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Plagarism

  1. startlingmoniker
    Member

    One of today's Blogs of the Minute has been "Through the Eyes of an Eer," which bothers me-- the post that the WordPress.com main page is linking to is almost entirely consisting of original content from another site, Stratfor.com! To make it worse, they provide no link to the original content, just some bogus line about how they just "came across" it and that they "don't care how much traffic it gets." Please.

    Here's his, and here's the original:

    http://eerfoolwvu.wordpress.com/2007/04/16/highly-unlikely-this-was-a-spur-of-the-moment-emotional-move-vt-shooting/

    http://www.stratfor.com/products/premium/read_article.php?id=287317

    Don't get me wrong-- I'm all for quoting someone. But when you quote, please provide some sense of where it came from! Ripping off someone else's writing is not only in poor taste, it's also plagarism.

    I should also note that I wouldn't have brought this up in the forum, but my comments were NOT approved by the blog owner-- no big surprise there!

    --DaveX, STARTLING MONIKER

  2. mark
    Staff

    Have you reported the blog?
    If not, do so please.
    This is not the place to report blogs.

  3. eerfoolwvu
    Member

    I came across the article on a UVA football forum and it did not provide the source. Additionally, when you try to go to that link it asks you to register for the website so I have no idea whether that link is legit or not.

    Honestly this just seems like some jealously issues to me because my blog which was never even made til yesterday made it to #1 on the website. I'm not a blogger, I simply came across that website on the forum and wanted people to see it. As luck would have it, it happened to make it to front page of digg.com

    Find a way to actually see the article you're referring to and I will add it, but just sending me to a login/registration page isn't something anybody is going to bother with when they can just read it here.

  4. startlingmoniker
    Member

    I've been able to see it just fine, and I didn't pay for any subscription. Hell, I never even heard of that site until today. I just took a line of text from your blog and googled it-- voila!

    It's not jealously at all, it's just that I think plagarism is wrong, especially if someone is using a hot-topic event like the Virginia tech shootings to drive views. While I think that finding an entire global intelligence site's post on a football forum is a bit unlikely, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt-- but still, why not at least link back to that forum? Surely you could have asked the forum member where it came from before you posted the whole thing?

    BTW, I tried it again: Google this block of text with the quote marks: "delay in identifying the culprit or culprits is because the intelligence community is running foreign and criminal intelligence traces"

    That should take you to the Stratfor site.

  5. startlingmoniker
    Member

    I don't intend to "report" this blog-- I'd rather the community straighten itself out on its own, and this can obviously still happen.

  6. drmike
    Member

    No, it needs to be reported. In additon to the possible theft of the blogger, there's legal issues involved that Automattic must follow to protect themselves legally. As a webhoster myself, I've been sued and sent Cease and Desist orders due to the actions of my clients. (I cover my butt though)

  7. startlingmoniker
    Member

    Why don't we give "eerfoolwvu" a little time to correct things. If he doesn't want to provide a link, he could remove the entry. I understand that he HAS posted entirely from that site's "Premium" content, but I'm pretty sure nobody is going to get sued if he takes action to fix it.

  8. drmike
    Member

    Oh, missed that you were talking about eerfoolwvu. I was thinking you were talking about another site. I just got back from lunch and it was not fun.

    It's really up to staff actually.

  9. startlingmoniker
    Member

    Whoops. My bad-- I just checked my gmail... looks like "eerfoolwvu" should DEFINITELY know better than this. He's a business major in college!

    A quote...

    "...I'm not a blogger so I couldn't care less. I posted something I thought the world should read and it happened to make it to the front page of digg...call it dumb luck or whatever, but I'm not here trying to make a profit or anything, so perhaps you should seek some help with your anger before you end up doing the same shit Hui did.

    Senior Ag-Business Major
    Davis College of Consumer Sciences
    West Virginia University"

    Niiice.

  10. startlingmoniker
    Member

    Dr. Mike-- I was hoping more to bring this up as a general topic, see if people would pay a bit more attention to this sort of thing in the future. It would be ridiculous to assume that "eerfoolwvu" is the ONLY person doing this sort of thing. Blogs do have different rules and form than other media, but this seemed like a fairly egregious example, and since I was already thinking about plagarism on blogs...

