Content Curation: Innocent Sharing or Just Another Pile of Digital Marketing Bull Chips?

#18
Alexa, thank you for sticking with the conversation. For the record, at the beginning of this piece by Jim and me, I quoted a definition of "content curation' (a phrase that has its own meaning independent of the respective meanings of each word component of the phrase) from EContent magazine. I know that you read that definition, although it does not appear that everyone did. Here is a definition of "content curation" from Curata, a firm that offers such as a service to content marketers: "Content curation is when an individual (or team) finds, organizes, annotates, and shares relevant and high quality digital content ..." Curata also identifies what it calls "content farming" as "... the unethical pirating of third-party content and publishing of high-quantity, low-quality content." My contention, if you will, is that the two activities described coalesce most of the time, in fact, when it comes to content marketing. As to editors being curators, that is to twist the concept beyond recognition. In the art world, there are curators who gather photos of art works, add commentary, and publish the conglomeration as a "catalog". There are also editors of anthologies or co-authored works who might skirt the concept of curation, but can hardly be considered the defining paradigm. The Oxford English dictionary defines "editor" as: "A person who is in charge of and determines the final content of a newspaper, magazine, or multi-author book ... A person who commissions or prepares written or recorded material for publication or broadcast ..." None of which coincides with what "content curators" in fact, do. But if someone wants to arbitrarily define the term "curator" to fit their argument, they are entitled to do so. I just think it is silly.. Reply

#18
I agree, Alexa, but you might as well be talking to a rock, when you talk to someone who thinks newspaper syndication is content curation. Syndication involves multiple simultaneous sales of reprint rights to the syndicated material. It has nothing to do with curating. Reply

#15
Alexa, I understand and agree with what you're saying... at least in the main. I personally do not deny that content can be curated in the "right" way and be useful. But that takes almost as much work as writing original content, so virtually none of those who style themselves as "content curators" will curate in the "tight" way. My point is that when most people talk about "content", that is a red flag, indicating they consider "content" a generic, interchangeable commodity, that you can simply drop into websites and pages like bricks and blocks. Which you and I agree is wrong. But unfortunately, the attitude is so common that marketing clients and potential clients who don't know any better believe it. At least until they've spent their entire budget on nothing. Cheers! Reply

Thanks Alexa Steele. The whole point here is to gradually get people to understand that the need professional help now, just as much as people day back in the analog days. The glut of posts that never get read is growing exponentially. LinkedIn Pulse readership is off by about 40%. The only explanation that makes sense is that people are tired of reading crap, and frustrated by how much of it there is. This is part of the reason we created the Beezers hive. We're all well read writers and we like posting the work of other good writers there. It's not gonna change the world, but it's a start. People really only start to figure this out after their bottom line has been affected. We're trying to get them there before that. Reply

#9
Thanks Praveen Raj Gullepalli. We'll try to keep it as witty as we can. Phil and I have come to love doing these, and will probably go on as long as we don't become demented, although there are some who will say we have already reached that plateau. Reply

#10
Thanks for the comment David. You are absolutely right of course. But I figure that if you promote the idea that quality content is king, as opposed to crap content, you will find people who get it. Probably a lot more who don't but that's what the 80/20 Differential is all about. Reply

#2
Praveen, be careful not to repeat your admonition too frequently, or you will get a reputation for being "negative." For there are many who are made uncomfortable by many of the things that you are saying.here. Of course, I am NOT one of them. Cheers! Reply

#4
#5 Actually, Jim and David, my point is somewhat stronger than that. Simply including a credit to the creator of a work when you duplicate and use that work for your own purposes does not invalidate your legal responsibilities under U.S. and International copyright law. Unless the reproduction falls within the definition of "fair use", you have violated the creator's copyright, unless you've secured permission for the use or purchased the right to use the material. Plagiarism is an ethical issue and is avoided by including proper and prominent attribution. But avoiding plagiarism does not ipso facto avoid violation of copyright. If you use, without permission, work created by someone else in the course of marketing or advertising or for any other commercial purpose, from which you gain benefit, monetary or otherwise, you are stealing (at least some of) the inherent value of that work. That is is widely accepted in the world of digital media, indeed often lauded, does not change that fact, David. Cheers! ( https://www.bebee.com/producer/@friedman-phil/writer-s-concise-guide-to-copyright-trademark-patent-plagiarism-i ) Reply

#4
... thanks for the comment. Phil's point is that the content is not always being credited, it's being appropriated by people who don't think there's anything wrong with that. Reply

Jim, it appears to me that content curation and content marketing have both become part-and-parcel of the overall social media experience. Thus, I'll repeat the question posed to your partner in crime, Phil Friedman, what wrong with either approach as long as the content cited is credited to the original source (author, outlet)? Thanks for more good buzz. I also hope you're settling in well with your recent move. Reply

#2
Wow... Praveen Raj Gullepalli. Thanks for the affirmation for a whole other part of the world. Reply