I was in the US a few years ago when the whole Carlos Mencia, Joe Rogan thing was kicking off – and I remember seeing Mencia do that joke (I think it was on his Comedy Central Show, Mind of Mencia).

Anyway – flipping through the channels, I saw a different comedian (Not Ari, who beleives he wrote the joke, an older fella, can’t remember his name – he appeared to be an old favourite, kinda like a black Des O’Connor) on a chat show, and he told the same joke (albeit, badly). Which kinda made me think that Mencia was getting probably a bit too much stick from Rogan over the incident – there are some jokes which, especially when politically motivated, or motivated by current affiars, where several comedians could come up with the same idea or riff. The news that GWBush wanted to build a wall to stop Mexicans entering the country illegally is a case in point.

The same I think goes for Josie Long’s gag – I am sure many people have made the link between quidditch and ‘a quid each’ – what’s odd is that she should claim ownership of it so vehemently – that joke isn’t particularly funny (imho).

So, I’ve no idea if any of this makes sense, as I’ve not read it back. But I think my point is that there may be some situations where apparent theft is possibly just a coincidence, and as comics they are looking at situations with a similar eye (i.e. where’s the comedy here?).

That said, apparently Mencia’s been nicking loads of jokes for years. And made a shitload of money doing it.

And, let’s be fair and to paraphrase a quote from your oiginal article: what the fuck do I know about comedy?

Deats.