  11. drmike
    Member

    This makes #4 for today on the subject. They get deleted as we have folks here who are troubled with copyright and like to use the forums here as their soapbox for their views on the subject.

    We also try to not discuss and debate policy here in the forums as that gets messy as well.

  12. raincoaster
    Member

    Interesting. I saw that blog; actually, I linked to it yesterday. It was obvious that whoever it was wasn't writing the content but doing a news "roundup" of sorts, but yeah, not quoting or accrediting sources is not cool. I characterized the entire thing as rumours, which it was, and some has turned out to be false. I'll kill the link.

    Obviously he cares if it gets in the Top Blogs. People who do not care do not reference Digg.

  13. carocat
    Member

    What I don't understand is that it's a completely new blog? With only a few posts? Why bother about stats?

  14. raincoaster
    Member

    Quite a LOT of new blogs are started to make the news/high posts. Whatever the motivation behind beginning this, having had attention brought to the protocol of attribution, having disregarded it, and further having made such remarks to someone else who wants only justice for the original source of the material, I think it fair to write that blogger off. That is the #1 blog on WordPress at the moment. Reporting for TOS violation, with a link to this thread.

  15. chicablog
    Member

    Congrats Rain on your top blog :-)

  16. timethief
    Member

    @chica
    OOPS! You have completely misunderstood what's going on in this thread.

  17. raincoaster
    Member

    Oh ye of little faith: give it time, timethief! And Chica, thanks for the congrats, however little deserved they may be. I appreciate the support. I'll get there eventually.

  18. raincoaster
    Member

    Actually, the Top Posts list has a bug and it's listing everything from the fourth most popular and downward as #1. Yay, I'm #1!

  19. timethief
    Member

    YAY! Good going! We have cultivated a beneficial bug that favours elevating underdogs ... lol :P

  20. chicablog
    Member

    If any of y'all see me on top blogs, please holler at me :P

  21. eerfoolwvu
    Member

    I added the source, hopefully this will make everybody happy.

    The article I posted that I had the source for I posted the original source to from the get go. This is not a blog I intend to continue doing. The majority of my family is Virginia Tech grads and many of my friends go there, as well as my girlfriend's best friend who fell victim to this heinous act.

    Seems to me that this was no big deal, but apparently I was wrong. I corrected my mistake and humbly apologize.

  22. raincoaster
    Member

    The article that you posted had no link to the source. I saw it and there was no attribution and no link. If there had been, you wouldn't have needed to add it in. What you did was illegal and against the terms of service agreement that you signed when you started the blog. It's a big deal.

  23. startlingmoniker
    Member

    That's a lie about you having posted the link "from the get go". Even now, you don't provide a proper link, just this text, squeezed in the middle of the entry:

    'blockquote' "It has been pointed out that this article came from the the following link:

    http://www.stratfor.com/products/premium/read_article.php?id=287317

    Thanks for catching this." 'blockquote'

    Besides, why are you starting a blog you don't intend to continue? Send your friends an e-mail next time, and don't add to the millions of useless, dead blogs out there.

  24. startlingmoniker
    Member

    Well, it appears as a proper link here... but on his entry, it's not. It's just text.

  25. raincoaster
    Member

    Quel suprise. And still in the top blogs.

    Good catch there, startlingmoniker. Since he's getting the hits anyway, what would it cost him to go ahead and put out a bloody link? My opinion of the individual is unchanged.

  26. startlingmoniker
    Member

    Well, that's what happens when people are chasing Digg.

  27. drmike
    Member

    *cough*

    Just for reference. Please note part 1.

  28. lloydbudd
    Staff

    Thank you for those people who have reported this issue. It seems mostly harmless to me because it seems like a rather isolated issue by this person and no copyright holder of related material has contacted us, expressing that their license in this case has been violated.

    I am closing this thread, contact us directly if there is a specific concern, otherwise lets try and keep the forum discussions not about specific blogs (unless to help track down a technical problem).

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