Jill Dillard, former reality star from the shows 19 Kids and Counting and Counting On, stays in contact with her former viewers through social media platforms and her family’s website. After a recent update, Jill promoted her site a bit more, and added a new recipe. Drawn to the Dillard Family site through Jill’s social media posts, viewers noticed something about her recipes and quickly called her out. Inquisitr reported recently on commenters accusing Mrs. Dillard of plagiarism, and it seems she took it to heart. Her website has now been updated, including a disclaimer and partial credits for some recipes or photos.
A page archived two days ago shows that the Jill Dillard’s newest recipe used to end with a copyright warning.
“The photos above are considered the property of the Dillard Family and may only be used with their written permission. Please request permission to use the photos.”
Following the criticism on Dillard’s social media pages, and reporting of the story, there’s a new disclaimer added.
“Disclaimer: Recipes on this site are a collection of our favorites. Some are our own recipes and others may have not originate on our site and/or have been adapted from other sites.”
Dillard has also added a credit, though without a link. (The original recipe can be found here.)
“Photo credit & original recipe: Allrecipes.com”
Jill doesn’t mention whether she has received permission to use the photo.
Jill has updated other recipe pages, too. On a recipe for The Jennings’ Salsa, Jill now notes that the photo she used came from the website of Chili’s restaurant chain.
Photo credit: chili’s
The recipe for Momma’s Homemade Yeast Rolls now credits Maangchi for the photo.
As Inquisitr reported previously, Jill Dillard’s recipe for Chicken Momo includes advice to check the attached video — but there’s no video on Dillard’s page. Jill’s recipe also advises the user to purchase pre-made patties from a local Indian or Chinese store.
Now, Dillard has updated the page on her website to credit Check Please for the recipe, and Pinterest for the image. Check Please does host a similar recipe from Himalayan Restaurant, but there are notable differences, such as advising the reader to find a video for wrapping instruction, rather than suggesting one is attached. The update of the page adds a short credit line, but doesn’t remove this error, which gives the appearance of a copy-and-paste without review. Jill Dillard’s version also includes directions for making sauce, not included in the site she says is her source.
Images on Pinterest typically belong to a wide range of websites, as Pinterest is a tool for collecting links, not a provider of content. PC World delved deeply into this in 2012, but the short of it is that one complaint content owners had against Pinterest is that individuals might do exactly what Jill Dillard may have done: use an image and credit Pinterest, rather than the actual creator or owner of the image.
It’s not the only recipe where Jill’s attribution is being questioned. One Twitter user noted that, while Jill has updated her website to credit All Recipes for photo and recipe on her Cheese-Filled Pupusas page, the photo actually appears to be from Zestuous. However, the text doesn’t appear to match recipes on either site. Instead, Dillard’s recipe is most similar to this one on a site called Delicious El Salvador.
If Jill has made a simple error, some of her viewers aren’t buying it. On her social media post sharing her recipe, a commenter going by the ironic name Stuffed Zucchini pointed out that the Dillard family is aware that copyright law exists, and applies to online content.
“…her website makes it very clear that pictures of her and her family are her property and nobody can use them without written permission or whatever. So she knows that taking other people’s pictures and content is wrong.”
Other viewers are attempting to call the attention of companies and organizations that may own some of the photos on the Dillard Family site.
It is not currently clear whether any copyright holders have contacted Derick and Jill Dillard, or whether they will further update their website with more information about ownership of photos and other content. Jill and Derick remain very much in a public spotlight after their abrupt departure from Counting On, and Derick Dillard’s online comments about a transgender child who is also a reality star.