PLUSH BOOKS COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT
I received several comments this morning informing me that one of my fanfictions has been stolen and published for money by a company called "Plush Books". A group of saints on twitter have been helping fic authors who's fics have been stolen, and have been providing information on what to do if you are affected. Please reblog this so that fanfic authors can check if they have been plagarised and learn what to do if they have.
Plush Books have been using FicLabs to download entire fics then upload them and sell them as e-books and paperbacks on multiple different sites including Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Abe Books and others.
Twitter user KokomRoily has been calling for help with contacting affected authors and a spread sheet in Google Docs of contacted authors has been made here. You can find the full list of works published by Plush Books here.
KokomRoily provides a good template to use with the Amazon DMCA takedown form (X, text version), which has limited characters, however, you will also need to search other sites too. Other sites have different legal requirements, and I'm copying the template I used here. A good way to find most of the places you need to contact is to look on Good Reads, which lists lots of the marketplaces selling the book.
Make sure you add an author note on the original story stating that this company do not have the rights to publish your fic. I strongly suggest sending this email from the email address that your fic account is registered to, in case you need to provide further evidence. Here is an email template that I put together based on the one above and modified according to the legal demands required on Barnes and Noble's takedown help page:
I affirm under penalty of perjury that I am [YOUR AUTHOR NAME ON YOUR FIC], the author of the work "[YOUR FIC NAME]" posted at [LINK] (entire work) as a free-to-read story. My work has been stolen and published and you are currently listing the work as for sale at the following location [LINK ON MARKETPLACE] as "[BOOK NAME]" by Plush Books.
Under statute 17 USC 512, [MARKETPLACE] has a legal obligation to take down Plush Books' "[BOOK NAME]" in response to a valid DMCA takedown notice by the author. According to this statute, if "[BOOK NAME]" is not taken down, you are making [MARKETPLACE] liable to be sued. Please check with a manager to verify.
I will not be filling in my contact information such as home number and address and I am not required to do so in order for my claim to be valid. I have written in the author's note section of my story that I have not given Plush Books permission to use my work, which is proof enough that Plush Books has stolen the work from someone. If you would like more proof, I can email you screenshots of comments/kudos I've received from my readers from [DATE], the original date of publication, that are still in my inbox.
I have a good faith belief that use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law. The information in the notification is accurate, and I swear, under penalty of perjury, that I am the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.
Please take ""[BOOK NAME]"" down.
[YOUR AUTHOR NAME ON YOUR FIC]