L'Affair Walmart: The Education of a San Diego Blogger

What happens when a part time San Diego blogger discovers something anomalous on a large company website?  He writes about it, tells family and friends about it and evey places it on the newest hipster site digg.com where it is summarily flamed and stays at the bottom of the hierarchical site's pile.  What happens when a seeming devotee of a mega-blog stumbles accross said San Diego blogger's post and introduces it to the mega-blogs?  Well, simply it gets put in their blog without attribution of any sort and twisted as their own story.  What happens when original author writes to supposed mega-blog author asking for proper attribution?  Supposed mega-blog author ignores you because said author and others are usually busy spewing virulent anti-Bush bile filed rhetoric but now can draw their attention where they believe they can strike the iron while it is hot.  Mega-blog steals story, adds obligatory cute taglines and references and passes it off as it's own.  Meanwhile original post is dismissed by mega-blog readers as insignificant?  How could it possibly be that this guy in San Diego was the first to note the problem; he has so few posts on his site!  Impossible!  Washington Post reporter however, performing due diligence, properly credited San Diego blogger.  What has San Diego blogger learned from this experience?  Despite the rantings regarding copyright and how the system is so oppressive to them, when it suits them mega-blogs will steal material and pass it off as their own, especially when it suits their own political agenda.      

Comments

[Johnny Huh?]

I'm all for credit where credit's due. You found it first and to you I shall be directing all of the credit on this incredibly, incredibly stupid move on Wal-Mart's part.

Attribution means everything online. Without it, people are stealing other folk's research and findings.

Good work on uncovering Wal-Mart's racism.

[Ontario Emperor]

If there's one thing that my Reed College education provided me, it was a love of original sources. We should search for them more, rather than taking the latest talking head's pronouncements as gospel. (This applies whether said talking head is a baby seal clubber or a Communist.)