Needless to say, SiliconIndia's views were taken apart through hundreds of comments - and within hours mini-debates began taking shape involving role of 'big' media, ineffectual cyber laws relating to online media, social media and the declining quality of journalism and journalists. This citizen journalist spoke with Prasant Naidu about content theft on part of SiliconIndia, the media industry, rookie journalists, and cyber laws.

CJ: Last heard, SiliconIndia has sealed its lips after you brought the charge of plagiarism against them in relation to one of its stories.  which you say were copied in part, and partly re-written on the basis of your original interview on your blog. Apart from creating awareness on social media, are you planning to take legal action?

Prasant Naidu: They tried everything and have gone silent now after deleting the article. I am talking to the mainstream media to feature this story, and some of them have shown interest. Apart from that I have spoken to one person on Twitter who is a lawyer, and specializes in copyrights. Rest everyone is saying that go the legal way but we all know that it is not easy.

CJ: In many ways, Lighthouse Insights pipped SiliconIndia to the post, with its interview with the renowned blogger and human resource expert Gautam Ghosh. Do you think the hurried piece by SiliconIndia about Ghosh was an attempt to catch up with the competition?

Prasant Naidu: They (SiliconIndia) believe in content farm whereas we believe in writing about a particular niche. SiliconIndia thought that they will do and no one will know about it. But then it is the Internet age, and you will come to know about it from some source. Here is the unique id of the tweet from Twitter, so that your readers are sure about the authenticity of the tweet.  https://twitter.com/lhinsights/status/235356308897947650.

CJ: Do you think the one and only tweet from SiliconIndia, justifying copying content, was made by a rookie for which SilconIndia is paying a heavy price?

Prasant Naidu: They were insane to tweet like that from a handle, which was last active in 2010. Now when you know people are angry about you, first you won't do like that, and if they had a rookie, then the company really does not care about it's online reputation being a tech news site. By the way, they tweeted close to 5-6 tweets to me, and to people who were supporting #occupysiliconindia, and when they saw the backlash they deleted all the tweets in a hurry. But you can't delete things on the Internet. The deleted article and tweets are with me. Their PR failed and they have zero knowledge about social media.

CJ: Did SiliconIndia underestimate the strong response it is facing on social media after a clear charge of plagiarism was made out against it?

Prasant Naidu: Yes they did. They thought that we would keep quiet. Being a social media believer I can't, and this is not the first time that it is happening. We have just raised a voice, and we have used social media extensively.

CJ: A lot of junior writers, especially working for online content companies, don't know the basics of reporting and responsible re-writing. Did a junior resource bungle up, and then showed bravado or did the editorial management try to disparage the charge of plagiarism in the hope that the reaction would die down?

Prasant Naidu: Before deleting the article, Silicon India had called me to say that they can delete the article or give credit to sort out the matter when #occupysiliconindia started trending on Twitter. I wanted an apology, which they are yet to give. The reason they gave, and most of the sites will give, was that it was a poor junior who did the article, and we have fired him or her. But I have two questions for SiliconIndia - trusting that they are telling truth - 1) a junior was asked to cover a story on Gautam Ghosh who is a reputed blogger in India and 2) the junior, if considered so, doesn't know anything about giving credit then why did he/she remove the link from Drizzlin, which was a internal link to one of our articles. It clearly shows that it was a smart move. Rest, what I have heard on Twitter, and seeing the content of SiliconIndia, I can tell that this is not a new practice, only thing is that we have spoken out and social media has added the fire to our fight.

CJ: How does Vinaya, co-founder at Lighthouse Insights, feel about the episode with SiliconIndia?

Vinaya Naidu: I am enraged and deeply ashamed of these older publishing giants who indulge in stealing content from blogs like ours, especially in the digital age. Their statement "We have the liberty to copy-paste since we are a news site" reflects a deeply ingrained philosophy they have been living by since the 15 years. All it needed was an apology from SiliconIndia! 

CJ: What laws related to plagiarism and copyright can India adopt from other countries to reduce content providers resorting to plagiarism?

Prasant Naidu: This is tough to answer since we don't appreciate the power of blogging in our country so implementing laws won't be an easy task. At present, you can put a DMCA complaint at Google's site but as I have learnt now, these sites who master the art of plagiarism know how to fool it. I wish we had laws where the site could be blocked for a while as a punishment, and a compensation was provided for the duration the article was on the site.