Talk:Plagiarism/Archive 1

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Plagiarism occurs whether intended or not

The first paragraph states: "Essential to an act of plagiarism is an element of dishonesty in attempting to pass off the plagiarised work as original." That is incorrect. Plagiarism occurs whether there is intention to deceive or not. I'll correct this unless anyone has an objection.

I removed this:

...but it does bring up some points that might be worth saying something about. Maybe something about works like Wikipedia not making any particular claim of authorship, and works like the CIA factbook being intended for copying, or about plagiarism only applying to creative works and not mere collections of facts, etc.

Plagiarism has to do with passing another's work as your own - nothing to do wi whether the information is in public domain or otherwise not "copyrightable" - As a writer I *should* attribute my sources even though there is no legal liability for failure to do so. So if I use information from World Factbook I should let the reader know so they (1) can determine the source and (2) check the information.

bob

links

ElKevbo, good idea but you've overdone it. Some of these are well-known, and exmple are useful. I'd write articles for one or two, except I'd have nothing to add beyond their websites. I've added back a few I know to be well-known. Deciding where to stop is, of course, not clear-cut.DGG 04:21, 6 November 2006 (UTC)


it is funny how easy/often it is to fidn plagiarism on the internet. especially in domain-specific topics, perhaps gardening information or plant information. frequently entire pages will be copied with little or no change, no credit given, etc.

== Plagiarism is not illegal == - - The current article has one or two inaccuracies. Unfortunately the first sentence is wrong - plagiarism is not illegal. In fact, plagiarism is not recognised in law. Copyright and Intellectual Property are legal terms - not plagiarism. I'll edit the article when I have time. - - * (not the above editor) - - Apart from arguments about terminology, this is not correct. In general, in any country that supports the Hague Convention, you have full copyright rights in a work from the moment it's created. Unauthorized use of the work (which plagiarism is) is therefore a violation of copyright law. 168.12.253.82 18:59, 15 January 2006 (UTC) - - :Plagiarism is often illegal, but you can plaigiarize the ideas in a work without violating its copyright (which only protects the specific expression of those ideas), and you can also plagiarize the content of out-of-copyright works whose authors died 70+ years ago. Deco 20:10, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Plagiarism is a great way to get a paper done quickly and as long as you don't cite anything, then it is nearly impossible to find out if something was plagiarized.

I find it remarkable there's an article on plagiarism, while Admins turn a blind eye to blatant, repeated acts by editors. Every page referring to the USN sub force I've seen is directly plagairised from the Dictionary of American Fighting Ships: not summarized or rewritten, copied. Nobody seems to care... Trekphiler 12:44, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Is this worth mentioning?

Both my high school and the english _and_ computer science departments on my university have the following policy: If you copy someone else's full text (or, in the latter case, any non-trivial amount of code) with proper credit given, you will receive a zero on the assignment. If you fail to give proper credit, you will also (in the case of my high school, receive a warning and ultimately risk failing the class or being suspended, or, at university: ) be referred to the office of the dean of students - How prevalent is this attitude and is it worth mentioning? --Random832 08:35, 2004 Jun 14 (UTC)

influenced by someone's ideas

If I read about someone else's idea, and am influenced by that idea, but I write something that is quite my own work, is it considered plagiarism?

No, but it's probably just good manners to acknowledge the other person's idea. Lee M 04:43, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Self-plagiarism

General issue

What is this? Copying your own work? Someone please explain, remove or edit it please.

In academia, self-plagiarism would be like turning in one assignment to more than on instructor without informing both.--Fallout boy 07:46, 26 December 2005 (UTC)
  • That is policy-dependent, though. As a research-paper is an implicit claim of furthering knowledge, the researcher must state what exactly is the claim of novelty. That would let the editor to rate the article in view of their policy. For example, all/most would reject a paper if already published in another journal, although may tolerate (as IEEE does) a re-edited [and expanded] conference paper.
  • A high-schooler, or a trade magazine (e.g: CUJ, DDJ) author, is understood to have reflected (written from) his/her accumulation/technique (original, or not) to the extent he/she wanted to reflect, in that article. Not necessarily his/her auto-biography. Although exact referencing could help the inquisitive reader to trace for reading further, that is an extra. Not the rule.
  • If that is a positional statement, even exact-replication may fit fine, if only the statement is in the general tense. e.g: "I think ...," or "I have faith that ...," etc. No need to try to refer to yourself recursively, if next time, again, to iterate your opinion for-or-againt that old quetion. (e.g: pro-life vs. pro-choice, intelligent-design vs. evolution.) If teacher questioned that, he/she'll read that, as the other questioner did.

FerzenR 07:45, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

If I send the same application essay to two colleges, does that constitute a plagiarism? I must go and apologize to my colleges if so. 202.161.131.69 18:55, 23 February 2006 (UTC) (My IP is not permanent.)

The deception in self-plagiarism is to do with the way academics are rated and the way academic papers are published. Many funding bodies use the number of "publications" to rate researchers and their institutions. So increasing the number of "publications" with no additional research work is deceptive. Academic publishers wish to print papers that contain new research, so presenting a substantially previously published paper is deceiving the publisher. Note the quoted word "publication": this is an academic jargon term; for example, giving a departmental seminar or writing an article for the popular press would not be "publication".

Fallout Boy's description is very poor -- as I've explained the issue is not "self-plagiarism would be like turning in one assignment to more than on instructor without informing both", since the morals of that depend upon the purpose for which the assignments were set. The example does not make the exposition clearer, which is the main purpose of an example.

For a current definition see Section 1 of Association for Computing Machinery, "ACM Policy and Procedures on Plagiarism", October 2005 which says "In this document we define self-plagiarism as the verbatim or near-verbatim reuse of significant portions of one's own copyrighted work without citing the original source. Note that self-plagiarism does not apply to publications based on the author's own previously copyrighted work (e.g., appearing in a conference proceedings) where an explicit reference is made to the prior publication. Such reuse does not require quotation marks to delineate the reused text but does require that the source be cited."

On the application essay, the moral question is if the recipients asked or expected the work to be unique. Confusing the moral question with the term "self plagiarism" isn't helpful as "self plagiarism" is a new concept and even professional ethics committees are not too sure if activities such as reusing textbook chapters can be described as "self plagiarism". --Gdt 05:42, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

I've added back the section on self-plagiarism. Certainly this is a topic which needs to be addressed even though there is a lot of argument about what exactly is and is not self-plagiarism. There are some good references to self-plagiarism, and I've included a few of them in the article. The Communications of the ACM article is especially good since it talks about a court case which argued that the re-use of one's own work (a photograph) was illegal. Fmccown 21:30, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Concurrent-submission is not necesarily self-plagiarism

There are certainly reasons why a journal or professor may not desire to accept a paper already submitted to another, such as limited reviewer resources, but the question is whether this is properly called plagiarism or just some other form of rule-breaking. Deco 09:48, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

That is two issues in one. If you refer to submission to the point of publication, then the editors were supposed to know, and the case is self-plagiarism.

Otherwise, that is not plagiarim, but concurrent-submission (this is one of the names employed to mean that case). Yes that is a waste of resource, in the case of those journals which do not get the paper to publish. That is, if 15 journals nod that paper, while only one of them may publish, that is a waste -- for 14 of them. Most (all?) journals and popular magazines already tell the potential author not to do that. Alternatively, for an application to the graduate school, the university does not ban that. If that model (request a fee) is/were popular also in the publication field, the "waste of resource" would only relate to the money from out of the pocket of the applicant. If the final publication does pay (or, the author does want that for other motivation), the author may take that risk to pay for the review of a few, I think. This would facilitate more opportunities to get tested, sooner. FerzenR 06:41, 10 January 2006 (UTC)


dissertation plagiarism, in the U.S.A.

I noticed a plagiarism, a 1982 Ph.D. dissertation of Northwestern University, Ill, USA. Is that also a "business" case? Although at the web ( http://www.geocities.com/ferzenr/decalun.htm ), I kept the names secret, I may tell that to any people who understand the subject (Petri net, etc).

The case is especially gross, as the advisor of that dissertation is a highy decorated, social type -- an (old) editor-in-chief of IEEE Computer magazine, etc.

The plagiarism glares when the absurd (unproven & provably false) claims get omitted.

