the context of the story was grossly misrepresented. And, the effect that can have on someone. Haven’t completely decided yet: still don’t know if I want my 13 yo. cousin to be able to read it. Sexuality is something which is wonderful if expressed in a healthy and positive manner (which the story does.) I still think that it’s possible that there is an age at which you are incapable of understanding the difference between reality and fiction; and, that young adults may not be capable of understanding the concepts portrayed in erotica as is intended to be understood by the authors.

Which makes me think long and hard before publishing my work (of which I’m proud) in an open forum where young people who know and love me could find it.

It’s kind of the same reason why my Mom (who has read one of my erotic stories and liked it) wouldn’t let me read The Thorn Birds or Anais Nin’s Delta of Venus when I was 11… it wasn’t that I couldn’t handle reading the words, I was just too young to understand the CONTEXT.

Now I’m off to work on my column for DollyMix. Look for it tomorrow.

Please pass this URL onto everyone you know and let them know LemmeFind are bastards, thief’s and purveyors of child pornography: www.lemmefind.us

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