/r/SleeplessWatchdogs

Photograph via snooOG

r/SleeplessWatchdogs is a place for finding and reporting plagiarism and IP theft of posts from r/nosleep, r/letsnotmeet, r/shortscarystories, and the like.

SleeplessWatchdogs is a place for finding and reporting plagiarism and IP theft of posts from r/nosleep, r/letsnotmeet, r/shortscarystories, and the like.


Copyright Resource Index

Here you will find resources that will help you understand copyrights, copyright infringement, and the like. You will also find individual pages for websites where stories are frequently posted without permission that contain the sites' policies and procedures regarding copyrights.



Disclaimers

We are a group of volunteers who are passionate about ensuring that authors are not mistreated or stolen from. We are not lawyers, and as such are unable to give legal advice regarding copyright law or contract disputes.


While we encourage users to report pages/channels that use their work without permission, we do not condone any sort of uncivil behavior directed at the offender.

Any sort of uncivil behavior from users who have had their content stolen - up to and including doxxing (sharing personal information) and harrassment - is not the intention or responsibility of the Sleepless Watchdogs.

If you are found to be participating in this sort of behavior as a result of a report on this subreddit, you will immediately be banned and anything that breaks reddit's TOS will be reported to the admins.



What Will Be Added To The Black List?

The Black List will only show narration channels/podcasts and social media/blog pages that are proven to be posting work without the original poster’s permission, without crediting the original poster, and meet specific criteria.

Contract disputes, payment issues, and selling of material on Amazon or similar can be reported on the subreddit, but these offenders will not be added to the Black List.



Submitting Reports

When should I report?

  • Your story was shared or narrated without your permission, especially if the offender refuses to resolve the situation when asked.

  • Your story was shared or narrated with your permission, but the person sharing or narrating the story refused to credit you when asked or did not credit you within 48 hours of agreeing to do so.

  • You have confirmed with at least one author that their story was shared or narrated by a page/channel without their permission.

  • You find a person, page, or channel that's presenting stories they did not write as stories they wrote (this includes stories being sold on Amazon or similar sites as books).


Before you make a report

  • Check the Black List and use the subreddit's search bar to check if your report has already been made.

  • Check the criteria for the Black List to make sure the channel/page you want to report is one we'll consider adding to the list.

  • Do not make a new post to report something that has already been addressed. Doing so will result in the post being removed.

  • If the report you intended to post has already been made on the subreddit, you are welcome to add a comment to the existing post to contribute.


How to submit a report

  • You are free to make public posts reporting unauthorized use or informing us of parties that poorly credit authors.

  • if you are concerned with remaining anonymous, please feel free to send us your report via modmail.

  • Reports can be submitted after you’ve performed your own resolution, or especially if the accused is refusing to respect your rights and the problem persists.

  • Regardless of how you submit a report, you are required to include a link to the channel/page and some sort of evidence. You shouldn't report someone unless you know for sure they are doing something wrong. Posts made without a link and/or proof will be removed.

  • Failure to provide context and/or evidence in your report or submitting a report of questionable nature will be automatically interpreted as an attempt to use us as a means of starting drama, and is subjected to the disciplinary actions regarding our NO WITCH HUNTING rules.


Once you've submitted a report

  • Please allow time for us to review your findings and, if applicable, conduct our own investigation. Be prepared for the possibility of us reaching out to you requesting clarification on certain items if the need arise.

  • Once your report has been confirmed as valid, we will reach out to you to inform and add the offender to The Black List. You are then encouraged to keep us informed and updated on future interactions, additional offenses, or account termination.

  • It is important to know that we will never reach out to the accused and advise them that you filed a report against them.

  • Our turnaround time is usually fairly quick. However, there may come times when we receive a high volume of reports. If this occurs, we will make a post announcing this and ask you to please exercise patience as we thoroughly review all reports in our queue.

