"Ten years ago Florida-resident Allen Rout posted a picture of his newborn son, Stephen, on the Internet. Then just two month ago, while googling his own name, he was shocked to discover that his son's picture had become a sensation in Japan. It was on dolls, in game shows, and even in video games. It was essentially being used as an 'open-source stock image.'"
Thursday, September 30, 2010
11
My baby? My baby seems so smart but I'm also worried about my baby's image being appropriated and reused by the Japanese in some sort of internet/reality crossover meme.
Hello, American blog reader. I see you are interested in distributing baby pictures in your home prefecture.
I am disrespectful to copyright. Can you see that I am serious?
So happy to see this story continuing to get play, although frankly I liked my version better before WeirdAsiaNews ripped it off: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/16/fashion/16meme.html
And, you know, there's also this if you're still interested: http://www.dadwagon.com/2010/08/02/qa-stephen-rout-japanese-meme-boy-and-his-father-allen-s-rout/
Okay, self-promotion mode off now.
Huh. Looks like lots of us should start reading Styles again!
Whoah, now, Choire! That's a bit drastic. Maybe you could ease into it instead, assign an intern to scan the RSS, ask friends if they've looked at it recently-you know, something not too taxing.
I'll take it slow, I promise.
The paper is unable to make deliveries to my home, so it's somewhat of a problem. (Over the course of the last 12 delivery dates, it has arrived 3 times.)
Sometimes however when so deprived I will peruse the paper "online"! Perhaps I will do so more diligently.
(This is sad because it means I'm not allowed to be among the .4% of all Americans that subscribe to the New York Times.)
DadWagon will always be MY paper of record for weird Asia news.
I think it's revealing that boingboing is blocked by The Awl's office web filter.
http://boingboing.net/2010/07/27/my-son-is-a-meme.html
Is this like Homer Simpson and "Mr. Sparkle" ?
("Mr.Sparkle is disrespectful to dirt!")