The jury had to block that, until at least they understood what that is.

The IEEE TransSoftEng article (1983), after that Ph.D. is false in each figure -- except the 4th, which is trivially the similar of the signs of SARA/UCLA-graphs (System ARchitects Apprentice, of UCLA, after UCLA graphs). Has no peer really ever traced those figures?

FerzenR 10:17, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Potential NPOV Issues

The paragraph on 'Why Plagiarism is a Problem' seems to suffer from POV. Its explicit goal seems to be to prove to the reader that plagiarism is ethically wrong and a societal ill. The whole thing is essentially several weak arguments, beginning with an argument which attempts to connect plagiarism with death, that attempt to blow plagiarism entirely out of proportion. Unfounded, vague, and subjective statements such as the "Plagiarism also holds back progress." have no place in an encyclopedia. Wikipedia should not be used as a medium for extolling certain editors' views on academic prudence. The paragraph should either be reworked into a series of argumets associated with individuals or groups, such as professors, teachers, or scholars in the field, or scrapped entirely. Geuiwogbil 10:43, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. I've moved it here for cleanup. The claims that plagiarism can lead to wrongful death are anecdotal even if true. The claims that plagiarism forces other students to plagiarize is true but unsupported and it doesn't emphasize why plagiarism is a problem in the first place. The claims of Asia universities ignoring plagiarism from foreign students for money seem like unsupported slander to me, and the singling out of Asia as a breeding ground for plagiarism seems to overlook plagiarism worldwide. The part about Ian Firns and the subsequent resignation of two university figures is good though. Deco 22:44, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Original poster of the Ian Firns and plagiarism in Asia replies: I didn't say Asia universities ignored plagiarism from foreign students. What I am saying is that Asian universities, whether with ties to overseas institutions or not, ignore all plagiarism. Their foreign partner universities (twinning partners) seem to be not interested in this problem. Student complaints about service in the Asia branches are routinely ignored by their foreign partners.

Why Plagiarism is a Problem?

Plagiarism is a problem because it is a form of cheating. Irrespective of the student’s intention, undetected plagiarism may result in the student receiving a higher grade than he or she would have received without the inclusion of the plagiarised material. The resulting (inflated) grade may be used for entrance to further education or employment – thereby deceiving entrance officers or employers into believing that the student possesses knowledge and skills that he or she does not. If the plagiarist then goes on to obtain work in a life-critical job/field, results can be catastrophic. Plagiarism also holds back progress. If students and researchers simply regurgitate others’ work, then academic progress stagnates through a dearth of original work.

A less tangible problem is the corrosive effects that plagiarism has on the student body and on society in general. Once plagiarism reaches a certain level, students who would not normally plagiarise may feel that they must in order to compete with their fellow students. Undetected plagiarism may encourage cheating outside of school or college, and foster bad habits which students take into the workplace.

In some situations, bringing plagiarists to book can be difficult. In 2003, Ian Firns of Newcastle University in Australia, visiting Wira Institute in Malaysia, determined that 15 students had plagiarised, and had failed them. He was fired; however, he had drawn the attention of the Australian Anti-Corruption agency to a large problem, resulting in the resignation of two important university figures in July 2005. The problem is that many public universities in the West and private colleges in Asia rely on foreign students who pay the full fee and then some. These students are considered so lucrative that administrators are willing to close their eyes to obvious cases of plagiarism, and it is in the economic interests of the universities/private colleges to graduate as many of them as possible to maintain profitability, resulting in education as a business, not a 'calling'. Plagiarism is a major problem in many private colleges and public universities throughout Asia.

plagiarism is a concept of the modern age?

How is plagiarism a concept of the modern age? It isn't really an issue of intellectual property, it's taking credit for something you didn't do. It applied just as much at the beginning of written language as it does today. Matthew Crumley

  • Agreed - removed the sentence. -- Barfooz 22:23, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
Many people don't agree. I've repeatedly heard people express the view that "plagiarism" is in fact a modern concept. It isn't really an issue of taking credit for something you didn't do, it's the concept that you take credit for something you didn't do and the general perception that you shouldn't do that. (To give an ill-fitting example: It's like calling a dog that takes a toy and aims to keep it a thief.) --Ibn Battuta 09:39, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

examples

i don't see the use of the section "famous examples". as we see in the discussion page even older and arguably resolved cases are highly controversial and the motivation in taking sides often very political. At the very least, cases still investigated must wait. the purpose of the article is to define plagiarism, not to condemn individual cases of plagiarism. this can be done in the articles on the persons involved (provided the case is already closed) 130.113.105.43 14:57, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

Take an example from Wikipedia: examine pages on USN submarines and compare the Dictionary of American Fighting Ships pages on them. They are identical. Trekphiler 12:50, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Contradiction

From the Definition section:

Plagiarism is the use of another person’s work (this could be his or her words, products or ideas) for personal advantage, without proper acknowledgement of the original work, and with the intention of passing it off as one's own work. Plagiarism may occur deliberately (with the intention to deceive) or accidentally (due to poor referencing).

How can it occur accidentally due to poor referencing and with the intention of passing it off as one's own work? —Guanaco 21:22, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Poor proofreading, perhaps? Say a student copies some data from the Internet, and forgets to reference it with a footnote. It becomes "plagiarism", albeit unintentionally. HubHikari 21:53, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

In that case, the student lacks the intention of passing it off as his own. —Guanaco 21:54, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
Whether from carelessness, lack of diligence, or lack of education about plagiarism, a student who is passing referenced material off as his own is plagiarizing. Maybe the definition needs to be edited for clarity.69.6.162.160 14:17, 25 September 2006 (UTC)Brian Pearson

Why plagiarism occurs needs sources

The section entitled Why plagiarism occurs makes several claims that appear to be taken from a work or works of research, but does not cite any specific work of research. Could the contributor responsible for it provide sources? Thanks. Deco 02:47, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

Has anyone noticed that this list is identical to the list here [1] without citiation or attribution? Except the last reason in the wikipedia version which makes it seem like it's baiting Wikipedia. --Tbeatty 17:49, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

This is the same as here except a line has been added. That would be violate the terms of the web page for copying. It's not cited on that web page so I don't know if it's orginal. In any case it's not cited on wikipedia. --Tbeatty 16:49, 4 April 2006 (UTC) 

Why plagiarism occurs

Students cite many reasons for plagiarising, including:

  1. being unaware that they’re plagiarising
  2. lacking knowledge and understanding of the subject
  3. poor time management skills
  4. feeling that the subject is unimportant
  5. believing that plagiarism isn’t serious
  6. feeling pressured due to over-assessment
  7. poor teaching
  8. they've done it before and not been caught

[citation needed]

The most common reason given by students is ignorance about plagiarism – that they were unclear about the plagiarism policy and, therefore, unaware that they were doing anything wrong. Many school districts have a plagiarism policy, which punishes students in increasing severity the more times that they're caught. A common misunderstanding among students relates to paraphrased material. Many students do not realise that paraphrased material should be attributed to the original author in the same manner as a direct quotation.

Some students do not consider plagiarism a serious offence since it does not (in their view) harm other students. Research has shown that students consider cheating in an examination to be much more serious than plagiarising coursework – even if both contribute to final grades.

--Tbeatty 16:49, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

incompetence

Plagiarism is not directly lethal -- as long as written pages do not blow. However, through the combination of

  • incompetence (which is highly implicated by plagiarism)
  • a potentially life-critical field (or, bankruptcy-prone, etc).

we have a big pattern of plagiarism-based-catastrophical-consequences. Telling [only] anecdotes is the news-business. In contrast, a pattern is the generative root of all the anecdotes, and would have a place there, even if there were not any known cases.

altruism & plagiarism

No mention of people who think themselves as the ultimate altruists, when they help other people (or their children) in homework/etc, in tight time, illness, etc. (Just as the evil consequences of plagiarism got left out, we leave out these value-judgments, too, I infer.) ((By the way, stage-6, the last stage, of moral development, as Kohlberg listed, is able to weigh conscience v. law, when they differ -- for example, to help disadvantaged people, affirmatively. Do we leave this discussion to the judgment of the reader? Or, should we weigh the good-v.-evil contexts? And offer non-plagiaristic alternatives to ... ))

No mention of 5-6-people groups in courses, where only single student writes all of "their" program/paper/etc. Do those other students count as plagiarists (esp. if they have not even thought alternative-coding, themselves)?

