Brief Interviews With Hideous Men Um, no
Published by StopMikeLupica March 30th, 2007 in NBA
(The Cavalier is on an extended leave of absence. He did not write the
following, and he doesn’t allow the substitutes to rip-off gags from other people.)
GREAT BOOK! BTW
I’m lost.
I think the next interview is with Allen Iverson in which we’ll get “The Answers”?
I have no idea what that was.
Worst. Post. Ever.
Wow, fussy much, you guys? ’cause I liked it.
As far as I can gather, it’s a complete rip-off of someone else’s (the author of that book) schtick, which is as offensive as RoundieGate, no matter whether anyone likes it or not.
Call me fussy or even a jerk, but never will Scoop Jackson’s ethics be available for perusal on any site I own.
Its not a “”complete rip-off” if you fully credit the source of your inspiration. Apologize to Canadian DJM, herb.
That what you get for trying to bring some culture, some literature, up in this piece….
Wow. I “ripped off” my favorite author– an author that, in my other post that I linked to I cited as “the greatest living writer of the English language”– and linked to his book. What a complete disgrace I am. Scoop Jackson’s got nothing on me.
I assure you, it was done because I’m a bad person, not out of ignorance.
It wasn’t just that you “ripped off”, DJM - you “completely ripped off” David Wallace Foster (he of “that book”), an author that I’m sure The Cavalier has read and whose work he is clearly quite familiar with….
I’m very ashamed of you DJM. As an semi-successful playwright, one would think you would know how to rip-off other people’s schtick without offending others. You should apologize.
Speaking of complete rip-offs, @ Todd Lerner: Stop. Biting. Dan. Shanoff. You. Lame. Scrub.
Guys if you’ve read this site for any amount of time you know how I feel about stuff like that.
Homages or hat tips are one thing. Doing someone else’s routine, even with credit, is quite another.
Sorry, it’s my line to define.
Sir, if you compare my post here to what Scoop Jackson did to you, you are not condemning me, you are harming your own argument against Scoop Jackson.
You have every right to delete any post on your blog; it’s yours, and I was thankful for the opportunity to contribute. But delete the post because it’s not funny, or it’s stupid, or it’s outside the realm of the content you wish to provide. Don’t delete it because I’m “doing someone else’s routine.” This is fair use parody of a best-selling book that is soon to be a major motion picture with substantial and fawning credit given to David Foster Wallace. This post is like me playing chopsticks next to his Back concerto.
Yes, it is your line to draw, but I think you’ve drawn it in absurd place. I do know how you feel about stuff like this; I remember when you said “I don’t care if someone copies me - it happens all the time. I care about this specific instance because of plans I have for the Orange Roundie.”
If that’s your qualm, isn’t there ample evidence that this will in no way harm Mr. Wallace’s ability to earn money on this phrase?
Or maybe I linked to the wrong book? I did rely on multiple sources.
Back concerto? Bach concerto.
I don’t know what that means.
Unfortunately, the correction of my mistake appeared before the mistake itself. I realize it looked like a non-sequitur.
blog suicide indeed to have toolbags try to bring their patheticness onto a once gre.. ok how about just good site…
:::shakes head in disgust:::
You think you’re right.
You think you’re right.
I don’t think anything’s going to get resolved.
ZAKK: I disagree. I think something can be resolved.
To The Cavalier:
I understand that you are still smarting from Scoop’s theft of your material. I apologize for offending your sensibilities. It was unintentional, and I’ll refrain from any sort of (even credited) parody on or near your site in the future.
Now I would like an apology for the implication, wrongly posted in an international forum, that I’m a plagiarist. Whether or not you appreciate parody does not change the fact that this is categorically and legally not plagiarism.
Um, as soon as you can find where I called you (or Scoop, for that matter) a plagiarist, I’d be happy to. What I implied you are is creatively bankrupt.
To take someone else’s schtick and adopt it as your own, whether credited or not, is weak in my eyes.
I read it, saw that you’d been doing it as a series at your site, and assumed you’d made it all up yourself. It wasn’t really my type of thing and I didn’t really “get” it, but I thought it was great you’d come up with an original angle you were working/developing on an ongoing basis. The blogsphere needs more of this.
Then I saw it was just a rip of someone else’s thing, and it all fell apart. An homage is one thing. Doing it an on an ongoing basis is, like I said, creatively bankrupt.
