someone stole my ad!

[terri]

okay,
so I got an email today from someone inquiring about an apt that I rented out about a week ago. The link came through "Urban Renters". When I went to their site, sure enough, there was my apt for rent. They basically copied and pasted the text that I had written along with one pic, my name and my phone number. I`ve never heard of this site before. I did not post the ad, therefore I can`t remove the ad. I did email them and I`m awaiting a reply. This is the 2nd time the ad for this particular apt has been hijacked and posted somewhere else, with my contact information and without my permission.

Has anyone else ever had this problem?
Has anyone else ever heard of Urban Renters?

Very weird.

I should add: there is no paid advertising on this site, so it`s not like they are stealing and posting peoples ads to bring traffic to the site to get hits. It looks like a nice site, I don`t know much about web design, but graphically I find it appealing, it`s very modern and clean looking, it could have more pictures and there could be more extensive search criteria, but it looks like a pay site. Last time my ad was hijacked, it was posted on a site that a lot of advertising so each time my ad was "hit" someone made money from it. Not the case here. Hmm...very weird indeed.
Terri

 

[ChrisDavies]

They found you a renter, where`s the problem?

Scraping is a common problem online, and you`re not likely to get a reply from Urban. The pull content from around the web, hoping to get traffic from search engines, so they can sell ads.

 

[terri]

QUOTE (ChrisDavies @ Aug 1 2010, 07:10 AM) They found you a renter, where`s the problem?

Scraping is a common problem online, and you`re not likely to get a reply from Urban. The pull content from around the web, hoping to get traffic from search engines, so they can sell ads.

The problem is place is no longer for rent.

One: I don`t want to spend time dealing with calls and emails about apts that are not for rent.

Two: there are no ads so they are not making money every time it`s viewed.

Three: I would be very upset if I had paid for an ad to be on this site only to have it buried among other listings that were probably expired or hadn`t paid to be there.

 

[jseib]

When I was a teenager I started a local classified ads site.. This is back before kijiji and craigslist dominated the market.. Anyways the problem I faced was noone wanted to post ads on an empty site.. So I copied ads from other classified ad sites for about 2 months until the site was generating 15+ ads per day on its own..

Just trying to say whats happening here is more then likely harmless even if it`s annoying.. If they won`t respond to your request to take it down I would suggest contacting the site you did post the ad on and letting them know about it.

Most bigger sites protect their content (your ad) and may have their lawyer send the offending site a letter asking them to remove it.. If the site you posted on won`t do that then you might just have to live with the phone calls for now.. On a good note if the ad is getting calls then maybe you should post your ad their next time then at least you can control when it comes down..

 

[terri]

QUOTE (jseib @ Aug 1 2010, 10:40 AM) When I was a teenager I started a local classified ads site.. This is back before kijiji and craigslist dominated the market.. Anyways the problem I faced was noone wanted to post ads on an empty site.. So I copied ads from other classified ad sites for about 2 months until the site was generating 15+ ads per day on its own..

Just trying to say whats happening here is more then likely harmless even if it`s annoying.. If they won`t respond to your request to take it down I would suggest contacting the site you did post the ad on and letting them know about it.

Most bigger sites protect their content (your ad) and may have their lawyer send the offending site a letter asking them to remove it.. If the site you posted on won`t do that then you might just have to live with the phone calls for now.. On a good note if the ad is getting calls then maybe you should post your ad their next time then at least you can control when it comes down..

They did respond, they took it off and they apologized. They said that they were testing some new functions. I think you are right, they must have copied ads from other sites. I never thought to contact the sites that I posted on to let them know, that`s a good idea.


Thanks,
Terri