(I would not strain the imagination by questioning whether that single student who wrote the software would also get a bad label, as (in case, that were) the lecturer meant them to collaborate, not single-person job.)

FerzenR 05:20, 5 March 2006 (UTC)


Famous examples section lacks citations

Similar to the note above (under "Dispute tag"): I didn't add a {{unreferencedsect}} tag but many (most?) of the "famous" examples of plagarism lack citations. If they're famous, we should be able to find something that has been published about them to justify our assertions that (a) it was indeed plagarism and (b) it is a famous example of plagarism. Please add citations and references if you know of any or have the time and desire to locate them. At some point someone (me, for example) might begin removing uncited famous examples if no citations or references can be easily located and added. Not a threat - just trying to uphold standards and such. --ElKevbo 05:34, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Extra whitespace

Is the extra whitespace in the middle of the Definition section intentional? Ken 05:32, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Content plagiarising is so popular. As a professional I have to check and recheck when analyzing the content. Copywriting also involves plagiarism and it is a shame that some of the specialists that take part in designing important educational web sites take the liberty to copy-paste materials without even editing or placing them as a quotation. However due to the frequency of plagiarism cases online we have plenty of tools and possibilities to fight with lack of human imagination and honesty.--Contento 14:46, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Essayfraud.org

I've deleted essayfraud out of the list, because I wouldn't like students, especially my students that sometimes write or read from wikipedia to see a list of over a hundred cheat sites. I kindly ask all the readers that have some relation to education or really are concerned about the issue to further delete this link form the article if someone decides to place it there again. Thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.231.97.12 (talk • contribs) 06:49, 24 May 2006

I understand your concern and empathize with you but your reason for deleting the link is insufficient. Given that the onus is on you to justify the edit, I've readded the site. Wikipiedia is not censored. --ElKevbo 13:32, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
I'm glad I've found a person interested in the topic. I was not against this site being present in the list until I saw this comment [2]. It was made by a respectable person involved in education problems as much as I am. I think this will be convincing enough. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.199.172.146 (talk • contribs) 12:17, 26 May 2006
Very well. It would have been helpul if you had posted that link in the first place (if I missed it, please accept my apologies!). In addition, please remember to sign your posts. --ElKevbo 18:48, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
Please note, 217.199.172.146, that you may not delete others' posts based on your biased, personal opinion. You want to delete a completely legitimate resource in the fight against plagiarism because you believe that displaying a list of fraudulent sites will entice students to USE those sites? Come on . . . . The complete opposite takes place. EssayFraud.org contains so many horror stories that students who read the site undoubtedly throw their hands up and just write their own papers. That's the goal of EssayFraud.org.
As for Mr. Hover's comments, he made them right after EssayFraud.org launched. He did not understand the intent of the site, and he unfairly tore it apart because of his own judgemental, misinformed, knee-jerk, biased OPINION. As I previously mentioned, deleting based on anyone's bias opinion has no place in Wikipedia.
Let's face it--students already know that plagiarism is morally wrong and academically punishable, but they take the risk anyway, right? With that fact in mind, EssayFraud.org goes a step further by showing students that even if they DO decide to take the ridiculous risk of being punished academically if caught, they will still waste a lot of money on a paper with terrible grammar/spelling. (And that's IF they receive the paper at all!) They will also get purposely overcharged and have no recourse because most of the paper mills are foreign-based. Furthermore, EssayFraud.org explains to students that all of the promises and guarantees on these plagiarism sites are rubbish. The crappy papers are never delivered on time, either. Finally, EssayFraud.org enables students to read the actual rip-off experiences of other students who learned to avoid plagiarism sites the HARD way. All of these things added up make for a very UNAPPEALING purchase. That's the goal of EssayFraud.org, and it works.
SarahTeach 21:17, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
Hi Sarah. Apologies for reverting your edit without reading your comments first. I waited over 20 minutes after your edit said to "See discussion" and still saw no discussion. I thought I had been stood up. :)
I'd like to propose a cessation on editing this particular link for a few days to allow others time to comment. You can readd the link during this time if you'd like - I won't delete it. (Offer withdrawn; see below) If we don't get any comments, I'd like to propose an RFC to ensure we get some good comments and different opinions.
I'm afraid I agree with the blog post linked to above in that essayfraud.org does seem to be a very suspicious site with little notability or useful content. I am also put off by your own edit history which is almost entirely composed of removing other "essay" websites and placing links to essayfraud.com on different articles.
Finally, I am unconvinced by your arguments and find them to be unrelated to justification for inclusion of a link in an encyclopedia article. --ElKevbo 21:29, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
ElKevbo, I find it odd that you want to punish me because I have a history of deleting essay mill SPAM and posting a link to a site that lessens the number of term paper sales. How does that make any sense? How in the world is that fair? And if the site has no useful content, as you state, why is it that when I emailed EssayFraud.org to express my support of their efforts, it took them almost 2 weeks to respond because they said they receive hundreds of emails every week from thankful academics and it takes a lot of time to respond in detail to each one? I've searched high and low, and no other site on the Internet has even a fraction of the insider information revealed on EssayFraud.org. They fight plagiarism in an innovative way, and it is extremely effective. On what basis do you deny this fact? Do you deny that students write their own papers after being scared by the horror stories at EssayFraud.org? SarahTeach 21:52, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
I have no desire to "punish you." Your edit history simply puts me off as it is similar to what I would expect of someone with links to that website. I am certainly not making that accusation - just an observation.
It would be most helpful if you could provide verifiable evidence of your claims that this website "scares" students with "horror stories." The entire forum at essayfraud.org has less than 200 posts total and most appear to be anonymous accusations. Nor is any of the information provided on the website verifiable.
The website even has a disclaimer where they "do not vouch for or warrant the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any message or complaint!" --ElKevbo 22:28, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
I strongly disagree with the removal of any link which is relevant, informative, and authoritative, unless it presents an immediate personal danger to someone. To discard a tool because of its potential for abuse would be like taking all the knives out of the kitchen. On the other hand, if you're arguing that this link is not relevent, informative, and authoritative, for example because it's too new or too biased, that could be a legitimate complaint. Pointing to someone's contribution history doesn't prove anything. Deco 21:59, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
I agree. After further research, I do not believe this site is authoritative. Not only do they clearly state that they do not stand behind the claims made on their site (in their disclaimer at the bottom of each page) but they have erroneous and unsupported advice and claims.
For example, their list of "Warning Signs that a Site Hires ESL Writers from Overseas" (let's ignore the fact that the entire "ESL writers from overseas" issue a complete red herring) contains the claims that:
  • It's a violation of American copyright law to transfer ownership of copyright. That statement is clearly wrong.
  • You can find out when a company was founded by looking at their WhoIs information. This would only tell you when the domain name was first registered. That is clearly a different matter entirely from when the company that currently owns the domain name was founded.
--ElKevbo 22:28, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
ElKevbo, I must point out that it is you who is clearly wrong on all three accounts:
1. Like any open forum on the Internet (as well as this very TALK page of Wikipedia), the forum owners may choose to communicate that they are not responsible for the comments and opinions of independant Web surfers! This is standard practice. Also, can you tell me exactly how the BBB, complaints.com, FCC, ripoffreport.com, consumeraffairs.com, etc. display the concrete "proof" that you say EssayFraud.org lacks?
I would imagine they conduct actual research. Regardless, how those other organizations operate is not the issue at hand. How essayfrauds.org operates is the issue and I have yet to be convinced that they are an authority on this subject. --ElKevbo 01:35, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
2. EssayFraud.org refutes the false age claims posted at particular WEB SITES, not the age of the fraudulent parent companies of such sites. Please get your facts straight. You can't keep making false accusations.
The wording on the actual website is confusing. Specifically, it states: "Lies about the age of the site (e.g. 'Since 1998') (Verify the company's true 'Creation Date' by clicking here.)" First off, the statement is inconsistent in that the first sentence is about the "age of the site" but the second sentence is about the "company's true 'Creation Date.'" My point still stands in that the registration date of a particular domain name is neither directly related to the "age of [a] site" nor a "company's true 'Creation Date.'" WhoIs just contains information about that particular domain name. DNS is separate from the content of a website and the company that created it. --ElKevbo 01:35, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
3. The laws quoted at http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap2.html do NOT apply to transfer of term paper copyright to students! You will note that none of the following words appear at http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap2.html:
  • cheat, college, credit, essay, fraud, grade, graduate, pass, plagiarism, professor, school, student, teacher, term paper, university, write *
Why do none of the afformentioned words appear? Completely separate laws, codes, and statutes govern the sale of academic research materials, that's why. For instance, New Jersey statutes 2A:170-17.16-18 and similar statutes of other states (see list below) not only forbid copyright transfer, but also dictate that essay mills may not offer services to ANY person giving the company ANY reason to believe that he or she intends to wholly or partially submit a purchased paper for academic credit.
California [Cal. Educ. Code §§ 66400- 66405 (1998)]
Colorado [Colo. Rev. Stat. § 23-4-103 (1997)]
Connecticut [Conn. Gen. Stat. § 53-392 a-c (1997)]
Florida [Fla. Stat. ch. 877.17 (1997)]
Illinois [110 Ill. Comp. Stat. 5/1 (1998)]
Maine [Me. Rev. Stat. 17-A §705 (1997)]
Maryland [Md. Code Ann., Educ. § 26-201 (1998)]
Massachusetts [Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 271 §50 (1998)]
Nevada [Nev. Rev. Stat. § 207.320 (1997 )]
New Jersey [N.J. Stat. Ann. § 2A:170-77.16 (1998 )]
New York [N.Y. Educ. Law §213-b (1998)]
North Carolina [N.C. Gen. Stat. § 14-118.2 (1997)]
Oregon [Or. Rev. Stat. § 165.114 (1997)]
Pennsylvania [18 Pa. Cons. Stat. §7324 (1998)]
Texas [Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 32.49(1998)]
Virginia [Va. Code Ann. §18.2-505 (1998)]
Washington [Wash. Rev. Code §§ 28B.10.580, 28B.10.582, 28B.10.584 (1997)]
I looked up those laws:
Unless I missed something, not a single one of those laws has much to say about copyright. In general, they're all laws that make it illegal to sale or aid in the sale of material intended to be used in academic fraud. They certainly do not prohibit transfer of copyright.
Copyright really is only vaguely related to the issue of plagarism. I brought it up only to illustrate a particular fact which essayfraud.org has gotten blatantly wrong. --ElKevbo 01:35, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
ElKevbo, will EssayFraud.org be "authoritative" enough for you when it is PR6 with 500 posts? Or, how about when it's PR7 with 1,000 posts? Right now, it's PR5 with almost 200 posts. Does that make the site any less original and important? No.
SarahTeach 23:47, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
(Assuming that by "PR" you are referring to Google PageRank - if my assumption is incorrect, please correct me!) PR is not terribly useful in determining the authoritativeness (is that a word?) of a source. Verifiably correct information is the primary measuring stick for inclusion in Wikipedia as a source. Based on what little bit of research I have performed, I don't think this site meets that criteria. --ElKevbo 01:35, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
ElKevbo, I appreciate your feedback, but you are misinformed. Plagiarism is often directly related to copyright ownership. A copyright owner would not SUE HIM/HERSELF for copyright infringement. However, a copyright owner is certainly prone to sue the plagiarizer of his/her copyrighted text, correct?
BOTTOM LINE: unless a student personally wrote a given paper (inherently owns the copyright), he or she may NOT turn in that paper for academic credit. Am I not correct in this assertion, ElKevbo? If you acknowledge this fact, then you must also admit that if a student submits for academic credit a paper that he/she BOUGHT from a paper mill, that student will be infringing someone else's copyright and committing academic fraud. Obviously, this directly relates to the copyright issue, in that if a paper mill owner offers to transfer copyright to the student, the paper mill owner is blatantly telling the student that he/she can submit the paper for academic credit! And, of course, that would constitute plagiarism on the student's end! Therefore, copyright ownership and plagiarism are DIRECTLY related in the academic sphere. EssayFraud.org is most definitely an authority in bringing to light this interrelationship, educating people who obviously do not understand, and warning students not to partake in academic fraud.
SarahTeach 02:57, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
The statement on essayfraud.org that "transfer[ing] copyright to the customer [is] against American law" is wrong. This discussion has nothing to do with plagarism and everything to do with incorrect information on the essayfraud.org website. Transferring the copyright may be slimy and immoral in this instance but it's not illegal. If I am wrong and transferring copyright (for the purpose of enabling academic fraud or otherwise) is illegal, please provide evidence as none of your previous assertions have done so. --ElKevbo 03:06, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
No, it is not wrong. ElKevbo, do you not see that offering to transfer copyright is part and parcel of "the seller or advertiser [knowing] or reasonably should have known [that the paper] was intended for submission by a student" (http://www.leg.state.fl.us/Statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&Search_String=&URL=Ch0877/SEC17.HTM&Title=-%3E2005-%3ECh0877-%3ESection%2017#0877.17)?
Simple equation:
paper mill transferring copyright = paper mill knowing the student plans to plagiarize = ILLEGAL
And do you know WHY certain paper mills offer to illegally transfer copyright? Because their papers are more attractive to students who want to cheat and plagiarize! BINGO. This is the VERY REASON why the term paper statutes were enacted!
SarahTeach 03:34, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
I'm sorry - I'm still not seeing in any statute or law that says the act of transferring copyright is illegal, even if it is used to enable academic fraud. I'm certain that transfer of copyright could be used as evidence that "the seller or advertiser [knowing] or reasonably should have known [that the paper] was intended for submission by a student" but that's very different from stating that "transfer of copyright" is illegal. --ElKevbo 03:46, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
I agree with ElKevbo. Sarah you are confusing laws designed to stop the sale of term papers to students with the right to transfer the copyright of those term papers. Plagiarism and copyright infringement are not the same! This is a moot point anyway. Even if a student were to buy the copyright to a paper he did not write himself, it would still be plagiarism to claim it as his own.

