The most appalling thing about the videotaped attack on a local homeless man is that, actually, it’s old hat.

Once a trend hits the internet, it’s hard to kill. Several years ago, news outlets featured stories about random, unprovoked teenager-on-homeless beatings — exactly like the recent one in New Jersey, filmed by a teenager.

Florida tallied at least six such attacks in 2006. Some teens recorded themselves in the act. They claimed to be inspired by a video series created in 2002 and sold on the web, starring the “Bum Hunter,” a “Crocodile hunter”-like actor who pounced on homeless people, wrestled them to the ground and bound their wrists.

This stuff is still getting hits online — more than 250,000 for one “Bum Hunter” on YouTube, with new comments like “freaking hilarious.” As recently as April, a Chicago teen sucker-punched a homeless man in the face on a subway platform. Like the New Jersey beating, that attack was purposely captured on video by jeering friends and went viral online. When authorities saw it, they pressed charges.

It takes a special depravity to premeditate such an attack and record it for memory’s sake. Our criminal justice system should recognize that.

New Jersey Assembly members Jon Bramnick (R-Union), David Rible (R-Monmouth) and Mary Pat Angelini (R-Monmouth) say they’re drafting a bill to increase the penalty for filming such assaults. “Videotaping your crime for the purposes of reliving it has a heinous aspect to it that should be punished in a more serious manner,” Bramnick said.

He’s right. And punishing the filmmakers, regardless of whether the videos are published online, avoids the potential pitfalls of trying to regulate internet content.

Still, that’s where the bigger problem lies: There’s a thriving market online for homemade, true-life assault videos.

If we can’t find a way to keep them off the internet, we must at least use them to our advantage: tracking down the perpetrators and aiding their helpless victims.

Related:

• YouTube beating of homeless man feeds a market for violence

• Outpour of support for N.J. homeless man beaten by 2 youths supplies the chance to change