tempests in teacups
My feelings about the little dust-ups on-list at nummy treat have gone from vague discomfort to slightly befuddled amusement. If you don't care about such things, you have my hearty congratulations and you won't want to read the cutaway.
The fact that anyone who posts vids online is no longer doing it "just for themselves" has already been covered by bonibaru, and I don't need to repeat it.
When bonibaru brought up the plagiarism problem on-list a few days ago, I was a little freaked at first, because I'd gone through the same problem for the first time just recently and it was genuinely upsetting to hear about someone else whose work I respect going through it *again.* I see now why the people who've had to deal with it multiple times are skipping the emotional trauma and going straight to pissed off. I don't think I have it in me to get that upset again; there's just no point, and, oh yeah, *it's just vidding.* Yes, it's a creative outlet for me, but it's certainly not my only one (although it may be my most time-consuming one at the moment). So why with the dire?
And then there's the fact that posts on-list have been degenerating into unintentional silliness. When the line "I felt like someone had not only kicked my puppy but were ready to kick me" appeared, I just had to laugh. As Heather says, "I was nowhere near your puppy!" I know what was in the messages I sent to the person who swiped stuff from my vid and now wants to play the wronged party in this whole mess. If she felt kicked by an honest inquiry as to what was going on, that's her own damage.
I mean, come on. Since when does "commitment to honesty and quality" equal "scary"? That's a new-to-me form of double-speak, and, as a rhetorical-theorist-in-training, I could find it a fascinating inversion of typical catachresis, but mostly I just find it absurd.
So you know what? Last night I made three fabulous pizzas (two with yellow tomatoes, yellow bell peppers, ricotta and mozarella, and lots of fresh basil; one with roasted eggplant, red tomatoes, red bell peppers, mozarella, and even more fresh basil), had four delightful friends over for pizza and beer (or, in two cases, root beer), and the five of us watched a couple of episodes of Season 3 Buffy (including "The Prom," which makes me tear up every damn time--hilarious, given that I'm the kind of person who was too bitter and jaded to go to my own high school prom).
Pizza, Buffy episodes, and real-life friends with whom I do stuff like go see outdoor Shakespeare productions (actually we're seeing Shaw's "Mrs. Warren's Profession" this Thursday 'cause we've already seen the three Shakespeare plays that are on this summer).
As renenet told me last night, "Perspective is good. Perspective with eggplant is even better."