“They laughed when I sat down at the computer to make money with my articles”

That title exists as a title suggestion in many copy writing books, so it fits into the definition of something from your “swipe file” and the definition of creative imitation.

If I were to take the exact same title or exact same set of words and claim as mine without attribution or permission, that is defined as plagiarism or stealing.

Hope this helps, and thanks so much for you comment and support.

Jeff

Who wants to buy an “also-and” product. And worse, who wants to sell a “me-too” product. Creative imitation works to an extent but boy can that become boring. Sort of like living in a world consisting only of shades of gray. Where’s the color and with color – creativity?

My suggestion: model principles but stand on your head to see them from a different perspective. That’s when the juice flows and great stuff happens. My own interpretation of creative imitation.

Amelia Brazell

I’m modeling Alex’s concepts and principles on some of my pages, but using my own unique style.

I’m modeling Alex concepts, but using my own unique style. It’s the principles you want to model, not verbatim copying.

CREATIVE INNOVATION.

The trick is to be slightly different/better while using the elements of the original that worked to generate revenue and remaining identifiable as part of a larger market so that you reap the benefits of same. A book should look like other books so we know it is a book…a teleseminar should look like other teleseminars, etc.

There are other ways to market (the ipod discussion) but CREATIVE INNOVATION is the far more common one.

The rest can be addressed by law. If material is copyrighted, and no license or other permission has been granted, then taking the words and reusing them are theft. The “fair use” doctrine allows limited quoting only, not wholesale reproduction.

HOWEVER, The creator of the words retains rights ONLY if he or she (a) claimed them in the first place and (b) polices infringements. If he or she does not choose to police use their work for whatever reason, then they can lose their right to them.

So, I wonder what the copyright situation was in the works in question. If the original person did not claim them…then have at it!

However…in the long run, we come back to the same principle we started with: You have to do something DIFFERENT to be successsful over the long run, to have something about you that is unique…so you have to internalize everything you learned by imitation so that you can generate your own original work.

Or at least that is how I see it!

I am curious though about the whole “swiping vs. stealing” topic. There are a number of headlines that have been copied for decades such as the classic Caples headline “They Laughed When I Sat Down At the Piano But When I Started to Play!”, with just a few words substituted for many other products. So the question is this, If one takes another’s headline and inserts a different non-competing product name in the headline (or sales copy) is this swiping or stealing. Is it creative imitation or plagiarism?

I do “get” the concept of creative activation and creative imitation as you described in your comment above – and I can think of many examples where I have used both in the process of learning, yet the words were all mine. I’m I’ve been studing copywriting to improve my reader appeal and have paid careful attention to see the formula and use it rather than copy the words of others.

I’d like to read more on this so I’m sure to have a well rounded understanding.

I really admire the way you handled the original topic of your post.

Thanks for taking the time to contribute your comment to my guest post on Alex Mandossian’s blog. I think we have the beginnings of a really good discussion here, and I hope we can keep it going.

The curious thing is that you and I are on the same page about creativity. My post was not intended to frame “creative imitation” as an end-to-end solution to be used at all times.

My definition of creativity goes like this:

“Creativity is simply looking at something that has always been there and seeing something that has never been seen before.”

From that definition I pull these two additional definitions:

“Creative activation” – what most people would call invention, I look at as seeing something that has never been seen before and creating something new. A good example would be the work of Walt Disney.

“Creative imitation” – learning from someone else’s work and using it as a jumping off point for putting your own, sometimes better, twist on it.

Having said that, there was another point being made in that blog post.

I don’t know if you had the time to look at the link to Eric Gruber’s course or some of the other comments.

The intention of the two examples given were twofold:

1. To highlight how my “creative imitation” of Alex Mandossian helped me to launch my teleseminar business and all I have been able to create in the short time since then.

2. The second example was intended to highlight how someone has taken my work with http://www.ArticleWritingandMarketingSecrets.com and done something other than creative imitation. I’ll let others and the comments of others on this blog name what they think that something might be.

Again, Stu, thanks for taking the time to contribute your comment and for starting a discussion about this on your own blog.

I hope we can have a discussion that benefits us all.

And all the best to you too,

Jeff