15 Comments
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EJ's avatar

Not that you asked, but I say, Let the pendant be made with attribution to you. You deserve to take credit for your inspiring words! And to make some money, if it proves profitable. Women are encouraged to feel it’s base to take credit or want it, but that’s how patriarchy gets to steal credit for men. You deserve to take up space and to have your words recognized as yours. xo

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Sari Botton's avatar

Thank you, E.J. <3

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Elizabeth Marro's avatar

For what it's worth, I think your name should be on that pendant along with your excellent words. I get why you are struggling but this is one of those moments when you must own all you've accomplished as you've traveled that "circuitous" route towards your writing and all the good things that have flowed from it. Perhaps anyone else could have said it or expressed a similar thought but you were the one who said it in the right way at the right moment. I'm looking forward to making a gift of this to a person who will want to know its origin story. You are the key to that story.

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Sari Botton's avatar

Wow. Thank you.

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Charlotte Dune's avatar

Wow. This is wild. I can’t imagine not speaking up immediately if someone was using my quote without attribution.

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Sari Botton's avatar

Well, they use the image of the tweet, which shows my name and that it's from my account.

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Charlotte Dune's avatar

Yes, sorry, I meant that comment in regards to Appell.

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Kris Jackson's avatar

Your words are important and if someone else wants to immortalize them, by all means take credit and money for it! Women are taught to give our time, energy, creativity, and WORK away for free. Lean in. Own your work AND GET PAID FOR IT.

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Sari Botton's avatar

<3

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Alison Krupnick's avatar

Hi - I have reached out to the OP, who is new to digital publishing, and likely didn’t realize the ramifications. Re: viral posts - years ago, my high school daughter attended a beach party where she hoped to seal the deal with a crush. Alas, it was not to be. She came home and wrote a Tumblr post about the “saddest thing in the world...” Last time she checked it had something like 500,000 likes and shares. She never divulged this to the crush.

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Sari Botton's avatar

Oh, wow! And thank you.

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Paul Vigna's avatar

Do the pendant, with your name on it. Life is too short to waste time on modesty.

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Cabot O'Callaghan's avatar

Conflict, confusion, doubts, moral dilemmas...I feel ya. Capitalism weirds up our humanity. Commodifying existence is a dark path. Not trying to claim moral high ground, I'm here with you, doing as the Romans do, as we must if we want to survive. It's a trip. If we don't claim and defend our creativity, someone else will have their way with it. And the digitalization of everything threatens to consume all, regardless of our vigilance.

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Ken's avatar

Internet. Only the wealthy can afford to chase copyright, in the same way that a small business may as well not patent. It’s sad but true.

I wanted to republish a paragraph from a science magazine, and properly filled out the form to request permission. They responded with “the website is down for maintenance.” well no it wasn’t. Pages loaded fine. Upon looking for similar information to use in its place I found the entire article had been lifted and republished already, numerous times, including by one claiming authorship.

No. I didn’t use it.

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Sep 17, 2023
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Sari Botton's avatar

Awww, thanks.

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