BEING PROACTIVE ABOUT CONTENT DUPLICATION...
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So we all know that duplicate content is bad for SEO.
I was just thinking... Whenever I post new content to a blog, website page etc...there should be something I should be able to do to tell Google (in fact all search engines) that I just created and posted this content to the web... that I am the original source ....
so if anyone else copies it they get penalised and not me...
Would appreciate your answers...

regards,
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http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=1229920
Google is working on it. They implemented rel=author which is the above link. They do not accept the "first indexed is original" idea presently, but it could be taken as an indicator.
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Thanks for the response Ryan...again you were great help.

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As Ryan said, rel="author" would help.
Another thing which might help is an app called Tynt. It adds a little snippet of code for whenever your content is copied from your site, then attributes it to your domain by attaching a link when that copy is pasted. It's not fool proof of course and the url can be removed, but I like to think of it as one more 'safe guard' to attributing content to your site (plus it's good for link building).
One bit of advice I found useful is if you do link to other content on your site in your posts, to use absolute paths to your own domain, this way if your content is just scraped you at least get the direct link to your site as well and added kudos as being relevant to the topic even if the post is picked up by someone else.
Of course, none of this is fool proof, but it's just a couple of added aspects that might help your site benefit a little if your content is stolen.
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Daylan offers some good points. If you decide to use TYNT, you may want to consider AddThis which offers the same feature but also includes many social networking options.
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Thanks for this link & to break this MYTH that google accept that "first indexed is original"