Fame is being the subject of a chain email.

[davywavy]

Some time ago, I wrote a satirical post about the recent war in Iraq, comparing it to the Lord of the Rings. This was well recieved, and in fact cropped up (uncredited, bah) in all kinds of places.

I was reminded of this when I got a chain email the other day. I've often wondered who writes chain emails - who takes that time and effort for anonymous circulation? It hadn't really occurred to me that the creators of the mails simply cut and pasted someone elses work and didn't credit them. Not that I'm bitter about it, you understand. Oh no.
Anyway, the chain mail I got was this one:


The Germans also increased their alert state from "Disdain" to "Dress In Uniform
and Sing Marching Songs". They have two higher levels: "Invade a Neighbour" and
"Lose".

Seeing this reaction in continental Europe, the Americans have gone from
"Isolationism" to "Find Another Oil-Rich Nation For Regime Change". Their
remaining higher alert states are "Attack Random Countries (Ideally Those
Without Any Credible Military)" and "Beg The British For Help.

The British are also feeling the pinch in relation to recent bombings and have
raised their security level from "Miffed" to "Peeved". Soon though, security
levels may be raised yet again to "Irritated" or even "A Bit Cross". Londoners
have not been "A Bit Cross" since the Blitz in 1940 when tea supplies all but
ran out. Terrorists have been re-categorized from "Tiresome" to "Bloody
Nuisance". The last time the British issued a "Bloody Nuisance" warning level was during
the Great Fire of London in 1666.


So, on this occasion, I know who wrote the chain email, or at least part of it.
It was me.
My apologies to those spammed by my work.

Comments

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

Way back when I wrote the first UKM/Cam crossover game, I wrote a plot and told the powers that were (and I think still are) in the UKM what the game was going to be - strange goings on in the House of Elizabethan Magus Dr. Dee.
At the next UKM game I went to, you'll never guess the plot: Strange goings on in the house of Elizabethan Magus Dr. Dee.
I wasn't even irritated at being ripped off. When someone asked me why not, I just replied that at least I was capable of having original ideas, and I was capable of having more then one.
When the BBC started plundering me for ideas a few years ago, i actually entitled my LJ "this LJ is copyright so stop ripping me off". It didn't stop people ripping me off.
But still, if I'm posting to the public domain, how much right to I have to complain? I just bitch.

And anyway - unlike the people who read my LJ for ideas, I'm capable of having my own.

[(Anonymous)]

A couple of years ago I sent the Eye a cartoon - bloke with mutton-chop whiskers slumped across a bar among bottles, glasses etc. Barman: "Come along, Dr Watson, haven't you got Holmes to go to?" Came back with the usual polite slip - no thanks, not suitable, etc.

A few months ago I saw an uncannily familiar cartoon in the Eye - different art (i.e. not mine), same punchline.

I suppose the thing is, someone might have thought of it totally independently - it's not such a unique, Euclid-like idea that only one person will have thought of it every 2,000 years, after all. Ho hum.

H