This came up recently on Facebook when a friend was commenting on people using other people’s ideas. Though this is not a new topic in the community by any means, having gone through my own evolutionary process around it, I decided to share these thoughts.
First, just because someone originated an idea doesn’t mean someone else can’t use it. For example, look at the Android — way successful — and yet a copy of the iPhone to some degree. There are those who contend that the copy is actually better than the original because it improves on what was done in the iPhone and makes it slicker.
Second, if you do a move/pattern/trick/sequence/combo and then I do the move after I’ve seen you do it, is that copying? Or is that me putting my own spin on the move and personalizing it for myself?
Anyone can flow; only you can flow like you.
It is, IMO, not enlightened for us to shrink back when others re-engineer what we have done, take it for themselves and re-purpose it. It may feel bad to our ego because we feel/felt special as the “innovator” of that thing, but it doesn’t help us to contract; it doesn’t help the art form to not share; and it does not allow true flow to emerge in the community.
I say this as an instructor, artist and entrepreneur who has had people “steal” my methodology/ideas/moves/choreography/etc. Know what? No one can ever deliver my ideas in my way — even my trained instructors. I trust (and I really hope everyone else can and will) that in the end, being open, free and flowing will propagate the best results. Of course, I didn’t always believe this and, even though I believe it, it’s not always easy to be as generous as these words. 
In the end I remember that as an innovator, I can always innovate something else. Someone who has to “steal” something from an innovator may never be able to innovate anything.
Personally, I think it’s worse for a true innovator to collapse and give up when others build on their ideas than for someone to use them without crediting their influences. The reality is we are all always influencing each other regardless of what we believe. Being in each other’s sphere of influence and seeing each other move and grow as individual artists impacts us, even when we aren’t consciously seeking to learn anything.
Consider that cars would never have evolved if each inventor didn’t take what was there before him/her and make it better by “stealing” it, modifying it and making it their own “new and improved” version of the vehicle.
I have found again and again — seriously, this is a consistent phenomenon — the more I share what I learn, the more I get back because in teaching it to others (who may go out and claim it to be their own) I learn more, get questions that have me consider variations on the theme and even sometimes get students who ask questions that straight up inspire me to come up with a new innovation.
In the end, I have to ask myself, “Is it more important to hide this idea that will make me feel so good to share out of fear someone else will use it more effectively than I do and/or pass it off as their own or do I value more the growth of the art form and my role as a Priestess sharing the flow?”
My answer?
Share the knowledge and the love.
Let go of worrying about who will “steal” my ideas without crediting me.
Keep innovating.
Stay in my light.
And trust, as has been proven accurate again and again, that my brightness will prevail…
Temple of Poi Home
I agree with you to some degree, Isa – I think the problem is not inherent in sharing, per se – but in the fact that in my experience the vast majority of people who would “steal” an idea or concept DON’T take it to the next level. Rather, they use such ideas as-is for profit and don’t bother to either A) give credit to the innovator or B) build on what they “steal”. This is why every juggler I know can’t stand those “Fushigi” infomercials on late-nite TV; anyone who knows better can clearly see that it’s simply theft of ideas developed over years by master juggler Michael Moschen. The only thing resembling innovation in that case, is the degree of marketing savvy involved in essentially cheapening and trivializing a beautiful form for mass-consumption. “Fushigi” is all about the bottom line, and it has ZERO soul. It’s highly insulting to those of us who know better, most of all Michael Moschen himself.