  • Please refrain from sending repeated messages inquiring about status updates, this may delay the outcome of your report.



Subreddit Rules

Please refrain from making non-relevant posts.

  • All posts made to this subreddit should be to either report or address issues concerning plagiarism and related subjects.

  • Off-topic discussions may clutter the subreddit and prevent users and moderators alike from addressing reports in a timely fashion. Repeated off-topic posts will result in being banned from the subreddit.

  • This especially applies to advertising posts or posts that can be considered spam, which will be removed immediately upon discovery and the poster subjected to disciplinary action.


No doxxing or sharing of personal information.

  • This includes personal profiles, full names, phone numbers, addresses, etc.

  • The only information you should share publicly is a link to the page where the offender is stealing or improperly crediting work written by someone else.


Do not tag offenders in any post on this subreddit.

  • This may cause unnecessary arguments and uncivil behavior. Comments tagging an offender or guessing who an offender is on reddit will be removed.

Be civil.

  • While we understand that the nature of this subreddit is reporting a negative experience, you must remain civil in both posts and comments.

  • Do not call names, threaten others, mention things you would do/have done to mothers, etc.

  • Any form of hate speech will not be tolerated.



Like to share or narrate stories?

Check out our guide to asking permission to use someone's fictional story!

Check out our guide to asking permission to use someone's non-fictional story! (i.e. stories from r/letsnotmeet)

The Black List was created to make authors more comfortable with sharing their work and help them trust the community at large. Please keep that in mind before taking your reaction to being on the list public.

If you have any questions or concerns regarding the Black List, or would like us to review your channel/page to ensure that you're doing things right, please feel free to contact us through modmail at any time. Please do not message individual mods.

If you are on the list, or have become aware of a report filed against you, it would be in your best interest not to immediately contact us to ask to be removed (the answer is NO) or to ask for the status of an open report filed against you (this would be interpreted as an attempt to hinder our investigational efforts and may result in us promptly adding you to the list).

Contact that we deem to be inappropriate may be documented under your entry for all to see, and may result in you being banned from this subreddit.

Harassment, death threats, bribery, and even setting your fanbase upon us will result in you being banned and all details added to your entry. If your actions are determined to be against Reddit's TOS, we may report you to the admins as well.

If you want to be removed from the list, you will need to message the mods to begin a 90 day evaluation period. Please read our list of Evaluation Do's and Don'ts. Once you start the 90 day probation period, you cannot pause, restart, or completely stop it.

During this evaluation, you will need to ask permission to use any stories and properly credit the authors of said stories. We will check. If the 90 days elapse and you have not had any incidents of copyright theft, we will remove you from the list.

If you claim to have followed these instructions and we find that you have lied, or you begin sharing stories without permission again, you will be marked as a "Legacy" report, and you will be permanently listed with no chance of removal.

If you contact us to request removal from the list, please be polite and patient. Repeatedly asking for status updates while we investigate may delay the process. If you are uncivil in your request at any time, we may restart the 90 day clock or mark you as a "Legacy" report and you will remain on the list permanently.

/r/SleeplessWatchdogs

4,491 Subscribers

2

"Fright Factory" imitator using AI and stealing from Reddit forums, gives no credit to authors.

1 Comment
2024/11/08
13:19 UTC

14

Another AI run channel stealing stories

https://www.youtube.com/@TheInternetSurfer01/videos

Found one of mine there. Already did a strike. It seems from the titles they take a mix of reddit content and not just nosleep stories. Please take a peek to see if you can find any of you work. I'm a bit busy to contact authors ion my end.

2 Comments
2024/10/30
23:53 UTC

8

3am Stories Stealing work with a TTS, no credit given

https://www.youtube.com/@3amStoriesYT/videos

Found one of mine, no credit and split into two parts. It's a smaller channel. I'm just so tired of this.

3 Comments
2024/10/30
23:45 UTC

5

AI Channel Sharing HYF Stories

URGENT: COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT - HELP REPORT THIS PAGE!