68.184.209.190 04:20, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm not "confusing" anything. Read my previous post (04:55, 27 May 2006). SarahTeach 04:58, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
Just to play devil's advocate, note that accuracy is not necessarily equivalent with authoritativeness - there's also a component of notability, usefulness, and so on. To me "authoritative" means that it is in some sense the official or original place to find something, like the first publication on a topic, the website itself in an article on a website, or the official webpage of a company, band, author, etc. Generally I prefer an external link to be at least one of notable, accurate, or authoritative. Discussion boards are usually not accurate or authoritative, but are occasionally notable. I'm not sure whether this one is - I had dealings with some pushy board webmasters at nocturnal emission and came to an uneasy compromise when I probably should've just rejected the link. Deco 03:52, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
Agreed. I'm not basing my request to remove the link based purely on the fact that there is blatantly incorrect information on it. I think it fails most tests for inclusion in a NPOV encyclopedia article as it's just a poor website. There just doesn't appear to be much useful information there other than some bizarre xenophobic claims and unsubstantiated claims and assertions. Maybe I'm just missing all of the good content...? --ElKevbo 04:09, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

Clearly, you detractors are not able to grasp the simple concept:

paper mill transferring copyright = paper mill knows the student plans to plagiarize = ILLEGAL

SarahTeach 04:35, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

First, please keep it civil. Second, there is no transitive law in legal or criminal affairs. If you claim that an act is illegal, then the proper way to support that claim is to either cite a law/statute/treaty/etc. or case law. --ElKevbo 04:39, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
Please, take your own advice. You've been insulting EssayFraud.org left and right (especially in your previous post). If you insult the site, you know darn well--and so does everyone else--that you are taking a backhanded stab at me. SarahTeach 04:45, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
Sarah, if it appears that I have then please accept my apologies. Assume good faith of other wikipedians. --ElKevbo 04:48, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
Sarah, the law is never so simple. It is more like: Paper mill transferring copyright = LEGAL; Paper mill selling paper with or or without copyright transfer knowing the student intends to plagiarize = POSSIBLY ILLEGAL depending on the law of the state. 68.184.209.190 04:49, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
I did cite the laws. I also explained exactly how those laws apply. Once again:
Unless a student personally wrote a given paper (inherently owns the copyright), he or she may NOT turn in that paper for academic credit. Am I not correct in this assertion? If you acknowledge this fact, then you must also admit that if a student submits for academic credit a paper that he/she BOUGHT from a paper mill, that student will be infringing someone else's copyright and committing academic fraud. Obviously, this directly relates to the copyright issue, in that if a paper mill owner offers to transfer copyright to the student, the paper mill owner is blatantly telling the student that he/she can submit the paper for academic credit! And, of course, that would constitute plagiarism on the student's end! Therefore, copyright ownership and plagiarism are DIRECTLY related in the academic sphere. EssayFraud.org is most definitely an authority in bringing to light this interrelationship, educating people who obviously do not understand, and warning students not to partake in academic fraud.
SarahTeach 04:55, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

