Free Plagiarism Protection

I put a lot of effort into my writing. Before I feature a website on this blog, I try it out first and/or sign up for it so I could write well about it. Sadly, there are some who just copy other people's writings and ideas without acknowledging the source. My best friend, who runs a website on Freebie Trading, was a victim of this. Several people copied her website verbatim! Just an example of how plagiarism has truly become a rampant problem on the Internet.

Therefore, I'm thankful that there's a service like Copyscape. It's really a laudable project, and a very useful tool for writers and bloggers. Copyscape is a website that helps you discover if your content has been copied without your permission. It works like a search engine. Just type in your URL and Copyscape searches for websites that have copied your content, including those that have the same sentences as yours. Pretty neat, huh?

One cool thing about Copyscape is that it provides free plagiarism warning banners that you could post on your website. Of course, you should only post such banner if the content is originally yours. The banner may not totally protect you from "copycats", but hopefully it decreases the chances of your content being copied without your permission.

Copyscape's free service allows you up to 10 searches a month, while a premium account provides you with thousands of searches and an unlimited number of results.

So plagiarists, beware. The next time you attempt to plagiarize someone else's work, there's Copyscape to track you down and expose you.

A stylish way to advertise your blog for free

I never realized that there are so many websites to advertise your blog until I joined several forums. Although most are free, some require certain conditions before they advertise or include your blog in their list. BlogUpp is an easy way to advertise your blog for free.

Launched in March 2008, BlogUpp was created to provide real value for the online community. It's got a unique way of promoting your blog by linking it to other blogs with the same category. It's also very easy to use. You don't need to register, sign up, or participate in forums. Just enter your blog's URL, copy the code for the widget, and wait for their approval which doesn't take too long. You may already put the widget on your blog page while your blog is being approved.

Perhaps one of the great things about this blog promoting service is that for every 10 readers of your blog, BlogUpp will show it to 9 other readers. This increases more traffic for your blog without any efforts on your part. What they do is take a picture of your blog and read your RSS on a regular basis. The number of blogs varies from language to language, and they are not mixed while sharing. Right now, the number of blogs on BlogUpp is rapidly increasing, which means more exposure for your blog. If you want to know how it works, you can check the widget on the right side of this blog.

According to the authors of the site, BlogUpp service will remain free and quality-content oriented. They said that they will soon be introducing, along with stats, the possibility for everyone to buy additional impressions for extra promotion. I hope when they said "buy additional impressions" they don't mean we will have to begin to pay for it.

With a lot of blog advertising venues to choose from, BlogUpp is definitely one worth trying.