Der größte Witzedieb der Welt
ist offenbar ein Italiener: Daniele Luttazzi, einer der bekanntesten italienischen Fernseh-Satiriker, hat angeblich nachweisbar über 500 Witze von berühmten englischen und amerikanischen Comedians von Eddie Izzard und George Carlin bis Bill Hicks gemopst. Viele Einzelfälle schön nachzulesen in einem italienischen Blog. Wer also selbst dringend ein paar Witze braucht und sie schon passend vorsortiert braucht: Bittesehr.
Latest news: In 2012, Luttazzi won a legal battle against La7 broadcasting company, which in 2007 abruptly closed his late show „Decameron“, accusing him, among other charges, of plagiarism from Bill Hicks. Sentence: It was original satire, not plagiarism. Luttazzi got 1 million 2 hundred thousand euros as compensation.
The accusation of plagiarism, according to Luttazzi, is a misleading half-truth. Five years before those allegations, Luttazzi himself told about his scheme on his personal blog: he wrote that he adds famous comedians‘ material to his work as a defense against the million-euro lawsuits he has to face because of his satire. Luttazzi calls his ruse „the Lenny Bruce trick“ after a similar trick played by his hero, Lenny Bruce. Luttazzi asks his readers to find out the original jokes. He awards a prize to anyone who finds a „nugget“, i.e. a reference to famous jokes: he calls the game „treasure hunt“. Luttazzi also calls the allegations „naive“, explaining why those jokes are not „plagiarized“, but „calqued“, which is a fair use of original material. He used a joke by Emo Philips to prove that the meaning of a joke depends on its context. Luttazzi’s blog lists all the comedians and writers quoted in his works.