Hey guys, do you suppose I would win a Nobel Peace Prize in 1999 if I proposed the Theory of Relativity?? Heck no. Albert Einstein did that about 50 years ago. So why would you “award” finalist status to an entry that copies the winning spot in last year’s Radio Mercury Awards? (I’m talking about entry #15 [March RAP Cassette] for those with brainlock.) It not only steals the concept, but some of the copy is verbatim!
This guy being named a “finalist” is a slap in the face to those of us who create, mold, and refine our work to produce a worthy message. This lack of originality sickens me to the point of canceling my subscription if this particular entry were to win.
Now, please excuse me as I must write a commercial for an auto dealer. Here’s my idea. Whatdoya think? “…Got Car?”
Feel free to print this letter in your next edition as I’m sure other members have similar feelings.
Doug Ankerman, Continuity Director
WHBC-AM/FM
Dear Doug,
Well, as you probably already know, the entry you refer to won the trophy, and we would hate to lose you as a subscriber. For your information, there was another winner, a runner-up, whose work had also been “done before.” And for all we know, there are several others whose concepts were “borrowed.”
Other RAP Members may have similar feelings, but it was a majority of RAP Members who voted this particular entry as the winner. It is our job to tabulate the votes; not to investigate the origins of every concept. So the thought of disqualifying an entry because the concept was not original puts us in the spot of wondering if any of the other, less known concepts were also taken from somewhere else. How can we judge one and not the rest? We are put in the position of having to let the entrants decide for themselves if their work is indeed their own.
A line from Andy Capp’s column in last month’s issue comes to mind: “There is no truer cliché than ‘There are no new ideas.’ Everything that is created is built on the work of those before it, and that from the work before it, and on and on.”
Perhaps the justice lies in the fact that you can look at any award you may win and know that you won solely on your creative talents. That’s a feeling of achievement certain others can never obtain.
JV
♦