The "EssayFraud.org" site says "Transfers copyright to the customer (against American law)." Where is a federal law to cover this? Or is there a law in every state? So far you have only given a few states. 68.184.209.190 05:16, 27 May 2006 (UTC)


ElKevbo, how and where do the BBB, complaints.com, FCC, ripoffreport.com, consumeraffairs.com, etc. display the concrete "proof" that you claim EssayFraud.org lacks? SarahTeach 05:07, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

BBB, complaints, FCC, and those other websites aren't the topic of conversation. Essayfraud.org is the topic. Let's not stray from that topic, please. --ElKevbo 05:20, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

I'll make it easy for you--they don't. Why? Privacy issues. What, exactly, must EssayFraud.org do to make you feel as though the complaints are "substantiated?" Should the owners of EssayFraud.org sneak into poster's homes, put a knife to their throats, and force them to post online the actual papers that they ordered? Perhaps their credit card statements and Social Security Numbers? Give me a break. You're being completely unreasonable. SarahTeach 05:07, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

Once again, I ask that you maintain civility. --ElKevbo 05:20, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

You've hypocritically come up with an UNSUBSTANTIATED claim about how EssayFraud.org does not verify the complaints. Now, THAT is an unsubstantiated claim. Where's YOUR proof? Do you have access to EssayFraud.org's system? SarahTeach 05:07, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

The claims made by anonymous posters to a forum are unverifiable. They may be true and I'm sure that many of the claims made about people getting ripped off when attempting to commit academic fraud are true (how can you expect the people helping you to cheat and break the law to be honest? Honor among thieves, right?). But there is no evidence publicly presented of the truth of these claims. Nor is there evidence that anyone actually investigates these claims. If there is such evidence, please point it out because I'm missed it. --ElKevbo 05:20, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to leave you paper mill supporters now. Perhaps, some day down the road, when you're laying in a hospital bed suffering from post-op complications, you'll find out that your heart surgeon was awarded his license based on a dissertation that he BOUGHT from a paper mill. Maybe then you'll look back and think to yourself, "Ya know, maybe I should have supported EssayFraud.org instead of beating them down for no good reason." SarahTeach 05:30, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

Please maintain civility 68.184.209.190 05:50, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

After further research and consideration, I withdraw my previous offer to allow essayfraud.org to remain linked to from this article. The site has little merit and is notable primarily for the controversy it has stirred up in Wikipedia and elsewhere; accusations (backed by some evidence) have been leveled that it is linked to other prominent essay mills.

I also object to the uncivil and combative behavior of [User:SarahTeach] in this discussion. She has exhibited similar behavior in past discussions of essayfraud.org. To keep from cluttering this page with further discussion related to SarahTeach's behavior and unrelated to the article, I recommend further discussion (if necessary) take place on SarahTeach's Talk page or my own. --ElKevbo 20:06, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

"Controversy"? With who--you and the essay mill owners? Only essay mill owners oppose EssayFraud.org. That, I can understand, but what's YOUR reason? Do you support essay mill owners, ElKevbo? Why are you so ardently opposed to an anti-plagiarism site? If I didn't know better, it would appear as though you have a vested interest in opposing EssayFraud.org. "Evidence"? You mean the fabricated nonsense spewed by the Ukrainian essay mill owners to which you link above? Your opinion does not carry an ounce more wait than mine. It's funny how you accuse ME of being rude, when it is YOU who started that trend! Should I show everyone the proof? And, for the public record, what have YOU done to curb plagiarism? SarahTeach 22:33, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

As one of those who took part in the previous discussion about EssayFraud.org, the consensus then was that this link was indeed linkspam. While it does attack some essay mill sites, EssayFraud.org appears to operate in support of other essay sites. I am also troubled by how SarahTeach removed all the discussion and comments related to this from her talk page (see her history for what was said then.) That said, SarahTeach is welcome to try yet again to make her case for adding the link. However, two things should happen: civility must be maintained and the fact that the previous consensus was not to include this site must be remembered. Best, --Alabamaboy 19:54, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
Alabamaboy, for the record, I was perfectly civil until ElKevbo started insulting me by way of harshly insulting the site that I am suggesting. When someone tells you "Hey, I like this site," and then you say, "It's just a poor website," and then you continue to insult it, that is a backhanded insult to the person in support of the site. I can read between the lines, and so can everyone else reading the posts. Civility goes BOTH ways. I don't think ElKevbo would be very happy if I were to publicly insult the sites that he has supported.
Also, can you please show me exactly where EssayFraud.org advertises or supports any particular Web site? And just so you know, I support FREE SPEECH. Don't you? Businesses have every right to provide LEGIT RESEARCH MATERIAL. What they do NOT have the right to do is lie, cheat, and steal. SarahTeach 20:32, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
My dear friends,
I've returned to see the decision of Wiki Community and am glad to see that my slight contribution has raised the discussion this big. Finally I see some genuinely interested people that made an effort to show the depth of the crime to the public. This made me do another little research of my own. You are free to judge from these comments [4] especially the comments of Chris 2000. I wouldn't dare to influence your decision. Do not forget, we are discussing honesty and commitment to development of young posterity we are to raise. Inner conflicts of the members of this business are absolutely irrelevant to the problem. Their very existence is a threat to the education process.--Ronald Ellis 09:38, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
I don't think anyone understands what you've typed above. Please clarify. Also, I do not see how you've contributed to this page at all previously. SarahTeach 19:42, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
Hi SarahTeach. Strange, I thought we are discussing the same topic. I'm the one who started the discussion over essayfraud.org. I saw that my comment caused a discussion and decided to register, for ElKevbo noted that I do not sign my comments. I read your comments and your persistence couldn't but cause my admiration, though you already know that the fact is indeed a powerful force. As for other Wiki Community members, I praise your acknowledgement and thank you for that great contribution to an old man's data I was gathering on this topic.--Ronald Ellis 08:39, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

At the risk of restarting a settled argument, maybe somebody can clarify: how is selling a paper in any way illegal? Unless you argue plagairism is a form of (legal) fraud, & I'm unaware of that as a matter of law, selling the paper in itself isn't illegal; only if fraud is involved is it something like "accessory to fraud". No? (I'm leaving aside express provisions prohibiting selling.) Comment? Trekphiler 13:05, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

OR self-reference removed

Since no one has fixed this, and I see no way to fix it, I have removed it as OR and self-reference. It also contains a doubtful statement.

Wikipedia articles often do not cite sources, but contributors are increasingly being admonished to do so. Wikipedia articles do not involve personal credit to any author, so there is no plagiarism. (However anything copied from another source should certainly be cited, and copyright issues should also be taken into consideration.)

The self-reference is manifest, and serves no vital need in this article. The OR is the specific application of plagiarism rules to Wikipedia, and the doubtful statement is that Wikipedia edits cannot be credited to a specific author: the history function renders the assertion clearly false. Robert A.West (Talk) 00:03, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Anti-Anti-Plagiarism software

I Added the anti-anti-plagiarism software section. Kantale

Doesn't that refer just to open source software publication--at least this is what it seems the link is talking about--shouldn't in go there, not here. If it does stay here it needs some context--do I understand right that it is a way of protecting open source code so it will remain open source?DGG 21:03, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps this could be expanded into a section about the dubious morals of the use of anti-plagiarism software. Why should students be required to compulsorily add their works to a database of writings? Should not the student should be given some share of the profit generated by their works being in the database? Why should students be forced to submit their works in a machine-readable format, and does this discriminate against those who need or choose to write longhand? --Gdt 05:57, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Although there is a commercial market for anti-plagiarism software, there is an element that this is there to protect students who legitimately work hard to produce their own work. - if one student in a class plagiarises and is not caught, subsequently receiving a higher mark, this can make a student who does legitimately complete the work disadvantaged. - a student's work may be stolen from them and submitted. Without automated checks a student may be unaware that this has happened. - a student may plagiarise accidentally or be unaware. The use of anti-plagiarism detection has academic benefits about making the student aware of what they have done, especially if caught at the introductory level where it can be treated as a lesser academic offence than if caught within a crucial piece of work.

