Cut and Paste Digital Culture

I don’t mean to be solipsistic here, but I found something today that was interesting. Actually, the phenomenon is well known, but it’s the first time it happened to me.

So I’ve got a personal blog. It’s nothing special; I’m just keeping a digital record of my progress on reading all 100 works David Pringle listed in a 1985 book as the best science fiction novels from 1949-1985. So I just finished #4 (I only started a couple of weeks ago), which is Robert Heinlein’s The Puppet Masters. It’s about these communist slug creatures that take over the minds of Middle Americans and make them…make more mindless slug-controlled humans. I know, I know, you’ve seen it before (Invasion of the Body Snatchers and so forth), but this one is particularly Heinleinian and a heck of a ride. A good friend of mine who is a Marxist historian thinks it’s the worst novel ever written; I think it’s fantastic.

So I put “Heinlein” and “Puppet Masters” into the Blogger search engine today--I wanted to see what other people were saying about the novel--and the first things that popped up were sites not controlled or even heard of by me that were using my exact words. First thought: “What the hell?” A little more investigation revealed that these sites use my first few words and then link to my blog. That made me feel better, but it’s still strange and a little creepy. On the other hand, it’s not like I made the Nimoy video I posted earlier today or the liberty squirrel below.

Now why were they (Rebellion Coffee for instance) interested in what I have to say? Well, I don’t think they really are; I believe I was picked up by data miners. But that’s beside the point. They’re Libertarian websites. Heinlein was very influential on the party, and he certainly believed in freedom from government and the rights of the individual. Strange then that these Libertarian sites were making my words prima facie look like theirs. Heinlein himself sued the makers of the 1958 movie The Brain Eaters (which, just to make my day go around in circles, stars Leonard Nimoy) for lifting their idea from The Puppet Masters of all things. Anyway, I find the whole thing fascinating but disturbing. It’s really troublesome when several sites have the same posts, words, etc. but are controlled by different authorities and “authors.” It’s becoming difficult to know where things originate from on the Web. Most likely it’s Essaytown.com.