Your reviews aren't yours

Sitter Questions, Advice & Chat
1

So I just looked at my profile on another pet sitting site and saw they the original words I had imported from my THS reviews were now replaced with AI summaries.

After contacting the admins of the site, I learned that THS made them take all the imported reviews down. THS owns them.

So THS owns the words written about you and the words you have written about other people.

What is next - will they say the own the pictures we have uploaded to their website and that we can use them as we please?

I believe words written about me belong to me and the author.

2

Shocking if true. All the more reason to copy our reviews for safekeeping.

3

Yes, except that you can do anything with the copies. THS think they own those words.

4

Goes to show that THS is not only keeping an eye on the competition but being a bit of a bully about it too.

5

Fascinating. Same on my House Sit profile on another platform. Thanks for sharing the info. Is this screenshot the same “other” site you are referring to? Mine were initially verbatim and said Imported from THS. Looks very different now.

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6

Maybe they are starting to realise they might have killed the goose that laid the golden eggs :thinking:.

7

Is that the new site you told me about?

PS It’s 60 degrees and rainy here today. Nice change!

8

@Makelikeanapeman I am also on GPS and, after seeing your post, I checked my profile. Yes, mine are also summarized. As much as I dislike this, I feel the intent of my reviews will still give hosts a good idea of my profile. I have to think that TrustedHousesitters must feel a little threatened. I do wish more owners would sign up to this new site, given the membership is currently free. There are many sitter members there, so I would think it would be a great opportunity for owners.

9

Just checked my profile … and yes, it is true

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10

Yes it is! (I now see who “you” are jajajaja). Enjoy Cali.

11

Wow. That’s a pretty low road for THS to take. Sorry your experiencing that, but thanks for the warning. If we end up not renewing next year than I am going to screenshot reviews just in case.

12

This is tricky. They are “your” reviews, but they are other people’s words. It feels like THS’s arguments is that they own people’s words when those words appear on their site. So I wonder if I cut and paste my own profile or listing onto another site if THS could claim I stole from them? It’s part of the whole idea that with companies like THS we are both the customers and the product. You don’t simply “pay” for a membership, if you are a homeowner you provide photos and descriptions of your home which might appeal to potential sitters enticing them to join. If you are a sitter your photos and profile might appeal to homeowners thinking of joining. In addition your real worth is in diseminating discount codes which prolong your membership, but more implortanly to THS help bring in more members who think they are getting a "bargain.

The thing about my words is, if I leave my words on any review of anything anywhere, I’m not sure I’d like to see them exported somewhere else. I believe I could take down my reviews if I wanted to, but I couldn’t if I had no idea where in the web they were. It’s an interesting conundrum.

13

Yep. THS Terms and Conditions related to Feedback, Reviews, References (FRR Content)

12.3. You hereby assign to us with full title guarantee all intellectual property rights in all FRR Content and you hereby waive any claims you may have in the FRR Content. This means we own the FRR Content …

14

Correct me if I am wrong (I am sure you will) :wink:
The new pet sitting site allows you to import reviews quite easily and they have been summarised by AI.
What if you copied and pasted the reviews? I know it would be time consuming in some cases but would the same apply. Would THS even know if they hadn’t been imported.

15

@Twitcher sounds like they are monitoring the situation quite closely. Much like the social media forums. They aren’t in them all yet though.

16

I don’t ‘do’ social media so have been spared the ads as well.

17

Essentially importing reviews is copying and pasting. A screenshot is imported and the words are copied from the screen shot and pasted into your profile. So I don’t think doing it manually would make any difference.

18

It seems to me that a review is like giving a reference. It is something you give the other person that they can use to their benefit.

19

Claude`s take on the issue:

That is a great question to raise. Generally speaking, reviews written by others are the intellectual property of the person who wrote them, not the subject of the review. Technically, reproducing them on another platform without the reviewer’s permission could be a copyright issue, even if the review is about you.

That said, in practice this is a gray area, and enforcement is rare. A few things worth considering:

  • The terms of service of the platform where the reviews were originally posted may prohibit exporting or reproducing their content elsewhere.
  • The terms of service of the platform where you intend to repost them may have their own rules about this.
  • Adding a note such as “originally posted on TrustedHousesitters” would at least give proper attribution.

The safest approach would be to ask your reviewers for permission, or simply link to your profile on the original platform rather than copying the reviews directly.

20

Disgusting and arrogant. Reviews not only reflect the details of the sit but also nuances and subtlties about the writers which can never be gleaned from the cheap and lazy application of ai.

The “human-ness” of relationships is an essential component of each sit and each review.