[thelist] Site Copycat (Special Circumstances Involved)

[Richard Bennett]

Hi,
----- Original Message -----
From: "David Bindel" <dbindel at austin.rr.com>

One thing to keep in mind is, he might seem like a clueless copycat whose
undercutting you and stealing your clients and work, but that's seen from
your point of view.
>From my point of view, as a tax-paying freelancer who has to support a
family, you are that annoying college student who is working from his
parents basement, undercharging his customers, making it harder for me to
ask a reasonable rate because there's always someones son who's studying IT
and will do it for less.
And I am the thorn in the side of larger webdev companies, because my hourly
rate is half of what they charge, because I don't have to employ someone to
do the job etc etc.
This is the way things are in business.
You have to position yourself by being positive about your own work, not by
wasting energy on putting others down.

I would suggest reading a few books about business psychology - one good one
I remember was called 'Getting past no' .
The essence is, to use the possitive aspects of a negative situation to your
advantage.

> Should I contact his hosting company about this blatant copying of my
> work? (we are hosted by the same company)
> etc...

All those options will make a bad situation worse.

> What else can I do?

You could use the situation to your advantage.
You can tell him that you enjoyed teaching him what he knows for free, but
once money is involved, you need your cut too, as partners.

You could decide decide to market php-driven site-templates, and use him as
a guinypig.

You could possition yourself as the local server-side guru,
>
> Thanks,
> David Bindel