We've probably all seen it. A stern old man with a goatee and colorful hat and outfit peers accusingly at you and proclaims "I WANT YOU". But, was this an original idea, or was it taken from someone else without permission.

The famous military recruitment poster we have seen was created by
James Montgomery Flagg (June 18, 1877 - May 27, 1960). Mr. Flagg was an American artist and illustrator. He worked in mediums ranging from fine art painting to cartooning, but is best remembered for his posters.

He studied fine art in London and Paris in his early 20s, and then came to the States, where he created illustrations for books, magazine covers, political and humorous cartoons, advertising, and spot drawings prolifically.

But, his signature work was the "I WANT YOU" poster. Actually, the poster was a self portrait of Flagg as Uncle Sam. That's all fine and good, but I happened to see a discussion of the work on television, and the expert discussing the picture called it a "plagiarism" of an earlier work by an English artist. Flagg's famous poster was created in 1917 to encourage recruitment in the United States Army during World War I. It showed Uncle Sam pointing at the viewer.

But, the poster idea itself was not an original one. Apparently Flagg took the basic theme of the poster from a British recruitment poster showing Lord Horatio Kitchener in a similar pose, with an accusatory pointing finger.

What Flagg did was take the British recruitment poster with the same finger pointing pose, put his face as the face in the picture (adding years to his face and a beard), and the words "I Want YOU for the U. S. Army".

Now, as I said, this gentleman on television called it "plagiarism", and others have been more generous, saying it was "inspired by" the earlier work.

Four million copies of the poster were printed and distributed in WW I and it was so popoular, it was brought back in WW II to stimulate recruitment drives.

Of course, the point here is what some are calling "plagiarism", others are calling "inspired by". Copyright and patent lawsuits have sprung forth in the twentieth and twenty first century from this kind of thing.

The point I have never determined is, how many changes must you make to an original work , before it becomes YOUR original work?

i believe thier is a percentage... like say if you take a photo into photo shop and mess with it...

Draft this!!!! ../.,

The next thing, some ambulance chasing lawyer will hand me a lawsuit for plagarizing the way I stand to wait for a bus. The explosion of lawyers being extruded from the law school factories have only added to this problem. The ultimate confidence job....I'll get you money for nothing..just give me a cut. Go look in your yellow pages. There is page after page after page of lawyers and law firms. Do we need all these lawyers? Hollywood or TV can't make a movie or show nowadays without a lawyer or doctor in it. They have glorified these positions so much that we have a glut of lawyers and doctors. With this increase comes the increase in the number of bottom feeders in these groups. People who pander lawsuits for a simple door ding in a supermarket parking lot and so-called doctors getting people to buy the latest TV advertised liver killing cholesterol drugs with 20 seconds of disclaimers to all their side effects.

There actually isn't a major need of doctors as there was in the 50s. With more technology being used in that field, some of the things that couldn't be done in the 50s except by an EXTREMELY skilled person that has incredible nerves of steel can be done by a machine that has a little more stability before the pressure of the job sets in.

However, there will always be a need for nurses. As I understand it at the moment, that field has been outsourced to Europe in terms of American doctors.

For lawyers, Lessig said it best. They don't have your interests at heart. It's all about the quickest buck. In another book I'm reading (Investing for Dummies) it's discussed how a tax attorney (who calls himself "The People's Attorney") is really only in it for the money. Granted, not every last law firm is bad. But still, greed comes in many forms.

Plagiarism is when you copy something exactly as it appears and then put your name on it. "Inspired by" is a better statement here. All that he really copied was the pointing finger. Everything else is as original as what I right here.

I don't see why it matters now. This happened 80 years ago. What, are they planning on using the poster again for one of Dubya's overseas expeditions?

Hah! Try seeinf where the American national anthem is from. The words are origional, but the tune is an English drinking song.

Uncle Sam doesn't look anything like Kitchener. You can't copyright an idea.

Yet. But we're working on that, too.

Draft the Bush twins.

A image must be 40% altered to count as an orginal work. To many people that would seem to be a very low percentage but being a photoshop editor 40% alteration on any image completely becomes a new image.