Remember when creating something meant just... creating it? These days, putting anything out into the world feels like walking through a minefield of "actually, that already exists."

The internet has created this bizarre expectation that we should all somehow be aware of everything that's ever been made, written, or performed. Before sharing your work, you're apparently supposed to have scanned through every social media post, every video, and every piece of content in every corner of the world – just to make sure no one, anywhere, has done something remotely similar.

What's particularly fascinating is how this affects creative fields. A performer (a stand-up comedian, for example) can come up with something completely independently, only to face accusations of copying someone from the other side of the planet. Twenty years ago, this would've been absurd – it was physically impossible to have seen every performance in every small venue across the globe. But now, with everything just a click away, we've somehow decided that ignorance is no longer an acceptable excuse.

The same goes for every creative endeavor. Write something? Better hope nobody in any country has written anything similar. Make art? Surely you've checked every online gallery and social media account to ensure your idea is completely unique. This impossible standard of awareness has created a strange paradox where being original means knowing everything that's already been done.
It's not just about copyright anymore – it's about this unspoken expectation that in our hyper-connected world, we should somehow be omniscient. The internet, which was supposed to make sharing easier, has instead created this suffocating pressure where every creator needs to be both artist and archivist, spending as much time researching existing work as they do creating new things.
The real irony is that this expectation of universal awareness might actually be stifling creativity more than protecting it.

Perhaps it's time to acknowledge that in a world of billions of people, similar ideas can and will emerge independently.