Adding a source can also mean that plagiarism that is not detected immediately can be detected later: - two students may both copy from a source which is not in the external database. By storing the work this copying will subsequently be detected when the second piece of work is submitted. Otherwise the plagiarism would not be detected.

Grammar, spelling, extra spaces

I corrected some grammar, spelling, and extra spaces in the article.

The United Sates of America office of research Integrity

has been changed to

The United States of America Office of Research Integrity

There are so many problems in this article! FreddyWare 21:17, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

Film example

I've once heard/read about a film director/writer(?)/whoever(?) who was accused to have plagiarized from another film. He claimed it was a coincidence and he had come up with this idea himself... and went to do his next film about a guy who creates some piece of work just to find out that someone else had done the same before. As you hear, I don't really recall any details—but in case you do, I think this example would clearly deserve getting onto the list. --Ibn Battuta 09:47, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Suggestions about organization and NPOV

I suggest the following reorganization of the sections so that the general information in logical order comes first followed by the examples.

  • Frequency of plagiarism
  • Organizational publications
  • Punishments
  • Examples of anti-plagiarism software
  • Famous accusations and examples of plagiarism
    • Academia and Scholarship
    • Computer Games
    • Film
    • Journalism
    • Literature
    • Music
    • Politics
    • Wikipedia
    • Other instances

The Practical advice section as written seems a bit preachy and morally POV

I will work on expanding the general information about plagiarism including a anti-plagiarism section with explanations of "Honor Codes" and anti-plagiarism software. I think if this article has a great start and that with a little work that clean-up tag will be unnecesary and we may even get this to a featured status. Ratherhaveaheart 22:28, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Category

Shouldn't there be a category for people who comit plagiarism? It would clearly be controversial, but not more than Anti-Semitic people for example. Mhym 07:04, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

What the Hell did this do to Crystal acid database?

When i try to click on a database or an actors name I can't get to it and am redirected to this page.--Jack Cox 02:37, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't know, but moving it to Academic Dishonesty was pretty disruptive to Wikipedia (no discussion, incorrect capitalization, the fact that Academic dishonesty already exists as a different article, no fixing of double redirects), so I moved it back. —Angr 12:21, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Essayfraud link

User:67.188.1.224 persists in adding an external link to http://www.essayfraud.org/turnitin_john_barrie.html, which is a long rambling rant criticizing - as far as I can tell - the efficiency and/or morality of using a particular commercial product that (it seems) attempts to use a hashed database to identify inter-student copying. It is unclear to me that this link has any encyclopedic interest. Before I keep reverting this link on sight, can anybody else see any redeeming value to it, and if so which? Henning Makholm 10:19, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

It may not be the best link but it's certainly illustrative of an ongoing discussion and debate in academia over the use of tools like TurnItIn.com. While I don't feel very strongly about this particular essay it is a significant point of view that probably should be illustrated in this article.
I am not, however, sympathetic to most of the editors thus far involved in the edit war over this link as there has been very little discussion and several silly, unsupported assertions thrown about. --ElKevbo 20:13, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
There may be an underlying controversy that is worthy of mention in the article - unfortunately I don't know enough about it to start writing such a section. My main point is that a knowledge-seeking reader is not well served in this respect (probably not served at all) by an unannotated link to a strongly POV essay. I don't think being "illustrative" is an argument in favor of keeping the link. An encyclopedia is a "tell, don't show" media: if there's an ongoing discussion we should explain what it is about and what the main arguments on either side are, not leave it to the reader to piece it together from random external links. Such links may perhaps be used to source the existence of a certain arguments in the real world (i.e., that they are not original research of the editors who write about them in the article), but they are unsuited for constituting our main coverage of the topic. Henning Makholm 16:03, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
Link removed again per above, twice - since nobody have presented arguments that the link itself adds value to the article. The anon who keeps inserting it apparently prefers to conduct his content dispute in edit summaries and on my talk page, instead of here where it belongs. Until he makes at least an attempt to explain why he thinks this link improves the encyclopaedic value of the article, I will consider it the best consensus we have that it does not belong in the article, and act accordingly. Henning Makholm 09:18, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
I don't object to your removing the link and I am displeased with the anonymous editor's refusal to discuss this controversial edit. However, I am also displeased that you have labeled your POV "consensus" when only two editors have engaged in any discussion whatsoever. That's quite a stretch. --ElKevbo 09:24, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
Sorry; I don't really think the word "consensus" fits either, for your reason, but it was the best I could think of on short notice. I did try to qualify it a bit. I'd be happy to be reminded of a more precise way of summarizing the situation. Henning Makholm 09:29, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
OK, let me explain "anonymity," as it pertains to the Internet. My IP address is LESS anonymous than any random username that I could assign to myself. Why do you insist on referring to me as "anonymous"? In what way? Would naming myself "catonahottinroof" make me any more familiar to you? Perhaps, to you, my statements would somehow carry more weight if I gave myself a TRULY anonymous, fake username? I fail to see the logic there. If either of you can point out to me where in Wikipedia's TOS a username is required, I will gladly ablige and create one immediately. Until you can do so, please refrain from using the flawed "anonymous" argument as a means to dispute the validity of the article. That is completely irrelevant and unfair to the article.
An "anonymous editor" is the usual term used to refer to editors who do not log in. The term does not imply anything about the validity of your arguments; I don't know where you got that impression. It is just that as you don't provide us with any name that we can use to refer to you, we have to find some other referrent when speaking about you. If you don't like to be called anonymous, you're free to choose a name we can call you by creating an account. Henning Makholm 15:50, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
You absolutely DID refer to my arguments in a negative light simply because I do not choose to create an unecessary, fake, anonymous username. If you'd like, I can provide your own quotes.67.188.1.224 19:30, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
Please do not make assumptions about why I am not convinced by your arguments. You're not very good at it. Henning Makholm 21:56, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
I will remind you for the second and final time to maintain civility. Please refrain from issuing personal attacks. This is your second such attack against me, and I will not tolerate another.67.188.1.224 05:27, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
Regarding the article itself, ElKevbo, I believe you are unfair in your assertion on "Henning's" talk page about the quality of the article in comparison to others. Just because you don't "like" the domain for some reason does not mean that the article is not completely valid and 100% legitimate. (I have personally verified the accuracy of every quote and every reference in the article.) I have read every significant, online article on the subject, including those by "The Chronicle" and "InsideHigherEd." Indeed, no comparison. No article, from any source, is more all-encompassing, well-written, and revealing. I would challenge anyone to prove me wrong in that regard. Please show me any article from any source that remotely approaches the depth and accuracy of the article in question. Please explain the grounds on which you dispute the value of this article. You insist that I justify why the article should remain, but one simply has to read it to see why it is extremely pertinent to the topic of plagiarism and current legal actions being taken against a certain plagiarism-detection service that has virtually monopolized the PDS industry and is the focus of plagiarism debates at nearly every university on the planet. 67.188.1.224 22:35, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
You're still not explaining what good you think the link does in the article. We're not discussing whether the essay you want to link to is itself "legitimate", accurate or well-written; we're discussing whether it makes sense for Wikipedia's "Plagiarism" article to link to it with no comment or context. What do you think is the encyclopedic value of such a link - that is, in which way does linking make Wikipedia a better encyclopedia? No page should be linked from a Wikipedia article unless its inclusion is justified. It is your task to provide such justification, not by defending the quality of the linked-to material, but by explaining why Wikipedia needs to link to it. In particular, arguing that the content of the essay would qualify as content of a Wikipedia article does not justify linking to it externally. External links are different; their targets are not part of "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit". Henning Makholm 15:50, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
I certainly did explain. Once again: "You insist that I justify why the article should remain, but one simply has to read it to see why it is extremely pertinent to the topic of PLAGIARISM and current legal actions being taken against a certain plagiarism-detection service that has virtually monopolized the PDS industry and is the focus of PLAGIARISM debates at nearly every university on the planet." 67.188.1.224 19:30, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
You're still confusing the concept of "discussing an issue" and "linking to a website discussing an issue." "Any [link to a] site that does not provide a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a Featured article [should be avoided]." If we should discuss the issues raised in the link, then discuss them and use the link as a reference.
Simply repeated your insistence that one has "only to read the link!" to be convinced does not appear to be a successful strategy for winning supporters. I understand why as it's not a very convincing argument. --ElKevbo 20:08, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
I would like other editors to read the article and comment. 67.188.1.224 05:37, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Non-written matter

Um, suddenly the introduction states that non-written matter cannot, as a matter of definition, be plagiarized. How does that square with two of the cited examples later in the article being about film and music? (I've never heard of anybody "forging" a violin concerto, but I remember reading arguments about whether one of Vivaldi's was "plagiarized" or merely "inspired by"). Henning Makholm 10:05, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Simple: definitions of plagiarism vary greatly from country to country. Therefore, an editor's national origin contributes to what he/she believes constitutes plagiarism.

