THE GURGLING COD

Mother's Day Ideas 1) Tennis bracelet 2) Brunch 3) Giving her intellectual property to Amanda Hesser

Mother's Day was never a big deal in the Cod's family, but the run-up to the first such holiday w/o requisite mother has been a little bumpy. I mention that by way of acknowledging the grinchyness that may or may not inform this post. Friday, there was a tweet from Food52, thus:

Getting your mom's recipe published in a cookbook would be quite a Mother's Day present http://bit.ly/bjLZMO Enter by midnight ET"

A way of recognizing Mom for all that hard work she put in feeding your sorry ass? Sure. And yet, if Mom reads the food52 TOS:

You have the ability to add content, including but not limited to recipes, to food52.com. We do not guarantee the accuracy, integrity or quality of the content you provide and do not have any obligation to monitor this. You agree that you, and not Burnt Toast, its affiliates or licensers, are solely responsible and liable for any submissions you upload, post, email, transmit or otherwise make available to food52.com; including any loss or damage to Burnt Toast, LLC or others who may suffer as a result of or in connection with any such submission to food52.com. You shall not submit any content protected by any intellectual property or other third party right without the express permission of the owner. You represent, warrant and covenant that you own or otherwise control all rights to any content you submit to food52.com or Burnt Toast, LLC, and have all rights, power and authority required to provide such content to food52.com and to assign your rights in the submission to Burnt Toast, LLC. Any and all such submissions by you are and will be true, current and accurate. No use of your submissions will violate or infringe any rights of, or cause any injury to, any person or entity.

And:

By submitting any content to food52.com or Burnt Toast, you simultaneously and automatically grant or warrant that the owner has expressly granted us a worldwide, royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive, fully sublicensable and transferable right and license to use, record, sell, lease, reproduce, distribute, create derivative works based upon, publicly display, publicly perform, transmit, publish and otherwise exploit the submitted content as we, in our sole discretion, deem appropriate. We may exercise this grant in any format, media or technology now known or later developed for the full term of any copyright that may exist in the submitted content. You additionally grant other users permission to access your submitted content for personal, non-commercial use as permitted by the functionality of the website and these Terms of Service.

Hey mom -- those snickerdoodles you used to make? The recipe belongs to Amanda Hesser now! Happy Mother's Day!

Hesser/food52 are not the only people using this model -- I'm on the record for admiring the This is Why You're Fat's model of getting paid to have other people write books for you quickly, as opposed to my personal approach of not getting paid to write books by myself, and slowly. If you can get people to do your work for you, for free, then bless your fence-painting, Web 2.0 heart! 

And yet. Sending a picture of your dog in a Richie Tennenbaum headband a and a funny caption off to Hipster Puppies, or a picture of a wheelbarrow full of nacho cheese off  to TIWYF seems like one kind of thing, and sending your mom's recipe to food52 seems like another:

1) For these Tumblrs, you are creating new content for the purpose of submitting to these sites, for whatever joy might come from having your vision publicized. A recipe, particularly one worth submitting to a contest, existed previously, and represents some portion of you/your mom's intellectual equity.

2) Volition. Presumably, for this to make much of a present, it would have to be a surprise. Thus, the "gift" would be "Congratulations, Mom, you are now a published author! But don't give your Green Goddess recipe to that cookbook fundraiser they are doing at the middle school, or Hesser's lawyers will be here faster than you can say 'Mr. Latte.' Another mimosa?"

As a rule it's a good idea to ask someone if they want their work published before it's published. Just ask noted involuntary author (and mom) Anne Bradstreet. So think twice before you press submit, and consider breaking off a day at an Aveda spa, or a nice (ie non-brunch) meal for mom instead. Play us off, Ms. Bradstreet: 

The Author to Her Book
Thou ill-formed offspring of my feeble brain, Who after birth didst by my side remain, Till snatched from thence by friends, less wise than true, Who thee abroad, exposed to public view, Made thee in rags, halting to th' press to trudge, Where errors were not lessened (all may judge). At thy return my blushing was not small, My rambling brat (in print) should mother call, I cast thee by as one unfit for light, The visage was so irksome in my sight; Yet being mine own, at length affection would Thy blemishes amend, if so I could. I washed thy face, but more defects I saw, And rubbing off a spot still made a flaw. I stretched thy joints to make thee even feet, Yet still thou run'st more hobbling than is meet; In better dress to trim thee was my mind, But nought save homespun cloth i' th' house I find. In this array 'mongst vulgars may'st thou roam. In critic's hands beware thou dost not come, And take thy way where yet thou art not known; If for thy father asked, say thou hadst none; And for thy mother, she alas is poor, Which caused her thus to send thee out of door.

Kick out the jams, Mother