eHow.com does not allow any kind of spam or plagiarism on their site.  Following are explanations and examples of each of eHow’s guidelines regarding spam, plagiarism, and trademarks.

SPAM

Spam of any kind is frowned upon, and some writers have been surprised to find that their articles have been removed from eHow’s data base on the grounds that they were considered spam.   Spammy articles include phrases like  “Please visit www.youravon.com/marysmith to see the latest products and get free shipping.”  Even if the article was a legitimate article about skin care, writers can’t build articles or steps around a link that will get them personal gains.   If you’d like to link your readers to a site that will benefit you financially, you must include those links in the “resources” section.  You can use a simple directive such as “see link in resources section,” but cannot include a spammy comment like, “…where you can purchase ____ for the low price of ____.”  Simply and gently point your reader in the direction of  your link and hope for the best.

Plagiarism

A lot of writers have been confused when they’ve learned that their articles  have been removed because of plagiarism violations.    Many think that in order to be considered plagiarism, their eHow articles must be a completely verbatim copy of the original article.  Not so.   If a song writer included the words, “Imagine all the people living life in peace,” in their otherwise completely original song, Yoko Ono could drag them to court for stealing the words that her husband (John Lennon) penned.   The same is true for a writer.   If you copy any part of a similar article, word for word, you have plagiarized the original article.   Even if you’ve re-worded 98% of the article, copying one or two sentences from your source could result in having your article pulled for plagiarism.

Trademarks

Brand names are generally frowned upon by eHow’s powers that be.  If a generic or like-product can be used to achieve the end result of your article, then use the generic name for it.  For example, if you used Crayola crayons to remove rust from bicycle handlebars, you should write your article using the word “crayons” rather than “Crayola crayons.”

The rules are fairly easy to understand an follow.  If you have any doubts, you can always ask fellow writers in the “Chatter” forum.