The Dark side of Writing: PLRs and Plagiarism 2

(c) 2015 P. Lynne Designs

There is a dark side to the world of writing and if you are a new writer, I thought I should warn you about this very nasty beast.  As I sit here munching on a cookie (and very tempted to grab another one, along with some milk or coffee), I was thinking about how this would be addressed.  After all, this blog has had its share of freedom articles and the like.  It is time for me to return back to why I started the second phase of My Ambiance Life in the first place.

I started to title this post, Trying to Avoid This 2: PLRs, but I did not because for one, I did not want anyone to think that I am writing yet another “Look what Beyoncé/Jay-Z/Black Panthers/police brutality” type post again.  Take note writers: when you get tired of a subject, it shows.  Second, 95% of you do not know what a PLR is, and what it has to do with plagiarism in the first place.  Well, now you are going to learn, so get ready to take notes (if you desire).

PLRs is abbreviated for Private Label Rights.  You pay a person to write you a basic article or post, and they sell you the rights to make changes and claim the article as your own piece.  This is difference from ghost writing, which is perfectly legal (more on that in a moment). 

You can have PLRs for anything.  Think about your Royal-free photos if you are into photography or Royal-free music if you are a musician.  It is the same thing, only this is for writing.  Let me give you an example:

You have just started a blog.  Your subject is about cars, classic cars.  You love talking about these cars, but you do not know a thing about them at all.  you first few posts turn out well, but you are a little concern about how long can you keep up the hype.  How long before people start noticing that you are no expert on classic cars?  (here is a tip:  make sure you are well-versed on your subject before attempting a blog, or you will run out of subject to post about).  You start researching for the answer to your little problem (when you should be learning about classic cars), and you stumble on an ad from a person who writes PLRs on any subject that you desire. Great, so you check out their website.  The “R” in PLR gives you the right to make changes in the document you now own (for a price).  The original writer cannot come to you and claim copyright infringement and order a cease and desist letter to you, because it is now your blog post to do whatever you want to do.

Problems with PLRs

As explained, you have the right to make changes to a post once you pay the person $5 or more to pen your post to your blog.  Now it is perfectly legal to have someone write for you, and you pay them, as in ghost writer or a guest writer on your blog.  The only thing you have to do as the blog owner is to just post it or give that person credit where credit is due.  The problems associated with PLRs are:

·         Plagiarism.  Didn’t your parents and teachers teach you anything about this subject?  PLRs is just another form of it.  Many sites use a program called Copyscape to check to validity of the article, and to make sure you are not spinning a post that has the same wording as the one you have written.  If there is any hint of a post, that can choose to reject it.

·         As the saying goes, make sure you check your sources.  Some writers are in it for the money.  They write stuff, do not check their facts, and next thing you know, you have a post with the wrong information on it.  For example:  If I know about the subject of glues and adhesives for scrapbooking, and I told you that you can use a specific type of glue for paper, but it causes a hazard later on.  You later find out from a friend that the type of glue used in the project was not made for paper project.  You could blame me, and I could blame the person who sold me the information.

·         Search engines frown on it, especially Google.  Enough said.

·         Scams.  You can spin the information in so many different directions once you get it, after all, it is now yours.  Again, most sites use Copyscape and the post you buy could be stole from a writer who worked for hours to get their message across.

Over all, do not get involve with PLRs, in both writing them and receiving them. Do not take the lazy way of writing a blog post or reposting them. You are better than that and your writing deserves better too.  There are better ways of earning money for writing blog post, articles, and publishing a book.  Prepare to be amazed at what your writing career can do for you and you never know where it can take you. Do not sell yourself short.  You can do this.