It is my first day on Steemit and I have noticed that some people on this platform like to copy and paste other people’s content from websites such as YouTube and post it onto Steemit with minimal explanation (if any) as to why they decided to post it.
When I see these kinds of posts, I don’t know what to do. Do I up vote the content and encourage more of this behavior or down vote because its plagiarism and I should discourage them from doing it again? Maybe the best thing to do is… nothing.
You see… the issue that I have is that I don’t want to reward anybody for simply copying and pasting someone else’s content onto Steemit and have them earn money off of it. It just seems wrong. At the same time, some of these posts are directing me to some interesting content that I would’t have found any other way. So because some of these posts provide me with value, that means its worth something and the post should be rewarded… right?…RIGHT!?
I mean is it really such a bad thing for these posts to earn some money? If anything they serve as free advertisement for the original content creator. Only…It becomes a bit of a moral issue when the original content creator is not able to monetize their content on the platform they originally posted it on but the ‘advertiser’ over here on Steemit is.
Intention seems to be the key when it comes to these copy and paste posts. A part of me believes that there are people who aren’t focused on monetary gain and are simply trying to get the word out about their favorite content they want to introduce to the steemit community BUT… another part of me believes that they are being posted purely for monetary reasons. Copy paste, copy paste, copy paste, copy paste, hoping one of them is a hit and the money starts rolling in.
Either way, I don’t think a short summary or review along with links directing to the original content creator (not just the content itself) is too much to ask for. Without it, it becomes hard to decide what kind of action to take towards the post because the intent of it is unclear.
Before I conclude, let me just say steemit is a new ‘thing’ that has tremendous potential for redefining social networking. The fact that this platform brings up issues like the one that I explained in this post is an indication that this is revolutionary. I mean… have you ever earned money just for being a part of Reddit, Facebook, Twitter, or any of these other social networks that exist today? Just for doing the minimum of what a social network has to offer (liking and commenting)? For most people, the answer is no. This copy and paste plagiarism thing isn’t a very big deal for most people on other platforms but here on steemit (where anything that anyone does seems to have a monetary effect) it is something that everyone should at least be thinking about.