No duplicate Content?
What surprised me when I searched for a keyword I am interested in writing about
There is a topic I am interested in because it’s about my demographic group.
I know there are many writers here on Medium who are in the same group, yet, I found that very little about it ever showed up on my feed.
So I decided to search from Medium’s Homepage to see what was available.
To my surprise, there was one story that showed up three times in the top ten results. Same title, same content, different image, and separate publication on different dates. It is written by someone whose name I have seen many times in the past thirty days since I started writing. Naturally, I am one of their followers.
At #2 is the oldest date, March 5th, 2018. It shows 3.1k claps and 16 responses.
At #6 is the latest date, Sept 19th, 2019. That one shows 596 claps and four responses. It is posted in the Largest non-medium Publication.
The one at #10 is dated April 6th, 2019. It has a single response and has 432 claps.
I knew some stories were republished, but generally, the original would be deleted, or unlisted — meaning hidden. So I was shocked to see it not only show up multiple times in the same search but three times in the top 10.
I’ve read that Medium has recently sent some emails to warn people about duplicate content and asking them to clean up their accounts or face dire consequences. I am just wondering if Medium even has the capabilities to know about the violations in light of what I just saw.
I am just thinking out loud here. I have intentionally left out the keyword I used for my search because I don’t want anyone to get in trouble because of me. However, if you are curious or interested, reach out to me, and I will share it.
