SMDA

Tiger Sugar: Promoter of Intellectual Property Theft

Social Media Donkey

A cartoon I drew for the very day the World Health Organization declared the infection spread of COVID-19 global pandemic on March 11, 2020, has gone through a series of modifications and additions. Two tsunamis perilously heading towards a city symbolizing Canada with waves representing COVID-19 and recession, were soon joined by bigger scares including Climate Change and Biodiversity Collapse. The evolution has been fuelled by the thoughtfulness of people from around the world who have either suggested modifications on social media or sketched in new waves with my attention included. It illustrates important discussions on serious issues confronting humanity and the chronological changes has made this illustration my most shared image ever.

But, like so many images cartoonists offered up to the Internet, dark forces are at the ready armed with design software to butcher artists work and memes-ify them to serve their appetites for likes and retweets. Just as egregious to discover signed cartoons reworded to suit partisan stances effectively turning satire into propaganda, is the removal of monikers and the extraction of intellectual property. We learn as children not to do this when we hand in assignments for school and that we should always source words borrowed from others. Why is it when theft of imagery that’s turned into memes is taken so passively?

Tiger Sugar was not given permission readapt the messaging

Along comes a post on Instagram where an account run under the banner of a big international bubble tea chain called Tiger Sugar used this image to promote franchise expansion. A glance through the account shows an endless scroll of not so witty memes mixed with photos of their swirly brown syrup concoctions aimed at a younger smart phone addicted set. A message was left under the post requesting removal of the altered image. As of the time of this writing the post remains and thereby grants Tiger Sugar bestowal of recognition into the pantheon of intellectual property thieves, better known as the Social Media Jackasses. 

Click to enlarge this unsightly meme

In researching this company one came across this unfortunate meme portraying it as one which serves effluent to its customers. How rude! To suggest this is where Tiger Sugar extracts its syrup is outrageous! Shame on whomever used imagery from this company without authorization to sully its messaging with such obvious contempt to use and discredit a popular brand. Ridiculous!

 

Friday April 17, 2020

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday April 17, 2020

Canada to keep border restrictions with U.S. for long time: Trudeau

Coronavirus cartoons

Canada’s border restrictions with the United States will remain in place “for a significant time” as the two nations fight the coronavirus outbreak, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Thursday.

Washington and Ottawa agreed last month to clamp down on non-essential travel while allowing massive trade flows to continue across their long shared frontier.

“There’s a recognition that as we move forward there will be special thought given to this relationship. But at the same time we know that there is a significant amount of time, still, before we can talk about loosening such restrictions,” Trudeau told a daily briefing.

U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday told reporters the two nations were “doing well” and said, “It will be one of the early borders to be released.”

The two nations’ economies are highly integrated, and allowing trade to continue avoided major problems for the auto sector as well as the transportation of food and medicines.

 



Part of a Politico package featuring Canadian cartoonists

 

Although Trudeau’s government has enjoyed good relations with the Trump administration over the last 18 months, tensions still remain. Last month, Ottawa slammed a U.S. proposal to deploy troops along the border to fight the spread of the novel coronavirus, prompting Washington to drop the plan.

A total of 1,048 people in Canada had died from the coronavirus by 11 a.m. EDT (1500 GMT), slightly less than 10% higher than the death toll a day ago, official data posted by the public health agency showed.

The total number of those diagnosed with the coronavirus had climbed to 28,899. The respective figures at the same time on Wednesday were 954 deaths and 27,540 positive diagnoses.

Medical officials now expect the death toll to be between 1,200 and 1,620 by April 21, Theresa Tam, the chief public health officer, told a briefing.

She repeated comments she made on Wednesday about being cautiously optimistic the outbreak could be slowing down. (The Province) 


Here’s an unauthorized version of the April 17, 2020 cartoon which found its way circulating through social media several months after originally posted. Obviously, it isn’t printable in mainstream media, and essentially puts words into the creator’s mouth which is never appreciated.  Whomever the mystery person is behind the re-adaptation gets a Social Media Jackass designation. Folks, remember, artistic work should never be manipulated, unless permission is granted by the artist.  

Why Political Memes Suck; And Yet Another Social Media Jackass Award goes to…

…Envelope please…The People’s Party of Canada! With shout outs to Rob Lussier, and Mark Friesen.

The story was posted last week by the Saskatchewan regional office of the CBC, under the headline “2 PPC candidates tweet cartoon of Jagmeet Singh wearing turban with bomb on it“. Naturally, it evoked memories of the Danish cartoon controversy, and without seeing the cartoon I wondered, who the heck would draw that? 

From left to right is a facial depiction of Jagmeet Singh by Theo Moudakis, altered to show a bomb in his turban, my caricature face of Justin Trudeau, John Fewings caricature of Andrew Scheer, and then another drawn by me of Maxime Bernier. I’ve linked my drawings to their original cartoons.

Turns out to be one of those Photo-chopped amalgams of various unauthorized repurposings to create what has increasing become acceptable in online political discourse: the meme. 

