Shameful Human of the Week: Judith Griggs

This week’s Shameful Human is the editor of Cooks Source Magazine. She has become a complete internet pariah in recent weeks following the revelation that her magazine published a blog post by Monica Gaudio without seeking permission.

When Gaudio got in contact with Cooks Source, Griggs blasted back with an astoundingly ignorant and condescending email that interneters the world over have come to marvel at:

Yes Monica, I have been doing this for 3 decades, having been an editor at The Voice, Housitonic Home and Connecticut Woman Magazine. I do know about copyright laws. It was “my bad” indeed, and, as the magazine is put together in long sessions, tired eyes and minds somethings forget to do these things.

But honestly Monica, the web is considered “public domain” and you should be happy we just didn’t “lift” your whole article and put someone else’s name on it! It happens a lot, clearly more than you are aware of, especially on college campuses, and the workplace. If you took offence and are unhappy, I am sorry, but you as a professional should know that the article we used written by you was in very bad need of editing, and is much better now than was originally. Now it will work well for your portfolio. For that reason, I have a bit of a difficult time with your requests for monetary gain, albeit for such a fine (and very wealthy!) institution. We put some time into rewrites, you should compensate me! I never charge young writers for advice or rewriting poorly written pieces, and have many who write for me… ALWAYS for free!

That’s right, apparently the internet is public domain now. And us online writers are of such a desperate and unclean bread that we should appreciate merely having our work lifted by “real world” editors like Griggs, so that they may edit our work and profit on it.

Following the outpouring of internet rage that came from Gaudio’s explanation of events, more digging led to the discovery that Griggs and her magazine have ripped off everyone from Martha Stewart to NPR.

Cooks Source has been sort of apologetic about the events described above, or sorry they got caught, anyway. In a pseudo-apology appearing on the magazine’s website, they attack crusaders for internet justice, blame overworked writers and untrustworthy submitters, and play victim as much as possible.