07-25-01 @ 6:17 pm EDT

Here is a peeve of mine at Stories.com. I'll try to phrase this carefully as I really don't want to offend those who do it--I'm sure many good authors do so--but it truly does bug me.

What bothers me is when people post the lyrics to popular (or not-so-popular) songs as static items around here. I'm further bothered by those who give these a high rating. I'm certain they do so only because they like the song and/or agree with what it's saying. But still--when people post these as separate items, just the lyrics with perhaps only a sentence of commentary or none at all, to me it seems as if they are trying to use "filler" to increase their number of items created. That may not be their intent...but it's what's happening.

Face it, whenever you post another song, you're "creating" another item.

While this is not technically plagiarism, as I have yet to see somebody claim another song as their own (I've seen only one instance of real plagiarism once, reported it, and wow, it was deleted within minutes!), it still seems to me to be a misuse of both the lyrics and this site. Take a look at it this way. You have a book by Stephen King or Anne Rice or whoever that you really like. Would you then copy an entire chapter and post it here as a separate item? Merely saying at the top, "I really love this chapter, it really speaks to me!" or whatever?

Even without claiming it as your own, you could get in trouble for doing that. Technically, we are not even supposed to quote lyrics in any of our works without the proper permission--and probably payment.

Let me get this straight: I do NOT mind the quoting of songs in longer stories; and if someone were to simply dedicate a JOURNAL to posting favorite song lyrics, to me that's walking the line, but I wouldn't be too bothered by it. It would be the creation of one item dedicated to song lyrics, or else it would be the addition of lyrics to a greater whole. (This would include a DETAILED REVIEW of the song, not just one sentence saying "This song is by Such-And-Such and I really like it, I hope you do too." )

But the creation of a new static item for each song that one likes...this I cannot agree with. And yes, I rate these very poorly. Every time I see the posting of song lyrics standing alone, as a separate item, I will give it a one. To me, it is a lack of work and concentration on coming up with something to post, and it borders on theft. Thank God now that hardly anyone (if anyone at all) reads this, as I don't want to deal with the backlash should anyone with a one-star-rated lyric come griping to me, but that's the way I rate. If you can't come up with something ORIGINAL, rather than bloat your number of items created by posting someone else's material without any ORIGINAL ADDITION of your own--such as a detailed music review--then you can expect one star from me.

This probably means zip to those who post lyrics--"Someone else will just come along and rate me a five"--and I can't do anything about that. But I thought I should let you know that this is STORIES.COM, and you are supposed to come up with your OWN MATERIAL.

Why not try it out rather than let someone else's words do the talking for you.