Those who follow this blog know that we in the editorial cartooning world don’t take kindly to the strange behaviour that compels people to make and share their efforts to create these ugly renderings. I have written much over the years against this practice over and over.

While the source of the above is unknown, two candidates running for the PPC, Rob Lussier (Brandon-Souris), and Mark Friesen (Saskatoon-Grasswood) chose to retweet an inflammatory message linking Singh to terrorism, and continue to stand by them as an appropriate line to supporters.  Obviously, the xenophobic tactic of spreading fear about Sikhs or Muslims or anybody that happens to wear a turban being aligned to terrorism is a racist one. The unauthorized use of the work of others is a secondary offence to a more serious one of spreading hate.

Alas, this is the peril of posting work on the Internet. When satire is turned around for partisan gain, or worse, used to spread hate. Be they chopped up editorial cartoons or photographs, memes are unsigned, repurposed imagery cluttering the online world. Yet, they’ve become a subject of study as they become permanently part of the election cycle (practically perpetual outside of the usual 6 week campaign period.) So when my local paper posts an article under the headline Why political memes matter to this federal election reporting scientific exploration, it gives credence to the concept of memes.

Over the past few years write-ups have suggested that memes have become the political cartoon of the era and that the work editorial cartoons draw face an ‘existential threat’ from advertisers and memes.  

The Condescending Willy Wonka Meme

Amongst the chatter within the tiny group of people who still draw editorial cartoons for a living there is universal disdain for these perspectives. While memes are generally frowned upon there are, admittedly, some pretty hilarious memes, non-political memes that is, which are quite effective in getting a point across, quick and dirty, with a wide audience. Which is, ironically, the basic goal of an editorial cartoonist in drawing a cartoon.

The difference, however, when it comes to political memes, is that they’re used for ideological or partisan purposes, as opposed to satire. The top rendering is a case in point, and indeed all of the other repurposed photo-cropping of editorial cartoons I’ve awarded Jackass awards to are partisan regurgitations. Meme creators are anonymous, the images they use are ripoffs, and only a fraction of time is spent whipping up memes as opposed to editorial cartoons.

Editorial Cartoonists are mistakenly regarded by some as being partisans. We’re supposed to skewer the people with power, to punch up, no matter what political party happens to be in charge of the levers of government. At the same time, we shouldn’t necessarily work as agent provocateurs for the opposition. I think editorial cartoonists are expected to satirize and draw out folly along all sides of the legislature.  To shoot editorial cartoon barbs from a constant point of the political spectrum and align oneself to a particular party, is in effect being partisan, creating propaganda, as opposed to satire. One need only look through a editorial cartoonist’s body of work to differentiate a satirist from a propagandist. Take this so & so as a prime example. Those of the latter group might as well call themselves political meme creators.

Political memes will never take over editorial cartoons, because propaganda will never replace satire. Can we just stop making the comparisons?

Congrats Social Media Donkey!

It’s election time in Canada which means the Internet becomes very active with rhetoric and persuasion, from all sorts of contributors, from political parties, opinion writers, Russian bots, trolls, and idiots.

Congratulations anonymous Twitter account holder Can Neo Cons purveyor of a robust chop shop of editorial cartoons. He (and he is a he) describes himself on his Twitter profile as, “I believe in standing up for what I think is right, Too much hatred going on in the world. I am into politics. All in the meme. Left Wing Populist.” He’s made quite a hobby out of extracting caricatures from editorial cartoons and reassembling them in tell tale bold bordered boxes with hackneyed thought bubbles peppered with spelling and grammar mistakes. He is the latest useful idiot to be used as a prime example to others why it’s not a good thing to repurpose professional satire to convey pea brained musings.

He isn’t the first person to do this and he won’t be the last, but there is a consistent hideousness in all of the reworked intellectual property that points to a pathological affliction among such individuals so obsessed by stealing other peoples work.

The behavioural pattern is very familiar. An artist will share work on a social media platform and among the discussion thread below will suddenly appear a chop shop art thief posting his awful repurposed work, in some vain attempt to flatter the artist. When alerted to their misdeed it is almost always the same: They’ll demonstrate immediate guilt, apologize for ripping off your art, and promise not to commit anymore vandalism to your art. Then they won’t bother to remove the offending rip offs of your art from their threads. After a little more back and forth between thief and the original creator, the thief will quickly dig in his heels, cite freedom of expression, telling the original creator that it’s the artist’s fault for sharing their art on social media. Then the fraudster will unleash a volley of insults.

Now, some of my colleagues have passive attitudes to these bottom feeders. Their follower counts are minuscule and in all likelihood there are mental disorders afflicting the individuals behind such accounts. Why bother giving them a broader audience?

In my view, they ought to be treated like any other thief of intellectual property. As we are taught in grade school we are to design our own work. We are told to cite supporting sources of our essays or creations. We are told at a young age that there are consequences for destroying property not belonging to us, intellectual property, or otherwise. This isn’t parody, it is theft, and if some people are so willing to engage in such wreckless activity, one has to wonder what other things such people might be up to. Let this serve as a convenient flag to authorities in case he has other shameful behaviour he thinks he’s hiding.