67.188.1.224 22:49, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Good question. Regarding movies - there's a script involved, actual, or implicit, and that is, or can be reduced, to writing. And that's the plagiarism. Similarly, with music, music can be reduced to writing, so you have plagiarm by showing the similarity - in the writing down of the music.
On the other hand, when you duplicate film, or music, with recoding, or other electronic devices, without permission, you get an instance of a forgery.

Yours truly,--Ludvikus 07:23, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

I think the entire "forgery" angle is a red herring. They are entirely different misdeeds, and the essential difference has nothing to do with the medium. They both have to do with claiming something to be original that isn't, but the details are completely complementary. Forgery is when I create something myself and falsely claim that somebody else made it. Plagiarism is when I take something somebody else created and falsely claim that I made it. For example, if I were to create a painting closely modeled after The School of Athens, sign it with my own name, and go on to seek people's praise for its aesthetic composition and learned references, I would be guilty of plagiarising Raphael, no matter that the plagiarized matter cannot be easily reduced to writing. On the other hand, it might be alleged that an email presented as evidence in a court case is a forged despite being entirely written in nature. (And, of course, most cases of copyright infringement are neither plagiarism nor forgery). Henning Makholm 16:07, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
There's the following to consider: In plagiarism there's always some [[original] lurking, of which the plagiarism embodies an unauthorised duplication. But in forgiary the existence or lack thereof of an original is immaterial. Quite simply, the forgery, in its material embodiment, is not what it purports to be.
I have come to this analysis by studying the Protocols of Zion. We know now, quite conclusively, that it is a plagiarism! But is it a forgery, as it is asserted to be to this day by many?
My view is that the original manuscript - which has since it was handled by Serge Nilus has disappeared - is, or was a forgery, written, allegedly by certain Jews, etc. However, that forgery, having disappeared, what we have remaining is the text (an immaterial thing). It is the meaning, not the physical letters of the alphabet arranged on paper, which constitutes the plagiarism.
So a forgery requires just what the word embodies - a forge. One cannot divorce the forgery from its physical embodyment and still have the crime.
All this becomes confused more by our modern technological computer revolution which makes duplication incredibly easier than ever before.
But CD's are forged, not plagiarized these days - just like paper money that has not actually rolled off its government's printing press. Things are easily confused here. And this is way. The very nature of money require all particular denominations to look the same, more or less. And so the crime of forgery is not the resemblance, or lack thereof, but merely its inauthenticity - and that's fundamenta lly tied to its physical embodiment. That's not at all the case with plagiarism, however. If one were to translate a plagiarism into another language, the crime of plagiarism would persist. But one cannot so alter a forgery.
So I think it is duplication which distinguishes the two. Again, plagiarism implies an original of which it is a copy, in whole, or in part.
But in forgery there is no other original, or the item presented is an original so to speak. And since the question boils down to this authenticity of an original presented, how can there be a crime without a body??? And that's why the material embodiment in the case of forgery is so fundamental. In other words, no forgery of monetary currency has taken place until such time as the forged plates have been created. --Ludvikus 22:23, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Plagiarism v. Forgery

It's interesting that the distinction between the above is not as easy to express as one might anticipate.

Imagine Michaelangelo's Piata. Suppose we were to discover he had a 'ghost sculptor' (like a ghost writer, but for sculpture). What would that make him? --Ludvikus 07:31, 31 December 2006 (UTC)


Examples.

Each section, each kind of plagiarism should contain direct links to the typical examples of plagiarism. They should coexist with links to lists of authors accused in plagiarism. Some reserve of examples should be at this discussion or even in a special section. Each example should be either self-evident, or refer to a respectable source, which qualify some product as plagiarism. I have some examples of self-plagiarism, but I already have used them at Multiple publication. Should I cite them here too, or it will be self-plagiarism? dima 07:09, 7 April 2007 (UTC)


The section on politics is largely irrelevant. Is the dust up between Obama and Clinton really important to the meaning of plagiarism? I think not, especially since whether either's conduct qualifies as plagiarism is iffy. At worst, there should be a list of political figures accused of plagiarism, but have the details of such on each of their own pages and just link to them. Having full discussions for each figure on the plagiarism page seems to degrade it. Thoughts?

Removal and discussion of external links

I moved the following three external links to this page before deleting them with notes why they don't meet external link guidelines:

  • Article checker, Online script that checks published and unpublished text for plagiarism using online archives, online sources, and major search engine results
Commercial site that shows up mainly in comments on internet marketing blogs.
There are no navigation buttons from this page, but the rest of the website consists of pages (and pages) of free essays.
An 8-page unpublished academic pager that meets the non-publisheds/self-published guidelines and authored by a seemingly non-notable academic.

Here are the remaining external links for reference and any comments/discussion associated with sourcing guidelines. Schneier.com is a blog, which technically doesn't meet the guidelines for a reliable source (and it's not supporting any specific statement anyway), but this one seems to be related to a publication and has a very detailed discussion.

  • The Assessment in Higher Education web site's plagiarism page contains links to a variety of resources (articles, books, cheat sites, etc) on plagiarism.

Flowanda 10:24, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

I added copyscape to the external links - this is a very useful tool for detecting plagarism for websites owners —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kthor (talk • contribs) 14:58, July 21, 2007

I reverted your addition. Wikipedia is not a collection or directory of links and this link does not add to one's understanding of plagiarism. --ElKevbo 19:06, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Cassandra Clare sources

The Cassandra Clare plagiarism sources do not seem to meet the guidelines for verifiability. The links are to a personal wiki and internet forums/blogs written by an anonymous user (although some of the responders may have identified themselves). I tried to find a news article or other third-party sources that had followed up or reported on these claims and could not, nor could I find any third-party news sources quoting the websites/owners as experts or authorities. Since the author's book is newly published by Simon & Schuster, and there is an unbelievable amount of chatter in the blogs that will direct anyone to those internet sites with or without Wikipedia, I think we either need to find stronger sources that meet the guidelines or remove the information until there is third-party verification.

I want to be clear that I am not questioning the content or authors of these sources, but I am trying to follow this: "Exceptional claims should be supported by multiple reliable sources, especially regarding scientific or medical topics, historical events, politically charged issues, and biographies of living people." Flowanda 02:31, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. The only good link was to the Telegraph and that article had nothing to do with the alleged plagiarism. Therefore I have removed the material. Good call! --ElKevbo 16:58, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

Irony, anyone?

The first sentence of this article plagiarizes dictionary.com. Punctured Bicycle 20:10, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Sigh. I've replaced the definition with the one used in this article for quite some time with no contention. For those curious, the definition was replaced by Alton32 a few months ago. This was his or her only edit. We need to be more vigilant of edits made to this article as it is a frequent target of vandalism. --ElKevbo 17:07, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

lmao you have got that right. wikipedia is full of plagiarism. people dont seem to understand that using synonyms and rearranging words does not make a work not plagiarized. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.192.20.87 (talk) 02:45, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Split article

There are problems with the organisation of this article.

