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Early last year I implemented several new and unique features on Neocamera and most have been copied by DPReview.

They announced the latest one this morning. It is called 'My Short List' there while on Neocamera, it is called 'Camera Bag' which I explained in a blog post last September. They had a vague announcement in March for the previously copied features, which I had also since last September, basically search engines for cameras and lenses by features or specifications.

It is obvious that those are the same features but they are presented differently. So this is not a case of design or style being copied, only the capabilities. Once you look at them, you see that there is an uncanny overlap in functionality.

Can something be done about it? In case it matters, my site is based in Canada while theirs is registered in the UK. It belongs to Amazon, not sure which corporate entity.

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A Drupal view with exposed filters can be used to create something like those feature searches with almost no actual code being written. While these features are certainly convenient, they are not particularly unique. Your sites are in competition. You're going to steal ideas from each other. The actual problem is doing things better.

Unless you can prove they somehow stole actual, proprietary code, or you have some sort of trademark or patent like Amazon's on "one-click" shopping, I doubt you have any case at all.

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According to DP Review, it took them several months. That was the account on my side too. We only make it look simple :) I suspect you are right about the case though, it is about idea copying. They certainly have the capacity to write the code having a bigger team and budget. – Itai Apr 28 '11 at 3:28
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"or patent like Amazon's on "one-click" - remember though that software is not patentable in most countries outside north America. – UpTheCreek Apr 28 '11 at 7:36
@UptheCreek Good point; I did gloss the geography in the question. But overall I don't think it's too important here. My underlying point was more that some form of provable wrongdoing is the only thing that can really be followed up on. In the absence of actual theft, a feature is just the expression of an idea, and that's even less patentable(if that applies where you live). – Su' Apr 29 '11 at 3:38

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