Who's stealing who?

So, at the weekend my mother turned to me, rather concerned, and asked:

"Have you blocked me from Facebook?"
Me: "No, of course not"
Mother: "Only, I can't see what you've been up to"
Me: "That's because I've not been putting it on Facebook."
Brother: "We thought you'd gone quiet. Your sister-in-law thought your phone had been stolen or something"

At which point I relayed my previous observations.

And then everyone joined in.

Mother: "Well, this is why I don't post anything. I comment that I like a photo of someone's  and blood Scoobydoo will comment back on it and I have no idea who that Scoobydoo is!"
Sister-in-law: "The share button freaks me out. Before I know it, my baby is half way round the world. I'm starting to just email my pictures to the family now"
Brother: "It's always been possible to copy and repaste... it's just that before it took a knowledgable intentioni that you were stealing. These days everyone presumes that it's perfectly ok."

And that last point sums up the most recent problem.

I happened to be in London yesterday (22 May 2013). Fortunately I was nowhere neer Woolwich. However my Twitter feed caught fire. There was a really quite horrific and apparently religiously-extremistly-provoked murder. which sent everyone into a frenzy.

I don't know if I have moderated my Twitter friends more carefully than my Facebook friends; but with both the murder, and previously the death of Margaret Thatcher, the responses have been so much more civil and ethical than the crazy loons who have ranted on my Facebook feed.

Anyhow, to show just how easy it is for people to steal things in the internet day and age, lets have a look at a status related to the horrific murder...

One of my friends shared a status:

Wow. Over 27,000 shares in 8 hours. However one of my other friends shared another status:

Added 12 hours previously and - apparently as claimed by himself - written by Ian Yates. The problem is his original post hasas been shared by just over 12,000 people. Way less than half that the 'lifted' post has been shared.

This is quite an issue as the rather delightful Neal Mann has identified:

Fair use or stealing?Buzzfeed lifts almost 400 words of quotes from @telegraph's interview with heroic Woolwich woman bit.ly/16aeT8K
— Neal Mann (@fieldproducer) May 23, 2013

Now, this is a guy who does his research (as every proper journalist should, despite being 'new media' and therefore seen by the 'old media' as a shammish flybynight, which they are trying to piss on like a catepiller tries to piss on a butterfly):

Worth noting Buzzfeed has added absolutely none of their own reporting to that article & including headline added 129 words of description

— Neal Mann (@fieldproducer) May 23, 2013

And he properly follows it up:

Good to see @buzzfeedben get involved & cut down the amount of quotes Buzzfeed used from the @telegraph Woolwich hero article.
— Neal Mann (@fieldproducer) May 23, 2013

It again goes to show
1) what a risk social media can be about control of your IP
2) how laws have failed to keep up with these new developments
3) how devastatingly quickly these things go viral - as the bike tweet lady
4) how effective - and yet ineffective - the individual can be.