Does anyone look at this from an economic standpoint? I think this is just an (unfair) form of taxation for being famous. Someone or something became too famous. People want a "cut" of the fame (in this case, it was literally the cut, ha ha). It's interesting to think how we can redistribute this type of "wealth" among people. I can think of Twitter replies or blog trackbacks as a primitive way to achieve it, but wha…
There's the role of fame itself, which is related to, but not the same so far as I see, as power. Both are ordinal -- it's a lot better to be the most famous vs, say, the 10th most famous, in ways that having only, say, $90 rather than $100 isn't. But there's something you're giving up for fame -- particularly privacy and autonomy. There's a risk to it (and there are numerous artists, politicians, and businesspeople who've been attacked, kidnapped, or murdered).
In biological evolution, there was a stage at which the first carnivorous organisms appeared. Before that, it was pretty much OK to let it all hang out, and just sort of slime around on the seafloor, munching on plants. Afterward, defences (and some offences) like shells and pincers and teeth emerged. You needed to protect yourself.
And while such defenses still exist, most animals now don't have heavy body armor. It's too heavy, and too cumbersome. There's hide and fur, tails to swat away annoying things. But also social habits -- the grooming behaviours of primates and other animals in particular. "I'll pick parasites off your back if you'll pick them off of mine." Standards and norms of behaviour.
The problem of too much fame, especially for lifeforms which aren't aware of the problem or cannot defend themselves (or move or hide, as with trees, hell, even rock formations), is one that's been around for a while. It definitely pre-dates the Internet as mulitiple posts here note. I've run across items about geotagged images of rhinoceroses, or of rare plants, or other treasures.
There's this item from a few days ago:
http://e360.yale.edu/features/unnatural-surveillance-how-onl...
As for how to deal with the problem socially, I think that may be the role of taboo. That's taking the matter beyond economics to an extent, as taboo puts an infinite cost or price to doing a thing.