I don't care that they stole my idea. I care that they don't have any of their own.
The secret of all effective originality in advertising is not the creation of new and tricky words and pictures, but one of putting familiar words and pictures into new relationships.
Art is either plagiarism or revolution.
Follow the masters! But why should one follow them? The only reason they are masters is that they didn't follow anybody!
The more powerful and original a mind, the more it will incline towards the religion of solitude.
Don't keep forever on the public road, going only where others have gone. Leave the beaten track occasionally and dive into the woods.
We've never considered our stuff either homage or spoof. Those are things other people call it, and it's always puzzled me that they do.
Every moment in business happens only once. The next Bill Gates will not build an operating system. The next Larry Page or Sergey Brin won't make a search engine. If you are copying these guys, you aren't learning from them.
The hallmark of originality is rejecting the default and exploring whether a better option exists.