That’s what one online retail merchant might want to claim after his company was hit with a potentially multimillion-dollar suit over allegations of plagiarism.
In a suit filed at U.S. District Court in Baltimore, the parent company of EvesAddiction.com claims competitors OverstockSilver.com and LikeTiffany.com ripped off its website with product images and text to gain hits and confuse Internet shoppers.
The companies don’t involve the adult entertainment or sex toys and novelties industries but the case illustrates how the Internet has become an increasingly competitive sales arena, even with wholesalers and retailers. In this case retailer EvesAddiction.com was OverstockSilver.com’s and LikeTiffany.com’s wholesaler.
The suit contains five pages of what appears to be word-for-word copying of content — down to a typographical error.
Earlier this year, Michael Cooke, owner of OverstockSilver.com and LikeTiffany.com, was confronted by EvesAddiction.com owner Ray Galeotti, but Cooke denied the plagiarism charges, prompting Galeotti to file infringement claims for each element of the website.
Galeotti’s company, EvesAddiction.com, has asked for up to $150,000 per individual infringing act by the defendant, as well as all profits from OverstockSilver.com and LikeTiffany.com.