I finally - after hearing multiple very strong recommendations and letting it sit in my later list for a while - watched Hbomberguy's epic video Plagiarism and You(tube). It is what it says on the tin - a very thorough and surprisingly entertaining discussion of people who create videos by passing off the work of others as their own. The surprise is just how literal and word for word the copying can be, and then sometimes also playing video from the same source on top. Truly shameless, and truly bad in so many ways which Hbomberguy illuminate with great wit and justified anger.
I was amazed at just how captured I was by this almost four-hour video. I did watch at elevated speed, but it still took multiple sessions to finish. Those sessions were much longer than I would have guessed.
I half expected to come away angry and perhaps a bit frustrated after so much watching on a bad topic like this. To my surprise, I felt more uplifted than anything else. I guess that is another sign of a good and thorough takedown - it gives the sense that a bad person got just a bit of payback by being so thoroughly revealed as a shameless plagiariser.
I also felt increased pride in the things I and others create. The things we put together ourselves, actually citing sources and inspirations. Creations where a million things could be refined, improved, edited, polished, but which are very much our own.
We build things. Things full of our our own ideas, whims, mistakes, and limitations.
That stands out in a sea of ripoffs and rehashed material.