Hi all, I need your help to take down a page that’s blatantly stealing content and profiting from it. This page has been posting my stories from my old, now-deleted account without permission, and worse, he’s making money off it. The channel has around 130,000 subscribers, and it looks like he posts 2-3 videos a day, each containing stories from different authors, but here’s the kicker: he doesn’t credit any of the authors or link to their original work.

I reached out multiple times, first through Reddit, then Twitter, and even tried commenting on his videos, but he blocked me and removed all my comments. He claims that his page is monetized “to help the authors,” but it’s obvious he’s just using our content to make a profit.

Unfortunately, because my account where I originally posted the stories is deleted, I can’t submit a copyright claim through the usual channels. I’m hoping the community here can help by reporting his page for copyright infringement. It’s frustrating to see someone steal others’ hard work like this, and I know I’m not the only one he’s done this to.

Page Name: SciFi Stories @scifistories1977

If you’ve experienced something similar or know how we can bring attention to this, I’d greatly appreciate your support in getting this page removed. It’s time we stop people like this from exploiting creators.

Thank you all for any help you can provide!

3 Comments
2024/10/23
19:03 UTC

4

Suspicious AI channel

Hello. At first, sorry for my English, Im from Poland. I think i found problem with AI channel "Pan Nocy". https://youtube.com/@pannocy?si=LI2bKZRCnjbqbY3k Monetization is ON, but his stories, I GIVE MY OWN HAND that they're from nosleep. Please, if you can, check that channel. I did not found any credits to owners. A lot of these stories are very similiar to these that i read here on nosleep.

1 Comment
2024/10/15
07:26 UTC

8

Not outright plagiarism, but certainly toeing the line

I actually found this video because I'm doing research on the same, old nosleep from 2011.

For context, the original author of the story is long-absent on any social media (reddit, twitter, instagram, facebook), but the story is one of the "all time greats" of nosleep.

I'm planning on covering the story, but since the original author can't be contacted, I know I'm going to need to do a lot of additional research/revision to make it transformative and qualify for fair use under copyright law (hence, why I'm researching the topic in the first place).

Well, to my surprise, I found a history YT channel cover it as a halloween special, but not credit it, or even indicate it was from reddit.

That said, this guy DID 'rewrite' the story, and he seems to be a history channel, not a spooky narrator, so he probably grabbed the story from a google search and posted an adaptation without thinking about the implications.

That said, on the flip side, he didn't credit the original source anywhere I could find which is obviously not great.

He doesn't claim the work was his, and mentions it's "a single, second hand account" in the video a few times but never indicates where.

Anyway, figured it's worth putting here just so people can have their eyes out:

Original Story:

A terribly creepy story my grandpa used to tell me about his experience in World War II (warning: really long, but it pays off) : r/nosleep (reddit.com)

Questionable Video:

WW2: The Grim Horror of the Swiss Alps (Special Story) (youtube.com)

3 Comments
2024/10/11
06:39 UTC

14

Please blacklist Creekyhours

It's been over a year and I am still having to copyright infringement hit people with the stolen and modified version of my story. It's everywhere; YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, etc. Here's a link to my original post over a year ago with other people finding he shared their stories without permission commenting. This is a repeat offender who destroyed my story and now that pedo dad version is what people are seeing from robo readers. It's deplorable.

https://www.reddit.com/r/SleeplessWatchdogs/s/SruShoq2M7

4 Comments
2024/10/09
08:02 UTC

15 Comments
2024/10/06
16:37 UTC

6

Robin J Sparrow

Another Youtuber who not only steals stories but rewrites them as well. I found my 'Big Slurp' on there. Others may wish to take a peek.

https://youtube.com/@robinjsparrow?si=PF3IyoUZ0iiUods_

2 Comments
2024/10/05
20:59 UTC

10

I found a plagiarized story...well my second find. What can I do from here after reporting it?