One of the main ones is that academic plagiarism is a much more specific area than plagiarism in general. Most academic research is related to academic plagiarism, e.g. plagiarism by students for academic credit. Since the wider definiton of academic plagiarism could also include plagiarism by tutors/academics/professors the category of student plagiarism could also be considered.

Some areas that the article would need to consider include: the extent of student plagiarism, methods of plagiarism prevention, methods of plagiarism detection.

Splitting the article would create more focused areas for different types of readers. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.194.16.60 (talk) 2007-05-13T17:19:30

I am not convinced that plagiarism by students is so qualitatively different from other plagiarism that it makes sense to write a separate article about it. If plagiarism is particularly common among students, it is probably because they have a greater incentive to plagiarize than other groups of people; a student has a particularly narrow interest in making somebody else believe that he is able to produce original works, and little or no reason to care for said works after this interest has been served. And non-students who have trouble being original usually have better options for escaping the requirement that they must be original (say, by choosing career paths that depend on other skills than originality, thereby eliminating the need to cheat), than a student has for escaping the school's demands. –Henning Makholm 21:47, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

Novelty

Why is there nothing in this article about how the idea of plagiarism is a historical novelty in the last three or four centuries? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 138.163.0.41 (talk) 2007-07-18T16:38:39

Because nobody wrote it yet. If you have at your disposal a respectable scholarly source on the history of concepts of intellectual ownership and how today's universal expectation of originality in intellectual work came about, then by all means do write a section on these matters. It would improve the article to have one. –Henning Makholm 20:09, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Someone, please, define "unearned increment", in the article.

Thank You,

[[ hopiakuta Please do sign your signature on your message. ~~ Thank You. -]] 01:15, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Edits concerning the University of Madras etc.

This is a recent edit that I moved from the main page to here for a couple of reasons: "* In 2007 researchers of the University of Madras published a paper in the Journal of Materials Science [1], an exact copy of an article from the University of Linköping published in PNAS [2] [3]" I moved the content (with my added internal links) here because of several back and forth edits, but also because there are several issues with the sources...the first two are links to the papers, and the last source, which I guess (and that's not a good thing) deals with the plagiarism issue, is not in English. Neither the papers nor FL articles are enough to satisfy verifiability in this case...is there a single source that meets WP:RS that can be used instead, or better yet, an internal link to a wiki article? Flowanda | Talk 00:09, 14 October 2007 (UTC)


  • Please do not vandalize Wikipedia by deleting valid content. I am really disappointed in the level of editing here. You are invoking WP:RS really for no good reason. If you have a concern with the third reference, the talk page is the place to discuss that. A simple google search would have provided you with this article in English: http://www.liu.se/en/news-and-events/News?newsitem=11285 V8rik 17:15, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
The responsibility to provide a source lies editor who adds the material. I further agree with Flowanda that an article that is not in English is probably not a very good source to use in en.wikipedia as it is very difficult or impossible for most editors to verify the source. --ElKevbo 17:33, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Hi ElKevbo, you make it sound as if I did not provide a source with my edit. I did provide a source. I am always willing to discuss the quality of sources (I have already provided an alternative) but once again deletion is not an option. V8rik 18:22, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
We work here by consensus and cooperation, not by issuing or adhering to mandates issued by individual editors. Even information that is fully supported by reliable sources does not necessarily belong in an article. The examples listed in this article should, IMHO, be only those that are high-profile or particularly unique and interesting. This should not be an attempt to exhaustively list all known incidents of plagiarism.
With all of that said, I am rather neutral on this particular example. Now that we have a good English source I can see how it could fit in as an example of blatant (and thus rather unusual) plagiarism in academia. But one could also make a valid argument that it's not high-profile or interesting enough to include here. I'm happy with whatever position the majority of editors take. --ElKevbo 18:55, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
I undid my edits on the main page and replaced the original source with the English page...thanks to V8rick for providing it here as part of the discussion. V8rik, I did not delete or vandalize your edits, and I don't consider them invalid; my apologies if my edits conveyed that to you. I moved the content here merely to avoid a potential revert war or misunderstandings that sometimes happen from discussion-by-edit-summary. I mentioned reliable sources only because the first two sources were primary sources and the third source wasn't in English; references help readers from having to do the work themselves to verify content and editors from arguing over sources now or down the road. It just seemed quicker and easier to do it here and get it over with...I hope you agree. Flowanda | Talk 19:54, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
Can you please tell how the example adds value to the article? As ElKevbo said, the list of examples is not meant to be exhaustive. In fact, it is already far too long to be useful in an encyclopedic article. It ought to be trimmed rather than extended. At the very least, it should be extended only when there is a concrete argument that the example improves our encyclopedic coverage about plagiarism as a general concept. Can you provide such an argument? –Henning Makholm 23:24, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
I believe that was the original reason you cited for removing the edits and one of the reasons I moved the edits here, but I thought the sources needed to be dealt with first. I agree that the number and detail of examples are diluting the article...the MLK and Hailey descriptions are overboard, for example, but rather than deleting just one more example, is there another way to include/list all these examples here or in another article? Flowanda | Talk 00:28, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
I don't think we need or ought to include/list all of these examples anywhere. I would love to start cutting down the example list severely, but that requires some kind of consensus about which criteria to apply when cutting (removing the current list entirely would suit me fine, but I doubt that is a consensus view). Lacking that, a good start would be to stop adding new examples, except ones that arguably add value to the article. Hopefully, discussion about which new examples to add will give us a better idea about which old ones to keep.
I think that at this point the proper sequence is to worry about whether we want the example at all before we send a contributor out chasing sources. It is wasteful to spend much time in sourcing claims that the article shouldn't make in the first place. (This assumes that most suggested additions would fail a relevance test rather than a verifiability test, but that does seem to be the case here). –Henning Makholm 00:49, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
Yes, but this article has a case of examples gone amok. I've started a new discussion below. Flowanda | Talk 01:40, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Pruning the examples sections

Based on the comments above, I've started a discussion on pruning the growing list of examples and how and if to edit/remove them. I think the examples are starting to dilute the main article and should be mixed in with the main content only if they help explain certain points or moved to a category listing page (or whatever they're called). I consider separate examples sections to be little better than trivia sections...they're very easy for drive-by editors to just cut-and-paste content into a variety of articles without having to incorporate their edits into existing content or even read the article. (Please note that this is a general observation, not a comment on the edits that spurred this discussion.) At the very least, the section on MLK, Bruce Lee, Alex Hailey and Dutch Shell can be reduced to one or two sentences and the remaining content deleted or moved elsewhere...I'm sure there are other examples. Any comments? Flowanda | Talk 01:57, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Just one, and I hope it's relevant-- it seems certain examples of plagiarism, e.g. academic and journalistic, are over-represented while others, e.g. in the visual arts, aren't. Pruning should be balanced by adding new examples in under-represented fields...and, as you suggest, incorporating them into the main part of the article. Rhinoracer 09:41, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

As applied to Wikipedia =

It's topical, but I don't see any mention of it here. Many editors simply paste text from websites without attribution. Here's an example commented on by another editor: User talk:Elpiseos Tedickey 11:38, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

Chinese Classics

It would be interesting to contrast the Western academic definition of plagiarism to the classical oriental practice of liberally quoting from the classics without attribution (because learned persons are supposed to know the origins of the quotation? or because universal knowledge is merely discovered, rather than invented? I am not enough of a Sinologist to know which is the case.... please advise!) 91.105.247.68 (talk) 23:39, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Translation plagiarism

Shouldn't there be anything on translation plagiarism; when you plagiarize something in another language? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.179.82.69 (talk) 13:53, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

  1. ^ Determination of dopant of ceria system by density functional theory K. Muthukkumaran1, Roshan Bokalawela, Tom Mathews and S. Selladurai Journal of Materials Science Volume 42, Number 17 / September, 2007 7461-7466 doi:10.1007/s10853-006-1486-5
  2. ^ Optimization of ionic conductivity in doped ceria David A. Andersson, Sergei I. Simak, Natalia V. Skorodumova, Igor A. Abrikosov, and Börje Johansson PNAS March 7, 2006 vol. 103 no. 10 3518-3521 doi:10.1073/pnas.0509537103
  3. ^ http://www.c2w.nl/15322-Plagiaat-No-problem,-sahib!-.lynkx
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