Crime
Nigerians and the indignities of Piracy!
By Jarlath Opara
I did a piece on “Gwo, gwo gwo ngwo! A Dance of deception”! The following day, because of how it was trending many pirated it, removing my name, replacing it with theirs.
Piracy and plagiarism are twins, the very havoc they unleash on the literary world, very acidic!. It has eaten deep into the social media system, without its thrive the traction, the social media space would have fallen like the chest of an octogenarian woman.
The duo have proven to be the oxygen that gives social media platforms life.
On their own, creative thinking and inspiration have become too essential commodity to be afforded.
The gwo gwo gwo ngwo dance has suddenly became famous, until one dances such, one possibly wouldnt be counted.
Every body is doing the dance, both the old, the young, the mad, the sane, the hooligans, the hoipoloi, the rich, the clergy etc. A typical description of an average human being, too imitative. The gwo gwo dance was the musing of one man, his creative ingenuity and the sweat of his deep thinking, turning what was obsolete into a new wine, finely brewed, intoxicating everybody around.
Though a natural predilection for one to gravitate towards good and nice things, things with traces and insignia of popularity, pirating or plagiarising such however makes one a rapist of intellectual property.
70% of contents our Nigerian content creators upload are already an existing story or comic lines either imported from outside or gotten elsewhere.
I have watched severally comic skits or motivational video clips redone by Nigerian skit makers without acknowledging the original source. They would do it as if it was their ingenuity.
What about stand up comedian? They are the worst hit, the level of pirated jokes without acknowledging the original source is alarming.
Majority of Nigerians in their cerebral space and deep inspirations have gone depressed and unenthusiastic because of the ordeal of piracy. Why engage their brain to masterly create contents that would eventually become a cash cow of those who weren’t at the quarry, when sacrifices were made for the creation of such skits, which every Tom, Dick and harry swarm to like bees around hornet nest.
Count the number of Nigerian skit makers who are creative and ingenious with their craft, not up to ten would be counted. Others are copy cats, update specialist and arm chair analysts of trending skits. The day Facebook or YouTube will be monetizing based on originality, that day many of them will get broke and abject.
Sadly and very condescending is when you confront such pirates and plagiarists, some of them would be so unremoseful, with an attitude of what is the big deal! One of the reasons legends and maestro like Mike Ejeagha and his likes who bestrode the musical world with passion, creativity and mastery are today not reaping in full measures the fruits of their labour.
Stay away from piracy! Stay away from plagiarism! Each of them comes with a sense of joy and soft life, but it diminishes the very reputation and integrity falsefully gotten when the bubble is burst.
It is more indignifying when people who ride on the high horse of integrity, stoop so low to rub themselves with the stinking mud of piracy and plagiarism. Pharisaic!
Jarlath Uche Opara Jarlathuche@gmail.com