I Put the Fun in Defunded

I don't do this very often, but get ready for an angry rant.

Do you see this pretty dress?  Who would have thought a few little dresses like this could lead to so much trouble?  But, they did.  You, see I have done a series of posts reviewing dresses like this--that is to say imposters.  I didn't know they were dupes when I first purchased a couple of them, but I quickly learned the hard way.  These dresses are advertised with stolen photos and then when someone places an order, factories scramble to try to make a facsimile of that stolen photo.  So I decided to investigate to see if some of these companies were legit and it was just a few bad seeds.  Turns out, it's all of them.

But, do you know who got in trouble, darling?  Was it the companies stealing photos?  Was it the factories stealing designs?  Was it the marketplace allowing them to profit?  No, it was me.  For talking about them.  I've been demonetized by Blogger and Google because of "promoting counterfeit goods."  Hmmmmmmmmm.  Let's talk about that.

First of all "counterfeit" is a legal term which according to Google means:  made in exact imitation of something valuable or important with the intention to deceive or defraud  I'm not making anything or selling anything here.  I provided links to the specific dresses I review, but I don't profit off of that in any way, shape, or form.  I also, always include the link for the original designer dress, also without any profit for myself.  Furthermore, I have been nothing but honest about the fact that these dresses are knock-offs, I have provided honest, unbiased, extensive reviews.  So, how exactly am I intending to deceive or defraud anyone?  It is the sellers, the factories, and the marketplace, not myself, who are intending to deceive people with stolen photos, stolen designs, and fake reviews. 

So, all the thousands of penny pincher blogs out there that have been telling people for years to buy the off-brands of cereal to save money, are somehow doing something different from what I'm doing?  No, they're saying, "hey, someone's making a cheaper alternative to this.  It may not be as good, but it will save you money."  Does that mean those bloggers will be labeled as counterfeiters or promoting counterfeit goods?  No, they're praised as helping people save money.  Why?  Let's face it, Malt O Meal's Tootie Frooties is totally ripping off Kellog's Fruit Loops.  Malt O Meal is counterfeiting, not the bloggers who talk about it as a money saving option.

 If Google actually cared about stopping this sort of thing those are the people they would go after, and they easily could ban or penalize sites like Ali, but they don't.   They went after me.  I was told to remove my posts or be defunded.  I could remove the posts, except those posts have been among my most popular with so many people telling me they are glad that someone warned them before they spent money on dresses that were not going to look like the photos.  Beyond that, I am just so tired of being told what I can say and to whom, tired of being told how I should look, act, dress, think.   So, I've decided not to remove the posts.

Plus, the joke is on them, because in the five years I've been using blogger, do you know how much money I've made from Google AdSense? $0.00.  That's right.  This is a hobby for me; it's not my source of income.  I do this for fun, so they can't dangle that over my head.  It's my blog and I'll do what I want.  

I understand that it's being hosted by Blogger, so I don't have total autonomy, but I'm not doing anything illegal and as I mentioned, if they actually cared about this issue they'd go after the people who are making and selling these goods, not people like me who are just talking about them, saying they exist, and calling out the lies. 

I really hate censorship.  And, I really, really hate it when people attack my integrity, especially when those people are some of the most power-crazed and crooked people on the planet.  Rant officially over.  I'll go back to smiling and wearing pretty dresses now.

By the way, I do not recommend this dress at all!  It looks nothing like the original PINK IVY Dress from Teuta Matoshi, they promised to send photos for my approval before shipping it and didn't, and it arrived with a stain on it.  I don't recommend doing business with Verngo as this happened with two out of three dresses I purchased there.