This Chrome extension is going to revolutionize the way I plagiarise the interwebs
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I have recently added yet another tool that makes it easier to instantly broadcast the work of others to multiple audiences in an attempt to appear smart and informed.
Since you are reading this, can you please advise if it is working? I am desperate for the feedback and need to validate myself by your responses to what is in many cases the re-tweeting and re-blogging someone else’s idea.
I am attempting to be a little ironic in my gen x kind of way, which I hope is obvious but had to point out in case I did come off as a little needy.
So I like these tools, so what?
The problem is that when the tools are so well made and it is ultra easy to forward or repeat another’s voice, we do it.
Just sharing an article with a friend is fine, and even reblogging with the relevant credits also has it’s place, my concern is the rampant distribution with no value add by the carbon copier.
If you are regularly blogging, or running a twitter account you should use these tools as an additional distribution channel for your voice. An extension of your original voice for which you take a considered approach in crafting the content that is delivered through this voice. These mediums also offer a very high level of engagement by your audience which sets a level of expectation and trust.
Expectation and trust you should not abuse by only forwarding and reblogging second hand ideas and content without adding value in the form of comment, interpretation, or by relating it to your followers context.
So back to the start..I have added the ‘Word This’ tool, which will assist me in the blogging process but as with any of the tools I have mentioned it is important that I remember to primarily use it to amplify and distribute my voice, and sparingly when sharing the content of others.
I am not an aggregator, that’s the job of a machine!
Link to the plugin for hosted and self hosted WordPress blogs for Google Chrome Word This – Google Chrome extension gallery.
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Meta Mike Biggs 
I totally agree with your thoughts. Very nice post. “What CAN be misused, WILL be misused”… not by me but others do it.
I feel no need to validate your expressed need for validation. I’m sorry, but I absolutely had to say that. It was my first thought after reading the beginning of your blog and I just liked the senctence to much not to use.
What I really want to know is why the graphic looks like a game of Simon Says with one button missing.
I wonder if there is a link to the missing simon says button and Chrome? maybe maybe not…
It is a very catchy and well-designed logo though!
You should read the license agreement that Google requires you to accept when installing the “Chrome Bar” or any of its tools. Remember nothing is free 🙂
People read licence agreements these days?
Hah, that was my thought.
This post makes me feel better about my recent self-promotion efforts. Thanks!
Crystal
http://www.crystalspins.com
“The problem is that when the tools are so well made and it is ultra easy to forward or repeat another’s voice, we do it.” Interesting article, interesting idea. I have to admit I love copy & paste, one of the first incarnations of this “repeat” culture you are talking about. We certainly do live in a rapidly changing interactive world and I love a blog that really makes me think!
And with copy-and-paste, the incidence of Telephone decreases. Words can still be taken out of context, but at least it’s easier to repeat what someone said, or typed, verbatim.
Less rampant are the days when “my sister’s boyfriend’s best friend’s basketball coach’s daughter said something about XYZ.” Today, it’s “I read on my sister’s boyfriend’s facebook wall that “copy-and-pasted-text.” On occasion there’s also a “click here for a screenshot.”
I wonder if people’s memories of what they just heard vs what they just read (50 words or less) will grow any better or worse or change little as a result.
nice. im gonna have to try this extension out soon 🙂 thanks
Is it review about google chrome? Try flock. For a blogger, I think it is more comfortable. You might like it 😉
I have tried flock, but there is sometimes too much going on for me. And early on I found it did not support all sites that I visited, probably a java issue. I may revisit 🙂
What I really want is an FTP plugin for chrome or flock!
Honestly speaking, I hate Chrome more than any other digital product out there. It crashes way too often without any reason, be it beta or stable version, on windows. And today, it caused system crash four times continuously on my linux.I won’t even look at chrome again.
If your whole system is crashing there is more likely some underlying fault with your computer. Granted Chrome does crash sometimes inexplicably, I suspect it to be more to do with plugins and the like than by a design flaw (though it does leak memory – as do a heap of other browsers mind you). For many it works perfectly and seamlessly without issue. Of all the computer crashes I’ve seen 99% were driver or hardware failure related issues.
Really? I think maybe it is not with chrome you should hate. I have the latest versions of chrome installed on my win7 performance and my work linux ubuntu rigs.