So, Michael Labelle, retired guy from Cornwall, Ontario, turned intellectual property thief, your misdeeds aren’t so anonymous after all. Your true identity is only mere clickity-clicks all over social media. 

 

Past Recipients of the Social Media Jackass Award. Each winner eventually removed stolen items from their feeds but it always took persistence:

Canadian Pride

“Teflon Jim” Stewart

HarpersGotaGo

Ontario Liberal Press Secretary’s Office

CJ Kalish

Facebook’s email!

UPDATE: Tuesday March 12, 2019

It took a week of waiting but after a complaint was lodged against Michael LaBelle’s theft his repurposed use of my intellectual property was scraped off the bottom of Facebook’s shoe.

Most of it, anyway. I listed 25 violations of intellectual property theft.

Tonight, Facebook sent me an email message following up on a complaint I lodged last week, and confirmed that Michael LaBelle had indeed violated Facebook’s rules regarding unauthorized use of Intellectual Property and has removed the offending material from his page Can Neo Cons. 

A quick scan through Michael LaBelle’s Facebook thread of awfulness will reveal a few more of my cartoons that were overlooked on a morning of logging infringements when I could’ve easily been more productive with my time than picking away at some loser’s pathetic hobby. Still, there remains extracts of cartoons drawn by well known cartoonists whose work has been degraded and repurposed to convey this thief’s twisted thoughts for all eternity.  The word needs to get out that this behaviour is unacceptable and that it won’t be tolerated. While some may wonder why I bother to devote more than a few seconds of fuming towards some cretin that pops up on my Twitter notifications, this is really meant for the future Michael LaBelles.  Michael LaBelle, rather stupidly, opted to react unwisely when his dirty hobby was exposed even when he was given the option to recant. Let this serve as an example to other Michael LaBelles that before the DMCA takedown happens you’ll be shamed first, and you’ll become the next useful idiot, like Michael LaBelle.

 

Friday November 16, 2018

Going Viral Virus

On any average day editorial cartoonists spend their days toiling on work for the purpose of filling a square for the print version of the next days’ newspaper for which they are employed. For the entire 20th century that’s how it worked.

In the next century, we began to showcase our cartoons on the Internet. 

Take for example this cartoon, drawn in 2006:

It was drawn at a time when Canada was at war in Afghanistan, meeting its international military obligations, and contributing to an allied mission to neutralize al-Qaeda terrorists based in the region, and bring down the Taliban regime. My critique on May 20, 2006, was of the federal government’s dithering position on whether or not to extend the mission, which began in 2001, for another 2 years. The Liberal Party, leading the government at the time, had become deeply divided over its willingness to continue the mission as soldiers were returning to Canada in body bags at an increasing rate. It didn’t help that their commitment to the effort could be seen in the underwhelming financial support to properly equip the hundreds of armed forces personnel sent.

It’s not my favourite kind of imagery, familiar and overused, and quite frankly, if I could choose which of my cartoons could go viral this would be last on the list.

So to my surprise it resurfaced on a popular cartoon Facebook page 12 and a half years after, the image intact, and the captions butchered to suit an American audience.

 

As posted under the unauthorized version of my cartoon, it’s like I put this cartoon in a bottle, dropped it in the internet Ocean in 2006, and it’s washed up on my FB page, all pixelated with the captions all monkeyed up. You can almost smell the mothballs and cat pee coming from the account of whoever made the modifications.

It’s getting all kinds of likes and shares, and even after pointing out that the original work had been doctored, the usual sort of social media sewer rats emerged endorsing the act of butchering someone else’s satire to suit their political opinions. 

In the past I’ve made a point of making examples of the sort who take pleasure ruining the work of professional cartoonists. I call it the Social Media Jackass Award. Today I’m pleased to announce that CJ Kalish (ChristopherJohn Kalish) who runs the above FB page, but refuses to delete the cartoon, is the latest winner of that award.

According to a colleague in the American Association of Editorial Cartoonists:

 CJ Kalish is a known thief of other’s work. He frequently posts doctored cartoons on his “fan site” without checking their veracity, uses other cartoons without permission, and often publishes material with no credit or ID of the real artist.

A growing number of legitimate cartoonists have been having a running legal battle with him for years now. Clay Jones and Nick Anderson first discovered he was stealing and using doctored work of theirs in 2016, and when called on it, CJ responded with lies and abuse.

Sounds like the classy sort of fellow who’s more than deserving of this recognition.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: don’t change intellectual property that doesn’t belong to you. Do your own work! As for those in the know of these breaches, yet refuse to do anything about them, enjoy the shame and humiliation.

Update: CJ Kalish has removed the doctored cartoon. Ensuing discussion I’ve had with cartoonists both on and off Facebook indicate that he’s had many run-ins with many cartoonists. As Clay Jones put it, quite simply, “he needs to share from the creators’ pages”, instead of copying images to his desktop and reposting them from his FB page.