Copyscape

As writers, our written word is worth its weight in gold. For some it is how the bills are paid. It's a hard business to be in, and there are more people out there looking to scam you than you might realize.

Thus, I present this awesome tool I just discovered called Copyscape. I'm told businesses use this to monitor their intellectual properties, but I see no reason why us writers can't use it, too. Once you write your story/article/poem/recipe for pipe bombs and send it off to your grateful (and hopefully paying) client you are assuming that they will publish or post your works as agreed.

But...what if they *gasp* take advatange of your work?

How would you even know that your supposedly honest client didn't just change a few proper nouns and then sell it again somewhere else at a profit? Some contracts actually allow for that, so maybe this isn't a concern of yours (since once the thing is sold, it kind of stops being yours anyway). But if that's happening are you sure your name isn't still attached?

Using Copyscape requires that you have a source to compare to, meaning your story needs to already be online. If you have webspace already then you're golden. If not, there are a lot of free services available for temporary webhosting. I'm not saying this service will save your from having your name posted where you don't want it, but it's an interesting, if not resourceful, tool to use just in case.