Like I said, I don’t understand why any writer would want to build any sort of rep under such a thing, and the fact that it’s a weekly, featured part of your routine at SML says that you do. Do you really want to be “the guy who does that great imitation of that other author”? It’s the equivalent of being a celebrity impersonator. I’m trying to help you here! lol
Anyway, and again, and THAT SAID, you find where I accused you of plagiarism, and I’ll send you a card and gift basket with a huge balloon that says “sorry”.
You on Scoop:
“He stole. He stole a concept, a schtick, a character. He took it and presented it as his own.”
You on my post:
“As far as I can gather, it’s a complete rip-off of someone else’s (the author of that book) schtick… never will Scoop Jackson’s ethics be available for perusal on any site I own.”
Oxford English Dictionary on “plagiarism”:
“The action or practice of taking someone else’s work, idea, etc., and passing it off as one’s own.” (all emphasis mine)
I’ll send you my address via personal e-mail. I really like those mylar balloons.
Touche!
Oh btw, since I apparently don’t know the meaning of plgiarism, I don’t know if initial offer holds up, although if you really, truly need/want a balloon and gift basket, I’ll stick to it.
Here’s my apology, so that all the world can see how wrong I am: I bow down to you, sir. You are a superior writer to me in every way. From now on I shall only do interpretations of other peoples’ work instead of coming up with my own stuff. The master has shown me the way, and I am sorry that I questioned him.
(I had no idea blog suicide would entail shedding readers in this way, assuming DJM is no longer a fan. What an interesting experiment it all is.)
So is there an open slot available for Tony Parker?
From now on I shall only do interpretations of other peoples’ work instead of coming up with my own stuff.
Wow, and you didn’t waste any time doing what you said you would, did you? Nice complete rip-off of the basketball jones’ entry:
http://www.thebasketballjones.net/2007/03/29/scottie-pippens-creepy-video/
Well-played, sir. Point acknowledged.
Do you really not understand the difference between reposting a YouTube clip and what you did?
I’d like to apply for the position of “whatever day that guy got, now I got it..”
I’d be money at it… it would bring a little bit of color to this site! (and I don’t mean like “Color me Badd” color, I mean like entertaining color… only minus the gay innuendo and racial humor)… of course I’m kidding!
Boney, what up buddy? Yo, if you want to post, you should learn a few things. First, two periods = damn, you look like a moron. Sir, if you are going for the ellipsis, it’s three periods (or four)….
Secondly, you might want to learn to say something intelligent or witty for once. In all the dozens of insignificant comments you’ve ever made on this site, those attributes haven’t been demonstrated. I’m not saying you can’t post despite your obvious lack of intelligence or humor… perhaps The Cavalier is looking for the human equivalent of a lorem ipsum?
ahh yes, stopmikelupica (and all associated sidekicks that offer content to that boring site)…
A little sensitive after 3 unsuccessful attempts to bring your brand of boringness to the YaySports! nation are we? I’m sorry if I don’t take to thumbing through books and typing their passages but replacing every third “and” with “the” and/or spelling LeBron with a lower case b because that makes it look like I typed it (I know you didn’t do that, I’m just citing examples to make it easier for the simpler minded bunch). To be honest, I didn’t care to know what an ellipsis was or is.. oops I used 2 periods, bring on my 6th grade engrish teacher to correct me!
Let’s all be honest here for second, if there’s a way to put up a poll for the weakest sauce brought to the YaySports! nation this past week, I would bet a YaySports! t-shirt that the boys at stopmikelupica.com bring home the bacon on that one. I’ve viewed your site, I’ve maybe chuckled once or tittered twice.. (oops, there’s a 2 period ellipsis again!), but I have never found content that brought it to the table like The Cavalier does! (or for that matter, any of the other bloggers that don’t have websites called “bulletsforever.com”).
But I can’t be mad at you though (oops, I started a sentence with but!!!). You do contribute to “blogger nation” while spewing your drivel regarding the NYK. I bet it takes a lot to piece a couple of good thoughts together to write about your boy Isiah or Eddy “Hot Plate” Curry, so I admire you. To use all that energy to piece a couple of thoughts together, now I can see why you don’t have time for the humor!
Here’s the part that Scoop, er, DJM seems to be ignoring. In his call out for guest “writers,” The Cav explicitly stated that the guest should not attempt to “do” Bill Simmons or to “do” The Cav. Inherent in that, to anyone with an ounce of common sense (or a gram, if you are Canadian) is “don’t try to do anyone but yourself.”