I have a favorable experience with chrome. For me I feel that IE is slow and doesn’t handle current conventions well like css and svg, Firefox is slow, safari doesnt work well with many things and on pc i know is slow. I found Chome to be the most up to date and fastest/lightest for my general use. I rarely ever see a crash, maybe once every few months. Currently i have 5 browser windows open and probably near 40 tabs all with different types of content, js, flash ads, php you name it whatever I happen to have been across lately and am not experiencing lag.
I have been using Chrome on a Win7 machine with 0 problems since its release. I use it for everything imaginable and for my purposes it’s the only browser to bother with. I don’t have issues with crashing or stalling, you may want to look around to see if the problem is elsewhere.
Chrome hardly ever crashes for me and I always go overboard with number of open tabs. I used Firefox before and IE before that and I always had more problems with those, particularly IE.
good.
Definitely “food for thought”. I especially like the fact that you mentioned that it’s ok to re-post/publish content AS LONG AS we add value to it. 🙂
‘Word This’ doesn’t even work. All it does is say, “This webpage is not available,” and hog the space next to your address bar.
well done! you do, in fact, appear moderately smart and pretty well informed : D
i’ll have to check this out, and see if it helps me cut-and-paste my way through blogging. . .
http://www.heatherensley.wordpress.com
“Expectation and trust you should not abuse by only forwarding and reblogging second hand ideas and content without adding value in the form of comment, interpretation, or by relating it to your followers context.” I agree, all too often I find that people copy and paste, or repeat something they found interesting without at least adding some sort of insight themselves. Come on people. The extension seems like it would be a helpful addition. I’ll have to give it a try. Not sure about Chrome though. I’m having the same problem with it crashing.. Great blog! Thanks for the thoughts! =)
Im a major google chrome fan. 😀
Well said. Take a look at “Alone, With Words” by Jed Perl:
http://www.tnr.com/article/books-and-arts/75386/alone-words
It reinforces your comments about cultivating one’s own voice.
It’s about time chrome has released an update, specially since lately a lot of issues have been coming out lately regarding it’s faulty system.
“plagiarise the interwebs”?
Seems to me that you’re missing the point. The Internet exists for sharing. I get a great deal of good ideas and information from the generosity of others who pass both facts and ideas along.
This is especially important since the traditional news media seems to be dropping the ball.
As a blogger I want people to hear what I say.
Which is why my blogs are Creative Commons licensed by-nc-sa, by-sa and CC0 (public domain) respectively.
An increasing amount of work is being released online under Creative Commons Licenses precisely because many of us want our work to be disseminated as widely as possible. Ideas do best with interaction and sharing. This isn’t plagiarism.
The only way to control an idea is to keep it to yourself. The Internet was made for sharing.
excellent comment! I completely agree.
http://sociosound.wordpress.com
I absolutely agree that your intellectual property should be acknowledged and credit given where due, but am not sold that passing something along isn’t adding value in itself.
Sometimes I have something to say or add to the conversation; sometimes I am just passing something along. When I am just passing something along I “share” using Twitter or Facebook, or favorite using Flickr or Youtube, and don’t feel compelled to add anything of my own to the conversation.
On the other hand, if what you have to say challenges me to think differently or is relevant to something I am learning about, I may feel compelled to comment or even post to my blog if it fits in with something I’ve been working on.
There is value in sharing and sharing can and should happen in various ways.
I do agree with your sentiments, the point of the article is to challenge the current trend. My next post may talk about the value of the channel which I have totally ignored in this one.
I welcome debate and multiple viewpoints 🙂
Laurel, VERY well stated.
Good post and congrats on Freshly Pressed!
Such tools are handy, designed to make our lives easier and for us to appear more interesting, but should always been used with caution. Helpful information is quickly passed on this way, but then so is misinformation. Just to be on the safe side, never pass on anything you hear, see, or read on Fox News. 🙂
Natina
http://crosswordcharlie.wordpress.com
http://humansareassholes.wordpress.com
Don’t like chrome, honestly…
I like chrome 🙂
http://ninjawiththeorangetshirt.wordpress.com/
Yep. Any tool that can be misused, will be. The more powerfull the tool, the greater potential for abuse.
Love Google Chrome. Love Google. But, there you go…
I read what everyone else has to say, now it’s my turn. I LOVE this! It means that I don’t have to put “Press This” on my bookmark bar. There it sits right next to the Weather and BitDefender. Just great! Thanks for this, friend. I appreciate it.
Hi,
Thank you for the sharing..
I will try it soon.
This is my first visit.
