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  • What to do if someone completely rips-off your product?

    Ramit Koul
    12 replies
    A recent launch of orbic ai today here on product hunt has bring notice to me that the product they have launched is a complete ripoff of my product (ainave). With all the AI tools data and UX, they are kind-off rebranding on our efforts of developing a good and useful AI platform without any consent or credits and this does not feels right. I admire if someone tries to get inspired from my product but this is just a pure copy/paste. I have reported the launch post and linkedin post but still, I don't think it's going to make any impact as we are a small team and don't have much social media power to counter this. All of this is happening before our upcoming launch is near soon and this is really heart breaking. Any feedback or help would be greatly appriciated!

    Replies

    André J
    Why do you think they ripped you off? What specifically did they rip of? It does not look the same to me. Only similarity is that it's an AI directory website. which there are 1000s of out there. And there is no copyrights regarding tech idea, design, or functionality. You can add copyrights to a brand. But that's about it. You can try to add patents as well, but that mostly apply to hardware. It's very difficult to add patents to software. The only way to create a moat that people can't rip off is to make advance technology that is hard to make in the first place.
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    Ramit Koul
    @sentry_co I have listed some things in this doc: t[dot]co/sAXMsICtsi Have a look at this. I know that it is also one of the AI directoy website and there are 1000s already but try to understand my point here. The tools data and all is 100% scraped and copied from our website which is explained in the doc itself. I might not be suprised if they get plagarism action from search engines as well. Not only that, even the smallest details are litterally copy/pasted. I really would have loved if they had acknowledged and got inspired from us but it is not the case. What do you call a product which has the exact same data (plagiarized) and almost same UX? A rip-off? Hope you get some understanding after reading the doc.
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    Ramit Koul
    @sentry_co Checkout more one thing I just noticed. They modified the auto-gpt and bing image creator page url and content as it was mentioned in the doc earlier with the screenshot. See, these guys are quite literally the fraudsters who now have feared of any action we might take. Believe me, I have never used these kind of strong words before but this is something where I cannot resist.
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    André J
    @ramitkoul In tech you have to build a moat to protect you. AI directory sites can for instance build traction as a moat. A brand people talk about. That will protect you from copycats. There are 1000s of product hunt copycats. but PH doesn't care. they have traction. I would not worry about orbic. Focus on your self. Focus on building momentum and copycats will die off. In fact take it as a compliment that they thought your idea was so nice they decided to build a similar idea. As for the data they scraped. If data is public, it's there to be scraped. no rules that can protect you on this. What you can do is to try and find something that differentiates you from the competition. Try to find a moat they can't copy.
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    Ramit Koul
    @sentry_co Thanks for your words! I completely agree with you that the copy cats will die eventually and we also are not just trying to be an AI tools directory. Infact, our next launch is somewhat which we believe is truly promising and not only that, we will find that moat someday. But, since we are small right now, maybe that's why it's hard to see people on product hunt supporting a rip off more than the original itself. Anyways, Thanks for the advice!
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    André J
    @ramitkoul Don't worry about copy cats, its apart of the game. But do point it out of course. Momentum is the ultimate moat, just focus on your self and you will. It's impossible to compete with people on a mission fueled by momentum and traction. 🚀
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    Marienelle Cano
    Well it depends, because if someone just copied the concept I think it's not that bad, but if our brand name was copied and obviously imitated, then I would like to make an appeal hahahah But for me our brand can't be ripped off by a cheap developer haha
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