Found on reddit, story called "I inherited a cabin in the woods. Something is hunting me"

ORIGINAL- https://www.reddit.com/r/nosleep/s/gS7uBRfjud

And if you press subscribe at the bottom the deleted user who posted it is u/DonquixoteRosey who posted it 3 years ago

PLAGIARIZED- https://www.reddit.com/r/nosleep/s/IVQRGJr8SI

The user who copied it and posted it 3 hours ago is u/Stark_Coyote_Primera

2 Comments
2024/10/02
10:23 UTC

5

Should I ask for permission to read and harshly critique some of “the classics”?

Hey, I just started a podcast last week where I read Creepypastas and newer stories from nosleep. However, in order to throughly analyze the direction that Creepypasta has gone as an internet phenomenon, I feel like I should read and criticize some of the “classics” like Jeff the Killer.

I don’t think I should need permission for certain stories like that because:

  1. What I am doing is going to be very transformative. For Jeff the Killer, I’m not just reading and shitting on the story, I am analyzing how it created a whole genre of “____ the killer” stories purely based on revenge, the possible origin of the image, etc.

  2. There are thousands of non-transformative existing readings of the property. My coverage of it wouldn’t even be a drop in the bucket in terms of content that covers it.

  3. What am I even going to say? “Hey man, your story sucks. Can I read it on my podcast?”

All of this stated, of course I will still give credit. However, I’m unsure if permission should be necessary in cases like this.

Note: I am only planning on doing this with the very largest and most unfortunately impactful stories in the medium like Sonic.exe, Squidward’s Suicide, and the most popular stories that spawned from them. If I’m doing a less-well-known poorly-aged “classic” like Pokemon Lost Silver, I of course intend to ask for permission.

8 Comments
2024/09/23
15:49 UTC

12

Glad I read this before I started posting, but....

This might be a stupid question, but oh well...

Is the best way to go about asking permission to narrate stories just via chat? I'm running into an issue where a lot of the stories I want to narrate are from accounts that have been away for years, and I'm being limited to like three chats on here. I'm assuming that some of the stories where we can no longer contact the authors are just going to be lost to time?

7 Comments
2024/09/16
03:20 UTC

0

But what if they link & tag the author?

Non-Monetized: After reading a lot of posts here; is it fraudulent or infringement for a non-monetization page to share a story and the author, providing the link to the story? Then IF MONETIZED: if they give HALF of proceeds?

8 Comments
2024/09/13
01:54 UTC

1

Need little help

Hi all , I want to translate Ted the caver. Does anyone know who the author of that creepy pasta ? Or is it copyright free ? Thanks in advance.

3 Comments
2024/09/07
02:14 UTC

10

A YouTube channel with artificial intelligence steals stories and makes fantastic profits from your stories. Wake up, storytellers, your work has gone for free. https://youtube.com/@horrorhutyt?si=VsXsW6tx0IsiQjid

6 Comments
2024/09/06
04:23 UTC

9

Hello everyone, I have found a new thief who is stealing dozens of stories https://youtu.be/fbJwNBG7Chc?si=kCTEfJ6qWVSt7pbm

11 Comments
2024/09/01
21:26 UTC

30

I'm Self-Reporting Myself (I didn't know I was stealing)

Hey all,

As the title says, I'm self-reporting my channel for using content without permission.

I'm a (brand, like, very VERY brand) new narrator in the horror space and uploaded my first 2 videos before reading up on the copyright/policies around these things.

(For those rightly wondering how that's possible, I essentially just googled stories on the topic I wanted, clicked the links directly to the reddit posts, and pulled them from there).

TLDR; I'm a bona-fide idiot for not reading up on the actual subreddit policies or even really thinking about copyright/IP before jumping in. Guess I was just excited to try this whole thing.

At any rate, I'm going through the videos I've posted (not too hard since there are only 2 containing a total of 4-5 stories) and reaching out to the authors now.