🙂
I am absolute explorer fan 🙂 and don’t think that chrome has got a chance to get near to explorer or mozilla in next 2-3 years
nice very nice
Not fully sold on the Chrome goodie, yet…
great post !!! keep sharing… 🙂
Great extension. Chrome users don’t have nearly enough extensions.
“…my concern is the rampant distribution with no value add by the carbon copier.”
You have just described my 72 year old brother! (not only no value added — but NO VALUE PERIOD!)
Just tried and I can’t tell the difference between it and “Press This”.
And regarding the core offering making it easier to grab other people’s stuff, well, there are way easier ways to do that. You could set up a feed to post someone else’s articles automagically.
The way I use press this, and it is an amazingly handy way to lower the barrier to blogging, is to read something interesting, have it ping something in my noodle, and then I can graba sentence from the the post to riff on.
B
You are totally right! If we make it too easy to plagiarize, then it will almost definitely happen. I think it’s totally fine if you leave credit, but will everybody? I don’t think so…
http://writeos.wordpress.com
not much would like to leave credits if they just copied their contents from another blog. Well, their visitors would most likely read the source rather than the blog that just copied the contents from the source. Anyways, I just can’t get the use of those plug-ins.
While I do not like plagiarism, I see the internet as the free exchange of ideas and to get the idea’s and arguments out there is far more important than to get credit for them.
Indeed thought, nobody likes a copycat as that really get’s my goat too.
With all the pressure to self-toot horns, thanks for making me think.
cool 😀
And here I am doing it the old fashioned way updating my stories for hours a day…gggrrrrrr
chrome is the best for faster.. i like this
In the future there will only be one blog on the Internet and it will have EVERYTHING on it. lulz
P.S. I always wondered why the Chrome ™ icon resembles that old electronic game from the ’80s, “Simon.” You know, the one where different colored lights light up on the console and you have to press them in the right order. Google it and you’ll see. Weird.
The game was ‘Simon Says’ and thus; ‘Google Says’. Or to expand on that; whatever Google says, goes!
Google is taking over the WORLD!
Interesting point; I think I’m safe, however, as nobody is dim enough to re=produce my amateurish blogging anywhere.
http://tomcatintheredroom.wordpress.com/
🙂
This is by far one of the better comments I’ve read regarding distribution of internet fodder.
I loathe receiving the same pictures and jokes repeatedly.
I belong(ed) to another blog environment where the whole idea of self-expression has been reduced to often pasting a non-original cartoon, or just doing a “status update” a la FB! *groan*
The whole idea gets reduced to a glorified (delayed) chat room with multimedia support.
If you wish to post something it should at least have taken some effort to compile.
My cartoons take a generous slice of time to be created, on top of that I often try to write at least a few lines to accompany it…
*sigh* its blissful being innocent of rampant recycling of other people’s drivel… I proudly generate my own drivel!
I have tried it and for sure it helps a lot. Thanks, continue devoloping more of these because they make my work easier. http://guideafrica.wordpress.com/
Wow perfect Info!
it help me so much….!
Hooray for The Think LAB! Up with original ideas and content! Down with “copy and paste” re-blogging from someone who does it better!
My blog contains 100% original work. My stories, my photos, my experiences. I have something to say. Hear my voice, and let me hear yours!
Why does it say “Cheatin’ uh?”
WHY DOES IT SAY THAT!!!!
Good post……!!!
Everyone plagiarizes, Shakespeare borrowed from Marlowe,
Google News borrows from everyone,
and anyone here that has taken a college composition class, ..I think I’ve made my point.
It’s about intent , I plagiarize all the time but I always cite the reference and link back to the original author.
And there have been a couple of times with the author objected so I promptly removed the material.
Plagiarism at its best is the fondest of form flattery.
Passing a blog post, a photograph, or even an idea off as your own is not really plagiarism, let’s call it what it is;
Fraud and Theft
“Good Day” ~ Paul Harvey
-jrr
I have only just started using Chrome and so far, I’ve had no trouble with it. I always have like 60 tabs open and everything goes fabbo. As per that ‘word this’, I have a looksee and get back with a verdict 😉
hey, i installed it and unfortunately it says this webpage is not available 😦 if it starts to work it will be cool tho
got it to work 🙂 had to go in options, i always skip the instructions 🙂 cheers
well in my opinion one of the best invention is “copy paste”.
“copy paste” “copy paste” “copy paste” “copy paste”
http://irfan989.wordpress.com/