I mean, honestly, other than giving credit to DFW, what you did was exactly what Scoop did–you took someone else’s idea and used it to fill a space where you were supposed to be using your own ideas. That’s weak.
Honestly, stopmikelupica, a simple “my bad” would have sufficed.
And by the way, since when does Dan Shanoff own the Worst/Best.Blank.Blank format? Shit, that’s been around for years, Dan was way ahead of us on that one. Douche nozzle.
ZAKK was right, but why the hell not give it one more shot?
Point 1: DJM and Scoop did the same thing.
David Foster Wallace’s book – which regardless of what you think of all this is still an astonishingly good book – is a psycho-sexual exploration of the modern American male psyche. I’m making jokes about LeBron using “thou” instead of “you” and Chris Bosh looking like a dinosaur. Content-wise, the two are unrelated. As unrelated as apples and hexagonal storms on planet surfaces. As Jules Winfield said (if I may be allowed to quote (although I’m guessing that’s not allowed)): “It ain’t even the same {expletive deleted} sport.”
The Cavalier wrote first-person accounts as the basketball. Scoop Jackson wrote first-person accounts as the basketball. One of these things is exactly like the other.
Point 2: DJM is weak to have used this formatting device, because somebody else invented it.
Now I’ll grant you that you may be right. It seems part of a bigger discussion about the ownership of rhetorical devices, but we can do it in the abstract here. It may be weak to have used Mr. Wallace’s formatting device. However, there are only a few ways to write fictional interviews, right? They are these:
1) Write a fictional interview in which questions and answers are seen.
Many people do this. Many people that I read do this. This is now so common that it is no longer necessary to provide credit, although this was almost certainly at one point not true. Somebody invented this at one point, right?
2) Write a fictional interview in which neither questions nor answers are seen.
This is ludicrous, although maybe kind of cool and post-modern.
3) Write a fictional interview in which only answers are seen.
As far as I know, only one person ever has done this. It was, in my opinion, a very good idea, and one which could provide humorous results when applied to basketball players. Meaning that I could a) use this technique and not credit the person that I believe was responsible for it, which I probably would have gotten away with, or b) credit the person that I believe was responsible for it.
4) Don’t write fictional interviews.
Well, if I let y’all choose, certainly #4 would be your choice, yes? Since it was painfully unfunny worst. post. ever. and whatnot. #2 is basically ludicrous. #1 is over-saturated and probably pretty tired. #3 appears to have a niche, and one which is not encroaching on D.F. Wallace because his book has NOTHING TO DO WITH ANY OF THIS. None of these actually sound like David Foster Wallace. It sounds nothing like him. Nothing. Nothing at all. They sound nothing alike. However, as far as I am aware, he was the first guy to write interviews where the questions aren’t seen. But it is not an impression, at all. I understand that The Cavalier – and some of you – believe that this still doesn’t make it OK. But this is sort of like saying that the Orange Roundie is theft because e.g. Scooter, the Talking Baseball exists on the Fox Network. Talking sports equipment is not new, right? There are famous pieces of talking sports equipment out there. But nobody considers this theft. Including me. But by the logic applied here, shouldn’t YaySports have refrained from creating Orange Roundie because there was already a talking baseball? Doesn’t that make the Orange Roundie character “creatively bankrupt”? I don’t think it does, but I do think that’s the logical end of the argument.
Point 3: The Cavalier’s apology
Thank you, I accept. Because that’s what the dispute was about. Who’s the better writer. You’ve really hit the nail on the head, there.
Also, if you’d like to continue this discussion with me (anybody), you can e-mail me at brian (dot) cousins (at) gmail (dot) com. I’m not going to be checking in here anymore, but if you have further thoughts you’d like me to consider — or if you’re, you know, D.F. Wallace’s attorney coming to serve me a subpoena — you can go ahead and e-mail me there.
“Lorem Ipsum”? “a psycho-sexual exploration of the modern American male psyche”? “As unrelated as apples and hexagonal storms on planet surfaces”?
I don’t know anything about your argument with Cav, but boy are you smart!!!!
CoachMike, he was arguing with me.
Not The Cavalier.
I promise, Cav, I will do myself if you let me be a guest blogger.
I’m kidding.
About guest-bloggering, not about doing myself.
DJM you say on your own site that when you saw that “Brief Interviews With Hideous Men” brought up your stuff before the other guy’s, you felt uncomfortable with that. That sums it up for me.
uughhh!
What does the BDP have to say about all of this?