Getting Rid of Followers?

1. 65

   ControlledChaos1posted 2 years ago

   Is there a way to get rid of people following you that you have doubts about?
   
   While not all followers are bad, I'm beginning to wonder about people who follow me who have no articles of their own. I have been having a problem with articles I publish getting copied and put up elsewhere as soon as they are published. People who follow know as soon as I publish something.
   
   People who follow, who have been on Hubpages for a while (6 months +) and have 0 articles make me wonder.
   
   Would greatly appreciate any answer for the question. It's making me not want to publish stuff as much.

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   1. 76

      Misbah786posted 2 years agoin reply to this

      Unfortunately, there is no such option. The only thing you can do is report their profile if you notice anything suspicious or negative.

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      1. 65

         ControlledChaos1posted 2 years agoin reply to this

         That's a real shame, as sometimes, I think there is no other explanation how an article you publish can be copied and put on another site within an hour or so.
         
         Wish management would figure this out.

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   2. 81

      theraggededgeposted 2 years agoin reply to this

      Some people are simply here to read. By creating an account, they get to read the authors they like.
      
      I wouldn't be complaining about it

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      1. 65

         ControlledChaos1posted 2 years agoin reply to this

         If just here to read, why go to the trouble of making an account? I'm pretty well convinced that there are some people (0 articles) that are here for stealing content. It's a very viable complaint.

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         1. 65

            ControlledChaos1posted 2 years agoin reply to this

            It's hard for me to believe that I'm the only one who is thinking this.

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            1. 85

               Jodahposted 2 years agoin reply to this

               No, I agree with you that it is certainly a possibility some only create an account and follow people to steal their content. I have had a big increase in new followers in the last two days in fact. It seems quite strange.

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            2. 66

               PaulGoodman67posted 2 years agoin reply to this

               While there are some individuals who copy manually, the majority of the plagiarism is done on an industrial scale using software.
               
               The plagiarists don't need to follow us, as our published articles are in the public domain.

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               1. 65

                  ControlledChaos1posted 2 years agoin reply to this

                  True, but if followed, they know immediately when we publish a new article, which means that your article can be copied and put up somewhere within the hour, probably.
                  
                  It should be an easy fix to just give account holders the option to "kick off" a follower if they want, right?

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                  1. 66

                     PaulGoodman67posted 2 years agoin reply to this

                     I see the entire followers and fan mail thing as being a relic from an earlier period of HP when they had a very different vision of the site focused around a community-based open platform.
                     
                     They could lose the entire follower thing and I don't think it would matter. I don't really bother much with any of that stuff myself. I don't think it's worth them tinkering around with it to be honest.
                     
                     Enabling an unfriend button wouldn't have much, if any, affect on plagiarism, in my humble opinion.
                     
                     My view doesn't really count for anything, though, of course.
                     
                     However, I do think people sometimes overestimate the human element in online plagiarism. It's mostly done by machines copying thousands of articles.

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                     1. 65

                        ControlledChaos1posted 2 years agoin reply to this

                        You're probably right, but it's still aggravating.

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   3. 82

      Miebakagh57posted 2 years agoin reply to this

      When any of those fellowers copy or stole contents, and are caught and banned, you loss the idiot brats. So, why worry? Just report them, and it'll be fine.

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2. 85

   Jodahposted 2 years ago

   Yes, as was happening recently when many articles here were being scraped and posted at a site called Apria (or something like that.) It is likely that the perpetrator was following writers here, however, because they were stealing articles as soon as they were published and the actual writers were being hit with duplication warnings and having their articles unpublished. Over about three weeks, every article I published was posted on the other site.

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3. 81

   Brenda Arledgeposted 2 years ago

   I do have a few who are here to just read, but if you have a concern...contact the team@hubpages.com

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4. 65

   psycheskinnerposted 2 years ago

   I can't really understand the concern.  The purpose of "following" is to see new content from authors you like. If it is working as intended I would expect most of those people to not be other hub-authors.

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