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The folks doing the ripping off here probably don't even see it as such. While it's easy to attribute something like this to malice, it's saner to attribute it

The folks doing the ripping off here probably don't even see it as such. While it's easy to attribute something like this to malice, it's saner to attribute it to staggering incompetence and lack of introspection. Pity the poor fools who are so unable to do something original that they must stoop to claiming someone else's originality as their own. I've seen exactly this sort of thing before in all sorts of walks of life, from school work to academia, from corporate environments to international politics - a bunch of mediocre, confused, out of their depth but don't know it types take someone (singular or plural) else's idea, barely repackage it, claim it as their own, wholeheartedly convince themselves that it is their own, and run with it - far too often somehow winning the battle of hearts and minds, as when the original author comes along going "Oi!", their readership or allies go "sore loser". I've learned by this point in life to take people using my work, even if they do so spitefully or in ignorance, as a compliment. Fabricators usually get shown up sooner or later.

stevesearer 11y ago
This is true in my experience as well. Originally there was the concept of reblogging where one site would publish something original and others would publish a small excerpt with a clearly defined link to them. From there came the idea of the [via] link where another site published its own article based on information from the original publisher and attributed a small link. And from there it seems like there is just so much republished content that sites think of the information as just public information and glean from wherever without any sort of attribution.
- lexicalscope 11y ago
  I find this amusing because I'm generally suspicious of sites that don't include some form of reference to wherever the information was retrieved - perhaps a habit from when I did more stuff in academia. Things don't exist in vacuum except things that are basically pure opinion articles - just about everything else is based on something and should probably be showing it. Maybe that's just me though.
- benologist 11y ago
  I think AOL pioneered "discrete attribution", years ago their content farming strategy leaked and one of the big priorities was "recirculating traffic" by ensuring as many links as possible go to their own properties - http://www.businessinsider.com/the-aol-way?op=1 http://www.businessinsider.com/the-aol-way?op=1
- Retra 11y ago
  Throughout most of human history, any information you could find was always public. Private information is a social construct, and not one that often advantages individuals to concern themselves with.
Terr_ 11y ago
I see it expressed in comic form [0] quite frequently. [0] http://nedroidcomics.tumblr.com/post/41879001445/the-internet http://nedroidcomics.tumblr.com/post/41879001445/the-interne...
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
dbbolton 11y ago
>While it's easy to attribute something like this to malice, it's saner to attribute it to staggering incompetence and lack of introspection. I.e. Hanlon's razor: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor
FLengyel 11y ago
Fabricators will get shown up later rather than sooner by someone else if one insists upon making excuses for them.
hitekker 11y ago
One thing I've noticed is that those who come out of the woodwork to mitigate the impact of thieving tend to be of the same mentality as the thief. Yes, a person can normally defend many matters without being attacked as identifying with any one matter. Yet this is one of those subjects, like plagiarism, where you would have to be ignorant or a thug to justify it.
JustSomeNobody 11y ago
They are probably the same people who complained when their teachers in college gave them "C"'s because they didn't properly attribute, also. I guess some people don't ever learn to be nice citizens. (Note: Yes, I know the MIT license doesn't require it. I can read. But reading the Medium article, they KNEW they were replacing minimaxir, etc with "The Author". Doing this is really showing their ass.)
dspillett 11y ago
> The folks doing the ripping off here probably don't even see it as such. But I'm pretty sure many of them would if they saw it happening to their original works. A fair number of times I've seen people accused of copying stuff that someone else copied form elsewhere (certain petty contacts I have on facebook who find jokes, repeat them without attribution, and don't like them being repeated again similarly without attribution). It often amuses me more than the original joke...

stevesearer 11y ago

This is true in my experience as well. Originally there was the concept of reblogging where one site would publish something original and others would publish a small excerpt with a clearly defined link to them. From there came the idea of the [via] link where another site published its own article based on information from the original publisher and attributed a small link. And from there it seems like there is just so much republished content that sites think of the information as just public information and glean from wherever without any sort of attribution.

lexicalscope 11y ago
I find this amusing because I'm generally suspicious of sites that don't include some form of reference to wherever the information was retrieved - perhaps a habit from when I did more stuff in academia. Things don't exist in vacuum except things that are basically pure opinion articles - just about everything else is based on something and should probably be showing it. Maybe that's just me though.
benologist 11y ago
I think AOL pioneered "discrete attribution", years ago their content farming strategy leaked and one of the big priorities was "recirculating traffic" by ensuring as many links as possible go to their own properties - http://www.businessinsider.com/the-aol-way?op=1 http://www.businessinsider.com/the-aol-way?op=1
Retra 11y ago
Throughout most of human history, any information you could find was always public. Private information is a social construct, and not one that often advantages individuals to concern themselves with.

Terr_ 11y ago

I see it expressed in comic form [0] quite frequently. [0] http://nedroidcomics.tumblr.com/post/41879001445/the-internet http://nedroidcomics.tumblr.com/post/41879001445/the-interne...

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

dbbolton 11y ago

>While it's easy to attribute something like this to malice, it's saner to attribute it to staggering incompetence and lack of introspection. I.e. Hanlon's razor: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor

FLengyel 11y ago

Fabricators will get shown up later rather than sooner by someone else if one insists upon making excuses for them.

hitekker 11y ago

One thing I've noticed is that those who come out of the woodwork to mitigate the impact of thieving tend to be of the same mentality as the thief. Yes, a person can normally defend many matters without being attacked as identifying with any one matter. Yet this is one of those subjects, like plagiarism, where you would have to be ignorant or a thug to justify it.

JustSomeNobody 11y ago

They are probably the same people who complained when their teachers in college gave them "C"'s because they didn't properly attribute, also. I guess some people don't ever learn to be nice citizens. (Note: Yes, I know the MIT license doesn't require it. I can read. But reading the Medium article, they KNEW they were replacing minimaxir, etc with "The Author". Doing this is really showing their ass.)

dspillett 11y ago

> The folks doing the ripping off here probably don't even see it as such. But I'm pretty sure many of them would if they saw it happening to their original works. A fair number of times I've seen people accused of copying stuff that someone else copied form elsewhere (certain petty contacts I have on facebook who find jokes, repeat them without attribution, and don't like them being repeated again similarly without attribution). It often amuses me more than the original joke...