Why It’s Not Okay to Steal My Tweets
Corporate entertainment emcee NYC
This post has been simmering in the back of my mind for a while now, and I’ve never seen any articles addressing this topic – so I think it’s time to finally let it out.
Since 2009, my company, TrivWorks – which produces creative team building activities for adults in NYC and beyond by using live customized trivia, as well as New York City corporate event entertainment – has operated a Twitter feed, @TrivWorks. It’s proven to be a very useful tool, particularly with regards to brand awareness/exposure & definition, engaging our audience, forming new strategic partnerships, public event announcements/updates, and helping us spread ideas & blog posts such as this, to provide useful information to would-be clients and help move our industry forward.
As any social media or brand manager knows, Twitter is about more than just promoting your own stuff; in order to appear compelling and appealing to others, you have to do more than just talk about how awesome you are, and tell people to buy from you – you need tweets intended to offer a “feel” for what you are about. Particularly with entertainment brands like mine, there must therefore be an aspect to your Twitter feed which isn’t intended to makes sales, but rather to entertain, pure and simple.
One of my personal strengths – for better or for worse – has always been my sharp wit. My zingers have gotten me into trouble many a time ever since childhood, and my puns are proven groan-worthy (just ask my wife). However, it seems I’ve found a home on Twitter in that the short-burst, real-time format serves as a perfect platform for the punchy, well-timed humor I’m known for. I realize it’s not something everybody can do, and I often wonder why I was given this particular talent instead of something more practical – say, a mind for architecture, or the ability to organize my office (again – wife nodding energetically).
That’s why it pisses me off when people steal my tweets.
For those not well-versed in the intricacies of Twitter, you can basically tweet anything you want – if people like it, they can share it to their followers using the handy “retweet” button. If a lot of people start retweeting that same tweet, it’s generally considered a good thing: brand exposure, click-throughs, the possibility of new followers, and even inclusion in articles. It’s also a form of social validation, as well as a means to define yourself and showcase what you have to offer to a wider audience – which, in my case, often means well-timed humor when serving as an emcee for NYC corporate event entertainment.
So what are tweeters of original content supposed to do, then, when someone else steals our stuff, and tweets it as their own? It’s happened so many times to me this past year, I’ve lost count: I’ll send a witty tweet out, often accompanied by an image. Somebody then sees that tweet, and instead of retweeting it, they actually copy and paste the content – text, images, hashtags and all – right into their own feed, and tweet as if it was their own, with no attribution whatsoever to me. I’m not talking about tweeting something similar or inadvertent – I’m talking about full-on plagiarism (which can be easily confirmed, since Twitter allows you to track unique images uploaded by your feed). Sometimes this results in nothing; other times, that ripped-off tweet will be retweeted hundreds – and in a couple of cases specific to me, THOUSANDS – of times.
Believe me, it’s frustrating as hell to see your well-timed joke stolen by some chucklehead, and they then reap the rewards. Not knowing what else to do, I’ve reluctantly adopted a “shaming” policy in response: if you blatantly steal my tweet – joke, image and all – I will publicly call you out with screenshot evidence (I’ve chosen not to publish any examples here – I take no joy in shaming the guilty, let alone repeat shaming).
I’ve received some rather enlightening replies from those who I’ve caught stealing my tweets red-handed: I’ve been told I’m overreacting; that it’s “just Twitter;” that imitation is a form of flattery, and I should take it as a compliment. However, most simply block me. And I’ve never, ever received an apology.
Here’s what they – and I’m sure you– are wondering: why do I care?
Why should it bother me that somebody lifted my joke, and got a zillion retweets as a result? So what if these guys are jerks, who don’t have a creative bone in their bodies so they have to steal tweets to appear funny? What difference does it make? Don’t I have better things to do with my time than shame losers on Twitter?
The honest answer is, I can’t say the exact reason why it bothers me so much. Perhaps it bruises my ego when I don’t receive “credit” for a joke I’ve created; perhaps it enrages me to see somebody else pass off something I made as their own. Ultimately, however, I think it really comes down to branding. My personal and professional brands are built upon humor; it’s a central part of who I am, as well as how I earn my livelihood. I’m not just tweeting for the hell of it – I’m tweeting to say, “this is who I am, this what my business is, this is what you’ll get if you hire me.” It’s one of the few natural talents which sets me apart from the competition, and I need to be fiercely protective of it if I wish for my brand to survive and thrive.
I understand those of you who say I’m taking this too seriously, that I should just “shake it off” and “let it go,” to quote two well-known ladies in pop culture. However, when a key piece of my brand is being stolen, who else will stand up for what’s right, if not me?
I welcome your thoughts below.
Branding and ego aside, it’s about intellectual (dis)honesty. Presenting someone else’s work as your own, even as little as a few words in a tweet, is wrong.
If someone is so willing to do it on Twitter, they’re willing to do it elsewhere. Where is the line drawn? Maybe they draw the line at Twitter, but probably not. And maybe they never take it far enough to actually find themselves in real trouble. But maybe one day they will, and then they’ll be like the jerk who cut you off in traffic only to be pulled over a few miles ahead… It’s so satisfying when that happens.
Paul – agreed entirely. It may seem like a minor thing, stealing somebody’s 140-character micro-blog post – but in the end, it’s still theft of intellectual property.
The reason this issue is bothersome and the reason people should care is that This is tantamount to theft! Yes, it’s petty theft, but it’s stealing, just like hotlinking a picture on one’s own Web page is stealing bandwidth. And people who do it should be called out as the thieves they are! It takes time and effort to create, and those that do deserve the recognition of those efforts. Keep blowing that whistle; you are encouraging everyone to stand up for their work.
Dean – it is theft, pure and simple. Glad you agree, thanks for commenting!
Yeah, I get stick from people when I get annoyed about tweet theft. ‘Taking twitter too seriously’ is an accusation. For me, the RT and Fave count of a good joke is part of the fun – it’s keeping score. You can tweet without caring at all about how well the joke does, but it’s like playing poker with chips instead of real money. You can do it, but it’s a different game and not as much fun without real stakes. Similar to watching a football game when you have no investment in either of the teams.
I’ve had a picture joke I put together stolen by several different accounts, many of the with far bigger follower counts than me. I got 600 RTs out of it, at least six accounts got over a thousand RTs with it – one got over 3,000. The thing about these accounts was that they were set up to make money. Someone else was actually MAKING MONEY out of my stolen joke.
Now, several of these accounts were run by the same company, and their CEO’s name was in the bio. I tweeted him directly and we talked for about ten minutes. In a friendly way I explained that it wasn’t nice to nick my joke without attribution. I suggested he could make amends simply by RTing a few of my other jokes.
He basically told me to F*** off, and said over and over again that he couldn’t believe I was taking it so seriously. I was less shocked by the joke theft than by his rudeness. This guy is a reasonably high-profile media figure – winner of a Young Business Person of the Year award.
Anyway, the next day he’d deleted his side of the conversation, so I’m glad I screen capped the whole thing.
Andrew – I know exactly your frustration, especially when the perpetrator tries to blow you off. You raise an important point I hadn’t even thought about when describing how the other larger feeds actually making money off of your joke – if that’s the case, then you could even claim you are entitled to compensation!
Tweet Stealing is definitely not ok! Have you tried watermarking your image so that when it gets copied the signature goes with the pic?