If any of them aren't okay with my posting or I don't hear back from them soon, I'll delete the videos and moving forward obviously just won't upload in the first place without asking first.

Obviously doing this all 'above board' is important to me or I wouldn't be 'telling' on myself, but I figure it's an honest public mistake so an honest public acknowledgement is in order. My channel is tiny (like, 10 subscribers), so obviously not monetized or anything yet, but I think it's more the principle that matters here.

--

So, let this be a lesson to you future new narrators. Don't be stupid. Don't be like me. Let my smooth-brain be a lesson of what-not-to-do.

Stay spooky friends,

Kell

22 Comments
2024/08/20
21:03 UTC

22

Reality Narritives is stealing work with no credit given.

I just reported one of his videos for copyright infringement for stealing one of my stories. He has a bunch of other stories on his channel and there is no credit given for any of them, so I highly doubt he is asking for permission. He's also changing the titles of the stories so not sure who stories he's taking. If I can match the stories to their writers I'll tag them here.

https://youtube.com/@reality_narratives?si=gE9W_G-KuhkDnv3_

3 Comments
2024/08/07
14:25 UTC

23

Problem about asking for stories, from a narrator

Hey everyone, I'm a narrator on YT.

In July I got my first ever ban and it was due to a TOS that reddit always had but never really enforced.

Messaging too many people, that are not expecting it can get you banned. Problem for narrators are, you have to message random people who are not expecting to use their stories.

Most subs have a zero tolerance to ask for stories in the comments. So the only way to get stories is to message people.

This not an excuse for thievery, but this does now send a wrench in the way of narrators who want to do it the correct way.

Edit: I have my own sub, website, and e-mail for stories to be submitted. I am very small and I read true and fictional stories. Yes I could write all my own fictional stories but I like to read and share others works.

This post wasn't about me per-say, it was about a reddit problem that is only going to be worse and I wanted it out there for this sub and narrators to know.

33 Comments
2024/08/01
14:23 UTC

21

Youtuber Poi (@WeirdPoi) seems to be stealing dozens of nosleep stories

He doesn't credit the videos at all, so I can't be sure of which ones are which, but his content is mostly non-credited nosleep stories:

https://www.youtube.com/@WEIRDpoi

The only one I saw before noticing the lack of credit was u/IncidentOk9368 "I still don't understand what happened to me in the Holly Hills Mall parking garage."

I have no idea if that person in particular just gave free reign or what, because there are tons of readings of this story. I didn't want to keep listening to the guy's voice or give him hits, so I didn't pick through the rest to see who else was in there. But if you're a nosleep writer, you should probably check to be sure he didn't steal your content, since there are no credits anywhere.

11 Comments
2024/07/20
03:46 UTC

29

“Eternal Darkness” YouTube channel narrating stories without permission

https://www.youtube.com/@EternalDarkness-/videos At least one of my stories was narrated here without permission, and I’ve recognized a few stories from other authors there without permission as well. The channel is monetized (or at the very least, has a patreon) and uses ai-generated art for its content. I was not asked for permission (and would have rejected it, because I don’t allow my stories to be used for monetization or in any AI related context).

The specific video where my story was used: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0c2WGDRm29k

17 Comments
2024/07/19
03:40 UTC

6

Narration Reel Thief — Factsfromziro

An AI narration channel called Factsfromziro has resurfaced, and is continuing to rip off reddit stories, uncredited. This time he’s on Instagram, which I hope will be more receptive to IP violation reports.

