Idea Thieves

Some people don’t see stealing the creativity of others as a big deal. I call those people idiots. 

I will unfollow or unfriend anyone who knowingly and routinely steals content from someone else. There are people who will tweet a famous line from a comedian and make it appear as if it’s their own. I’ve been known to respond to them with something like, “great line from Mitch Hedberg!” Some people don’t think of it as plagiarism but I do. Still, I realize I can’t fix the Internet and it has more problems than it knows.

Last week a radio host on a Toronto station read on air verbatim from my recent Sun House Proud column on mom caves. I suppose I should be flattered. The Toronto Sun thought enough of my piece to feature it on their homepage days after it ran. I had no idea it would create any controversy but I’ve gotten some feedback from men who think women have control of the whole house and don’t deserve a mom cave! This host felt the same way and had some fun with the idea on the air. That’s cool, but according to my reliable sources, he didn’t once mention that I wrote it or that it was from the Toronto Sun.

A professional does not do this. It’s rare these days that we ever have to use something from the paper but when we do, we give credit where it’s due. When I hosted a talk show, I’d sometimes use an idea from a column and always, always acknowledged the writer and the paper. Gone are the days in radio news where newscasters lift stories from print media without giving them credit. Say there’s a story about a man shot to death near Clinton while riding a horse. Police will only say that a “woman” was with him but the London Free Press says it has learned that the woman is the man’s wife. If you mention the wife angle on air, you attribute it to the Free Press. There will always be newscasters who skip this step and they are hacks. Journalists spend long hours working on digging up these little nuggets of information, especially when police won’t reveal much, and for another media outlet to simply take it without having done the work is showing poor form and disrespect.

So last week I was on the other side, flattered that something I had produced out of my own little head and put together with the help of some savvy contributors was thought worthy of discussion on air. But disappointed that the usual courtesy of acknowledgement went unobserved. It’s what separates the pros from the hacks.