Morning appeal. [volume] (Carson City, Nev.) 1877-1906, 1880-05-06
JOURNALISTIC PIRACY.

The practice editors have of foraging indis-
criminately through their exchanges and ap-
or. priating original articles without sign of
credit, is getting to be a sort of distinguishing
feature of Western journalism. The profess
sion is full of pirates who raise the black flag
on other mems brains and swOOp down on
every stray idea that floats along on the open
sea of thought. An item that appears In
Newspaper for the first time is copied by the
papers in the immediate vicinity and then, as
it drifts away from its frat moorings, its rights
cease to be respected and its identity is lost
forever. Some editor who hears the compost
tors calling for copy cuts out the item, and
sometimes through carelessness and some
times with malice aforethought, he clips
the credit from the bottom and the idea be-
comes common driftwood from that time. 1t
is the hotsan and jstsam that the waves sport
with or swolow up as the case may be. IT 1t
IL something light, pleasant or strlking y origl-
nal it is bonnd never to go to the bottom. 1t
may be cast upon the sands Of neglected
beach and lie there for years, but some high
sea will bear it to another cline. An editor
who prints an original artce without credit is
a. bad as the pirate who, after capturing a YES
sell effaces the name from the hull and sets it
adrift without a crew Yet when it comes to
this sort of piracy we all in the same boat.
Where is the journalistic writer who has never
stolen an ideal If he sits within range of our
voice let him stand up that his brothers may
view him from afar. Do we not all think it a
good deal easier to shear political or COM
mercial editorial from some New York paper
than to evolve it after the slow, methodical
and laberious plant These articles are all
written by men of big brains and large expert
ence, and a man out here in Nevada must
far as We are concerned We never yet printed
an editorial on the financial and monetary
question that we did net stea! bodily from the
st. Louis Republican or Chicago Times. Where
these sheets got it we haven't the least idea,
but its safe to believe they stole it some where.
When We want to give our readers something
really fine on literary topic We crib boldly
from Mr.. Carlyle of the Enterprise. We did
this for long time because We thought that
the Enterprise man knew all about literature
that there was to be known, until he said one
day that Bulwer wrote Tristan Shandy" and
We lost confidence in him. In matters of pure
and undefiled morality and religion, however,
we still pin our faith on the unctuous writ
ings Of the great and good Deacon Parkinson,
who has shed mellow religious light over the
wicked State of Nevada for years, making clear
the dark paths and placing many hardened
sinner in the true way to repentance. The
irreligious contemporary may rail at the good
old man, as the heather of old rallied at The
Lords Amounted, or as the thoughtess child.
rem made sport of the bald headed prophet
until the bears devoured them, but the time
will come when the sinners of the sage brush
will acknowledge the moral superiority OF the
Tribune man as teacher of the people, and
the voice of the scoffer shall be hushed. All
the good things about piety and virtue that
have ever appealed to the better natures of
men through the columns of this journal were
inspired by some sanity observation of our
esteemed neighbor, the Deacon. We indulge
in these confessions because they are good for
the soul, and not to make our professional
brothers feel sorry. The columns of the Ap-
PEAL are always open to the shears and paste.
pot man of any newspaper and they are all at
liberty to 60 for US as if We were a grab bug