I encourage you to see if any of your work is on his account. https://www.instagram.com/factsfromziro?igsh=Y2EwcmY2Y3IzYXFz

4 Comments
2024/07/09
04:01 UTC

77

Dr Spooks has been stealing stories for his AI narration channel since 2022

Hey y'all. I'm here to report Dr Spooks (YT channel https://www.youtube.com/@Drspooks788 ). Not only is he stealing stories from online, he's using AI to narrate my *published* novels. He doesn't even read the stolen stories--he just uses an AI text-to-voice program. And, of course, it's monetized. :-(

Update: He claims to have removed my content, but it looks like his channel is nothing but stolen work with AI narrations over AI art. His latest video ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSNO5FerMAk ) contains stories by u/Rha3gar , u/searchandrescuewoods , u/The_Mad_Poptart , u/shadowswimmer77 , u/bryany97 , u/clover10176 , and a bunch more. And this is just in one of his videos.

He also appears to be using his AI program to narrate other novels as well from other published works outside of the internet/creepypasta communities.

Update #2: He's apparently removed *all* the content from his page.

Update #3: Looks like someone else gave him his third strike, because his page is now officially gone.

37 Comments
2024/06/23
04:07 UTC

29

Creepy Ghost Stories narrated and posted my partner's story without permission.

I don't really know what else to say. He went and found my partner's story from 11 years ago and decided to narrate and post it on his channel. Be aware of Creepy Ghost Stories on YouTube, I guess.

Here is the story: https://www.reddit.com/r/nosleep/comments/1nmmk0/obscurity_man/

Here is the stolen story on Creepy Ghost Stories' channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSw88aClThI

5 Comments
2024/06/19
01:39 UTC

29

New Content Farm TalesNet Stealing stories. Claiming "Fair use"

Channel Here

A Text To Speech channel with the text over tops of video game footage. So, a content farm.
Most of the videos are from other parts of reddit, like AITH or other popular threads. They have some stolen nosleep story with no credit to the authors.
After I filed a claim they sent a counter claim saying,
"The copyright claim that caused my video to be removed was a mistake, my video followed the principles of fair use, the video was creatively remastered, the original intent and content were changed in the video, and there are elements of parody and medley comparison in the video. All materials on my channel and on my videos are my intellectual property"

And

"I believe that you made a mistake by deleting my video, my video contains material that includes fair use principles, I edited the video at my home, the video was subject to creative processing, the original intent and content was changed in the video material, there are also parody and comparison elements in the video potpourri!"

Nah bro. There is nothing creative about putting a stolen story through a text to speech program and putting that over top of video game footage.

3 Comments
2024/05/17
23:39 UTC

10

I got my story narrated without credit or permission on a spotify podcast episode.

1 Comment
2024/04/13
11:39 UTC

5

Uh oh

8 year old post is being uploaded to tiktok probably without permission

3 Comments
2024/03/23
17:20 UTC

6

How do get permission to post peoples stories?

Hi! I’m looking to start a TikTok account where I post your stories on my account and I don’t know I can get permissions! Please let me know so I could post these good stories.

Thanks! If any of you guys do allow me to post your stories please let me know😊

5 Comments
2024/02/24
22:29 UTC

32

Augh. Another Channel Stealing stories.

Another update: Finally my story was removed. Thanks Youtube!

Update: This channel is refusing to delete the stolen work and is fighting back with Youtube saying my take down is fake. I'm going to refuse to back down. I'm sick and tired of my work getting stolen when I offer it for free for narrators to use. Only narrators. Not Text to speech channels like this one.

I'm about to leave for work. I found one of my stories stolen on this channel. It looks like the channel is a mixture of a lot of work. Some stolen content, some other stuff. Please look to see if you can find any of your stories used without permission.

The Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@Horrorstoriescorner1/videos

5 Comments
2024/02/16
18:59 UTC

19

*Sigh* Another AI channel stealing stories. Creepy Vibes

I found the story I posted on the 14th on this channel. I did not give permission and they did not ask. I put a strike on the stolen story so I hope it gets removed soon. Please look to see if you can find any of your stories. When I have time I'll try to track down writers and contact them.

Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@Creeepyvibes/videos

My stolen story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqK4JeLDV6k

1 Comment
2024/02/16
18:47 UTC

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