The Tonight Show with Jay Leno knowingly ripped off VH1 bloggers with Taylor Swift video montage

There's parallel thinking, and then there's the time a TV show asks you for permission to use your work, and then does so without credit. That's apparently what happened last night to VH1 bloggers Rich Juzwiak and Kate Spencer, no thanks to The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.

In a post titled, "Jay Leno ripped me off" on his own popular personal blog, FourFour, Juzwiak recounts what happened.

Here is the video from VH1's The Fab Life, posted on Nov. 16, 2010:

 

And this is Jay Leno telling Taylor Swift last night what "we" "put together" for her:

 

After the show ended, and Juzwiak didn't see his or Spencer's name in the credits, he wrote:

What surprised me the most wasn't so much that Kate and I weren't mentioned, but that the video wasn't credited as having originated on the Internet. This is not an obscure work – it's racked up over 200,000 views in a week! I thought at the very least, he'd give and indication of this thing's preexistence so that his viewers could hunt it down if they were so inclined. That was, apparently, expecting too much.

This post is to reclaim due credit — that is one very tangible function of this blog that I appreciate very much. As with my NPR/cell-phone supercut feud, I am grateful that I don't have to stand by and watch when someone's going to be so rude as to swipe something I worked on just because it was made for the Internet. Newsflash to the mainstream media: just like you have actual human beings making you work, so does the Internet! A little respect for the people providing your content would be nice! I understand that ownership is a dubious concept these days, and that I'm claiming ownership of a series of clips that I never owned in the first place, but an idea is an idea. They're so hard to come by and so, so valuable.

I know how you feel, Rich. All of us plugging away on the Internet have got your back on this one.

Sean L. McCarthy

Editor and publisher since 2007, when he was named New York's Funniest Reporter. Former newspaper reporter at the New York Daily News, Boston Herald and smaller dailies and community papers across America. Loves comedy so much he founded this site.

View all posts by Sean L. McCarthy →