The blogosphere is amazing, isn't it? Just think of all the wonderful tidbits of really good information floating about in cyberspace, put there by people who have passion for their field or to offer a helping hand. The amount of information available in the blogosphere is astounding, especially when it comes to information about sales, marketing, management, and business.
Personally, I subscribe to about forty blogs, and I read them every chance I get. As a very active blogger myself, I revel in the idea that people from all corners of the world find value in what I have written.
But there is a dark side to the blogosphere that we all should be aware of. And we need to do what we can to shine a light on this dark underbelly of the internet. Thus, my post today.
Enter one "Michael J. Roman." Mr. Roman may have some excellent qualities, but he appears to be a plagiarizer with a significant body of others' work that he claims to be his own work. According to his LinkedIn Profile, Roman is a Managing Director at Modis, part of the MPS group.
[Update on 7/7/2010: I see that Mr. Roman has taken down his "Michael J. Roman" profile at LinkedIn, so the link in the previous paragraph won't work. He replaced it with a new LinkedIn profile (with new photo!) under the name of "Mike Roman" - you can view this profile here. ]
My friend Jonathan Farrington, one of the most respected business bloggers on the planet, just discovered that approximately twenty of Jonathan's blog posts have been republished (without his permission) on Michael J. Roman's site, plagiarizer. Each had been published by Roman as if they were his own work. In fact, Roman had the audacity to attach this to each of his stolen posts:
"The moral right of the author, Michael J. Roman, has been asserted. © Copyright 2010. All rights reserved."
Gutsy. Especially for a plagiarizer who lists "integrity" as #4 on his list of "top ten traits for success."
While checking out Roman's blog for any possible appearances of my own writing, I ran across a post by my friend and fellow sales trainer Kelley Robertson called "Boost Your Sales Instantly." The plagiarized version on Roman's site is titled "Instantly Boost Sales." There's no mention of the real author, nor is their a link to his site or the original article.
I love the blogosphere. But we all need to do what we can to rid it from plagiarizers like Michael J. Roman.
Please retweet or repost. Let's get the word out about Mr. Roman. It is my hope that by the time you read this post, the links to Roman's post will be dead, meaning he's taken his site down or at least deleted the stolen posts from his site.
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post (or don't) please leave a comment.Skip Anderson is the Founder and President of Selling to Consumers Sales Training.
He works with companies that sell to consumers in
all B2C sectors to increase sales by leveraging the buying potential of
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