I noticed a thread from 2005 was linked to in a Cracked article: 8 Bad Drivers Nobody Complains About - Part 2.
It’s in the #1 section, and curiously the author bunches a bunch of posts from different Dopers in that thread together into one quote to make it seem like a single person being quoted in the article.
I’m not sure what the fair use issue here is if there is one. If not, then…hey cool! We were linked from a Cracked article!
The Cracked link does not work.
Ah, thanks. I know one of the guys who writes these Cracked pieces, but this is not him.
Many of the Cracked articles are user-contributed, as with Wikipedia. You simply tell them you’d like to contribute, fill in a short application, give them a couple of samples and bingo, you’re on the user-contributor list. You then submit stuff and if it meets a certain standard (not particularly high) they run it. This one clearly wasn’t vetted properly.
The link from Cracked to the SDMB thread was to the archive, and I think what happened is they copied the text right from the archive, where formatting tags are stripped out. Thus a quote simply looks like it’s part of the original.
This is how it appeared in the original thread:
I did this once, but in a far more annoying fashion. (I was driving from MA to IL and got bored, okay?)
The offender was in the middle lane of a three-lane highway. I passed on the left, flipped on my left turn signal, and merged right. Leaving my turn signal on for several seconds, I observed he didn’t get the hint, so I merged right again (still with my left blinker on) and slowed down so he could pass me.
He passed and made no indication of having noticed in the slightest. I then pulled up behind him and repeated the entire scenario.
Still no response.
I passed him for a third time, and then got bored, and drove off, my left signal (and his) still visible for miles on the straightways of Ohio.
Too true.
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What’s interesting is that when they quoted yerba buena from the archive, the Cracked author took out the last quote (“But it’s usually…”), but left everything else in.
Christina H may have gotten her start that way (I don’t know her history.), but she is a regular contributor, to the point that she actually has a hatedom. Clicking on her name at the top of the article reveals she’s been contributing since 2007.
I’ve reported this to Ed.
Offhand I’d say this is fair use. It’s an excerpt from a longer thread (although it does quote most of one post), it links to the source, and it’s being used to make a point. It doesn’t portray the poster in a favorable light, but fair use doesn’t require that. So I’m inclined to let it alone.