Multiple Teds

I first talked about Ted’s Woodworking almost 10 years ago, and then again in 2018. Ted McGrath offers 16,000 woodworking plans that he designed – so he says – but what “he” really offers is photocopies and scans of project pages from woodworking magazines without permission or compensation to either the publications or the true authors.

I put “he” in parenthesis above because “Ted McGrath” simply doesn’t exist. That smiling face you see on all those clickbait ads for his plans, and in the middle of the photo below, is just an image from iStockphoto.com.

But does Ted now have competitors? On Facebook recently, I had a page suggestion for “Buck’s Wood Shop.” I checked it out. He has 59,000 “likes,” and is followed by 65,000 people – wow, popular guy! Which is really odd since “Buck Connors” posts almost nothing but links to other sites and pages, and not many of those. The only original posts he makes are for his collection of 150 free plans on his website.

Sure enough, by supplying your email on his site you can get a link to 150 plans, so I signed up with one of my disposable email addresses. I not only got those plans, but I now get three or four emails a day with links to more. Trouble is, they’re all copies from woodworking magazines, including some by writers I know.

Meanwhile, having shown an interest in Buck, Facebook algorithms sent me an ad for “Walter Recommends,” another expert woodworker offering 150 free plans. “Walter Smith” does the same shtick: With an email (I used another fake one) you get a link to the plans, and daily emails for more.

But here’s the thing: At some point in getting links for free plans from Buck or Walter, there always comes up a link for, guess who? Ted’s Woodworking, of course. I did a reverse image search on ol’ Buck – you can see him on the right in the above photo – and found out that he’s also Clint’s Woodworking and two others, with the very same song and dance. The photo itself is from Adobe Stock Photos. My image search also revealed that “Buck” has four other Facebook pages, including one simply called “Woodworking Plans.” That one is also really popular, with 10,000 likes and 10,000 followers – pretty impressive considering the page has fewer than two dozen total posts.

Walter Smith, on the left in the above photo, was the same deal, same stock photo source, and links to the same free 150 plans. Same daily emails, and same eventual link to Ted’s Woodworking. Walter also has several variations of Facebook pages, again with a massive following but almost no real content. And in the end, like Buck, he’s just a Ted clone.

I don’t know how Ted’s Woodworking empire continues to exist. In the case of Facebook, Ted breaks about a dozen of their rules, and somehow continues to get away with it with almost 20 Facebook page variations. Elsewhere on the Internet, Ted can be found selling a by a variety of names like “Ryan’s Shed Plans,” “Wood Plan HQ,” and others. Just the copyright issues alone should shut him down. But eventually, everything always comes back to one place: Ted’s Woodworking.