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Subject: 
Re: PROPOSAL for new track (was Re: New Lego Track!
Newsgroups: 
lugnet.trains, lugnet.loc.au
Followup-To: 
lugnet.trains
Date: 
Wed, 18 May 2005 12:46:47 GMT
Viewed: 
222 times
  
I've snipped all the rest away because I agree with it, close enough, and I want
to focus on one thing...

In lugnet.trains, Gary Quinlan wrote:
In lugnet.trains, Larry Pieniazek wrote:
Gary:
Larry:


I also have a question about the images of the different radii track? Are these
new images or just recolors of the images that Ben Fleskes did? If they're new,
how do they differ from Ben's work? If they're Ben's work, was credit given to
Ben and to the others he based his work on?

I am still interested in the answer to this question.

I was sent an email from somebody not associeated with Lugnet. It was a
brickshelf reference about something that was repeatedly talked about by members
of the public at our recent public train display. I don't know about you but
juggling the time between work, family, kids, building and posting I didn't have
enough time to back track and figure out who originally posted the images. If
Ben did well all I can say is thank you, I'm not alone, good work. If he didn't
well then who ever did I say the same. Or just maybe more than one person is
able to come up with the same good idea completely independently of others.

THe following is my view but I believe it's pretty widely shared.

LUGNET is (especially when it's working right) a meritocracy. You get respect
here through merit, through contribution, through what YOU'VE done. In some ways
it's a gift economy. (if you don't know what I am talking about, read some Eric
S. Raymond, try using Google to search a bit, you'll find it)...

An important part of a meritocracy, an important part of a gift economy, is
giving thanks and credit where it's due, when it's due, without being prodded.
If you want respect from the community, you can't pass work of others off as
your own. This is pretty important to internalise if you want to be successful
at presenting ideas here, people will call you on even the slightest inadvertant
infraction of this, an improperly attributed throwaway quote is enough to set
some people off, as I myself have learned.

Your first post presented images, images that clearly took a LOT of work, as if
they were your own. When politely asked about it, you evaded the question. It
was only when pressed that you admitted that they came from somewhere else, and
tried to justify passing them off as your own by saying you didn't have time.
Well, if you had time to post about it, you had time to do some sleuthing, or at
the very LEAST put in a sentence or two up front explaining that you got the
images somewhere else.

That's a pretty LARGE faux pas in LUGNET culture, in my view. Far larger than a
single line throwaway quote used in passing for humorous effect, mind you, you
were passing off (or appeared to be passing off, you were cavalier in your first
statement) a very significant body of work as your own.

What you SHOULD have done, to gain and keep respect was this: Instead of putting
the same images in YOUR BrickShelf folder (maybe with a recolor of them, I seem
to remember them being a different color) you should have GIVEN A LINK to the
originals, and said "Someone sent me this link, isn't it cool, I want to thank
whoever did the original work and I want to take the topic up again". WIth that
link someone would have quickly identified the author for you, I would expect.
It would also be clearer that you had done your homework and that you weren't
claiming to have suddenly come up with a brand new idea.

Even if you couldn't tell who they were by, at least you were giving credit in
the FIRST post. NOT the THIRD post after being pressed about it. That's not what
the gift culture requires, it doesn't require begrudging admission after being
badgered, it requires explicit and up front acknowledgement of the gifts of
others. Immediately.

You owe the original artist, the person whose gallery you saw (and near as I can
tell, copied without proper attribution), a more sincere effort to determine who
he or she is than you've given, a sincere and fulsome thank you and a heartfelt
apology for appropriating their work and passing it off as your own.

If you fail to deliver on those, there will always be a significant fraction of
people on LUGNET who won't respect your opinions because you're not doing things
the LUGNET way, you're not giving the proper respect to others yourself. So I
hope you see why I'm harping on this, it's because you say people aren't
listening to you as much as you want. This is part of why. To get respect you
have to give respect.

Think about it and do the right thing. I believe you'll benefit from it in the
long run.

Hope that helps.

FUT to .trains only.



Message has 1 Reply:
  Re: PROPOSAL for new track (was Re: New Lego Track!
 
I've also snipped all the rest away because I agree with it, close enough, and I want to focus on certain things But if I get it right, what your trying to say is that posting in newsgroups etc is easily overlooked and taken for granted so it is (...) (20 years ago, 19-May-05, to lugnet.trains, lugnet.loc.au)

Message is in Reply To:
  Re: PROPOSAL for new track (was Re: New Lego Track!
 
(...) I was sent an email from somebody not associeated with Lugnet. It was a brickshelf reference about something that was repeatedly talked about by members of the public at our recent public train display. I don't know about you but juggling the (...) (20 years ago, 18-May-05, to lugnet.trains, lugnet.loc.au)

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