In an increasingly digitalised world, original content is becoming increasingly rare. With the massive adoption and extensive performance improvement of AI platforms, plagiarism and content theft has become even more of an issue.
Concepts such as the ‘dead internet theory’ can probably drop the ‘theory’ suffix, and the research agrees.
While Meta has a very real roll to play in this decrease in original content, their most recent guideline release seems to show at least a somewhat good-hearted attempt to decrease blatant theft of visuals, text, and ideas.
Here’s what you need to know. At the start of May, Instagram released new guidelines stating that content had to be sufficiently original otherwise such accounts would not be recommended to new users. The guidelines state: “If your account isn’t eligible to appear in recommendations, you can become eligible again when most of your recently posted reels, photos and carousels are considered original in a 30-day period. This is calculated on a rolling basis and you can always check your standing in Account status. Accounts with limited reach – you have the option to remove unoriginal content or appeal the decision to become eligible to appear in recommendations again.”
While the social rule of ‘credit the original creator’ has existed since the start of online content platforms, the potential monetary gain from stealing other’s work in the modern world as well as the ease of access to bots and AI account tools has caused many to disregard these principals in search of profit.
This latest guideline release from Instagram will hopefully do some good in reducing low effort and content thieving accounts.
As they put it: “It takes a lot of time and effort to create original content, so those who create it should get the proper credit. Original content is work that you wholly created or reflects your unique perspective.”