I could say the exact same thing about the haunted house production company I work with; this past season marked the 3rd consecutive year we have produced a particular haunt, and we always have to make efforts to block unscrupulous people from snapping photos inside the haunt (not always successfully). Lo and behold, this year we started seeing other, less-well-produced and innovative haunts literally STEAL our designs, BRICK for F’n BRICK. What choice do we have now, but to simply ditch our previous designs, and start over from scratch to create new designs that these other folks could never dream of? Yes, we are certainly capable of doing so – but I think any artist could agree that to a great degree, we have to try to profit from the work we have DONE in order to subsidize what we are currently DOING. People who “steal” in the name of “sharing” only undercut the ability to do that, it’s like standing on the shoulders of giants.
hmm…nothing wrong with using existing ideas/concepts to create NEW ideas/concepts, but unfortunately this is rarely the case. Usually ideas are taken strictly for exploitation and profit, not in the interest of taking anything to the “next level.” I will elaborate further on your actual blog post.
don’t worry — anything you write here gets imported there (cool ass plugin Wordbooker is!).
I contend that any time someone uses another’s idea, inherently the idea is shifted because the person presenting it can only share it from their own lens of awareness which is different and therefore causing a shift in the presentation of the idea.
yeah… i’m not in favor of stealing. i am in favor of using what’s come before us to create progress though. thanks for sharing…
It’s said that imitation is the best from of flattery.
We have all stolen from the dead person(s) who developed the 3 beat weave, butterfly and many other basic moves, once these moves were revolutionary. Some people make a living teaching these moves to others. And yeah, if I see someone poi in a manner that I have never seen before and I find it interesting, I’m going to try it too.
The only way I see it being wrong is if someone steals a whole routine, and even then, if the routine is one that you been performing for a while, maybe it’s time to develop a new one.
I think that if someone steals an entire routine, no matter how long they have been performing it, that’s not cool…
I love this post, Isa! Thanks for sharing.
We are living in a time of abundance-based business practices. To keep thinking negatively, jealously hoarding ideas and innovations like a government agency is to be stuck in a bygone era. The days of intense secrecy in all aspects of business are disappearing. Those who lock up their best work to protect it from copycats under the fear of being surpassed haven’t really committed themselves to innovation at all, and will get left behind. The successful artist/entrepeneur in 2012 innovates, and moves on, innovates and moves on. That’s the progressive, abundance mindset.
@JP – I think this is a perfect illustration of that point. If the entire success of your haunted house is based on building something that should never change, perhaps the business model needs to adapt. Apple is not sitting on their hands waiting to be surpassed. They create something great, sell tons of product, get copied like crazy (NONE of which is as successful as them), then come out with the next thing. Lather, rinse, repeat.
On the other point, who cares about Fushigi? It’s not marketed to you or any serious contact juggler; you are not the target audience. It’s a toy, and it was marketed really well. It sounds like contact jugglers are envious that they didn’t come up with a way to cash in on them as well. Sure, the quality is not the same and the learning curve is way steeper than they imply in commercials, but that will become clear over time. Fushigi might disappear into obscurity in a few months when the novelty fades. Great ideas stick; poor imitations disappear. The same could happen to that knockoff haunted house when they have no more good ideas of their own.
To suggest that marketing is not an innovation is silly. Steve Jobs didn’t invent the portable MP3 player; he just sold it really, really well. Yoga has been around for millenia but it became marketable in the US in the 1960s. The vast majority of people are not purists and don’t care who “did it first” or how original or authentic something is. If they did, Taco Bell and Olive Garden would perish. Most people care if the performance is entertaining, if the service is good, if the product is easy to use and meets their needs and is a good value. Yes, it may strip out its soul, but to be fair, being able to take something that works and package it in a way that many people can enjoy is still an art form. That is still innovation.
PS: Isa, for the record – Android was actually purchased by Google in 2005 and developed concurrently with the iPhone. They were both unveiled in 2007, but the first commercially available Android phone wasn’t out till the next year. Android is based on the Linux kernel, which came out in 1991, so it could be argued that the seeds were planted decades earlier. Though they might seem similar, the Android operating system did not copy the iPhone.
@ted: the fact that the android came out later officially is relevant: the os may not have been copied, but rather, the functionality/workflow/usage was, to some degree, copied since it wasn’t commercially available first and i believe that is the important part.