4 ms·

How is it morally gray? Who exactly is being harmed? What this guy did is the definition of the hacker ethos. I could even make a compelling argument that he's

by noego 8y ago

How is it morally gray? Who exactly is being harmed? What this guy did is the definition of the hacker ethos. I could even make a compelling argument that he's made the world a better place through this project.

WilliamEdward 8y ago
Copyright infringement.
ritchiea 8y ago
Taking content from public accounts to repost without permission for your profit is definitely morally gray.
- 1024core 8y ago
  It's no different than, say, "re-tweeting".
  - minimaxir 8y ago
    Retweeting/Quote tweeting preserves the source tweet intact.
- noego 8y ago
  Sites like Reddit are also profiting off of content produced by other companies such as NYTimes. Companies whom Reddit has certainly not obtained permissions from. Is that morally gray as well? If the "aggrieved" party in his manufactured controversy are the other content creators on Instagram, shouldn't they be the ones to decide whether his behavior is problematic or not? If the allegedly aggrieved party isn't flagging his account and isn't upset about his behavior, why do uninvolved 3rd parties feel the need to jump in with moral judgements?
  - ritchiea 8y ago
    It's not manufactured controversy, the biggest accounts who are successful from these aggregation without permission practices are constantly under criticism from the creators whose work they are profiting off. If you think this is "manufactured" google "Fat Jew" or "Fuckjerry" those are 2 Instagram accounts that creators led unfollow protests against because they profit from other's content. There's a ton of criticism of these practices, it's morally grey at best, I believe it's morally wrong. It's not hard to see why this upsets creators. There are thousands of actual content creators, artists, comedians, writers, etc working on social media to make a name for themselves and develop a following (or maintain a following, some of the people aggregators steal from are very successful). These people do the hard work of making original content that is interesting. They suffer failure, they launch new projects and ideas and do a ton of hard work. Then the aggregator accounts skim off the top of the entire network, don't pay the creators and end up with thousands to millions in ad money without doing any of the original & difficult creative work. Rip off at scale is far more lucrative than doing the hard work of making original material. But the lower effort rip off at scale is only possible profiting off of people doing hard work for free.
    - noego 8y ago
      I googled fatjew and fuckjerry as you suggested. Their entire controversy originated because they reposted other people's content without attribution. That's what made it a valid controversy. That's what makes this a manufactured controversy. http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/02/how-instagram-enables-fuckjerrys-success.html http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/02/how-instagram-enables... "Threatened by the backlash, Ostrovsky promised to attribute everything that he posted to its source in the future... Tebele and other meme account admins instituted similar policies, and the controversy died down"
umvi 8y ago
Well, 2 things mainly: 1. Auto scraping other people's photos and reposting is a bit morally gray. He claims he stopped doing this in an edit to the article and now only scrapes royalty free stock photos 2. (Automatically?) posts guaranteed positive reviews for restaurants in exchange for goods (without disclosing this fact?) It would be one thing if he got a free meal in exchange for an honest review (good or bad). But an automated, guaranteed good review without disclosing you received a free meal is slimy in my book because it breaks down the trust of the review system. How can you tell if the ratings are from real people or paid bots? "Cool Movie" was rated two thumbs up by 10/10 critics!! vs. "Cool Movie" was rated two thumbs up by 10/10 critics!!* *All critics were given a free trip to Disneyland in exchange for two thumbs up rating

by noego 8y ago

WilliamEdward 8y ago

ritchiea 8y ago

Taking content from public accounts to repost without permission for your profit is definitely morally gray.

1024core 8y ago
It's no different than, say, "re-tweeting".
- minimaxir 8y ago
  Retweeting/Quote tweeting preserves the source tweet intact.
noego 8y ago
Sites like Reddit are also profiting off of content produced by other companies such as NYTimes. Companies whom Reddit has certainly not obtained permissions from. Is that morally gray as well? If the "aggrieved" party in his manufactured controversy are the other content creators on Instagram, shouldn't they be the ones to decide whether his behavior is problematic or not? If the allegedly aggrieved party isn't flagging his account and isn't upset about his behavior, why do uninvolved 3rd parties feel the need to jump in with moral judgements?
- ritchiea 8y ago
  It's not manufactured controversy, the biggest accounts who are successful from these aggregation without permission practices are constantly under criticism from the creators whose work they are profiting off. If you think this is "manufactured" google "Fat Jew" or "Fuckjerry" those are 2 Instagram accounts that creators led unfollow protests against because they profit from other's content. There's a ton of criticism of these practices, it's morally grey at best, I believe it's morally wrong. It's not hard to see why this upsets creators. There are thousands of actual content creators, artists, comedians, writers, etc working on social media to make a name for themselves and develop a following (or maintain a following, some of the people aggregators steal from are very successful). These people do the hard work of making original content that is interesting. They suffer failure, they launch new projects and ideas and do a ton of hard work. Then the aggregator accounts skim off the top of the entire network, don't pay the creators and end up with thousands to millions in ad money without doing any of the original & difficult creative work. Rip off at scale is far more lucrative than doing the hard work of making original material. But the lower effort rip off at scale is only possible profiting off of people doing hard work for free.
  - noego 8y ago
    I googled fatjew and fuckjerry as you suggested. Their entire controversy originated because they reposted other people's content without attribution. That's what made it a valid controversy. That's what makes this a manufactured controversy. http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/02/how-instagram-enables-fuckjerrys-success.html http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/02/how-instagram-enables... "Threatened by the backlash, Ostrovsky promised to attribute everything that he posted to its source in the future... Tebele and other meme account admins instituted similar policies, and the controversy died down"

umvi 8y ago

Well, 2 things mainly: 1. Auto scraping other people's photos and reposting is a bit morally gray. He claims he stopped doing this in an edit to the article and now only scrapes royalty free stock photos 2. (Automatically?) posts guaranteed positive reviews for restaurants in exchange for goods (without disclosing this fact?) It would be one thing if he got a free meal in exchange for an honest review (good or bad). But an automated, guaranteed good review without disclosing you received a free meal is slimy in my book because it breaks down the trust of the review system. How can you tell if the ratings are from real people or paid bots? "Cool Movie" was rated two thumbs up by 10/10 critics!! vs. "Cool Movie" was rated two thumbs up by 10/10 critics!!* *All critics were given a free trip to Disneyland in exchange for two thumbs up rating