Are we too defensive of our effort and reputation?

So I just read an article about plagiarism, and in it, the author speaks out about how professionals and leaders tend to give extreme punishment for any sort of plagiarism when sometimes it isn't truly deserved. Some people to it in a deceptive way to gain reputation for themselves, and that deserves punishment of course, but maybe not necessarily to be confused with theft, as they aren't really hurting or taking away from the source, but rather gaining a bit of credit themselves.

Other times, we simply punish people for plagiarism because they have the same ideas as others. Think of movies made after books, or variations of books such as Romeo and Juliet made by a wide array of authors, all based on Pyramus and Thisbe to begin with, those are taking ideas from past artists, but when done under those types of circumstances we tend to call it "allusions" while the times that it upsets someone it is immediately labeled plagiarism and can easily destroy someones career.

Hell, you could say this post is plagiarism because I'm using a lot of the ideas and points mentioned in the article, but in the end, am I not just passing along the ideas mentioned by the author (even if I'm not really taking credit for them)?

Anyway, I know that I personally get furious when I see people using signatures they didn't get permission to use and take credit for them, I know Dimitra does too, but sometimes maybe we take it too far. Maybe we're worried too much about boosting our own reputation that we go overkill with our feelings towards the person that is using something they didn't make. Or maybe we feel like we put so much effort into our work, and we deserve to be known for it, but perhaps we take it too far.

What are your thoughts on plagiarism and the punishment people receive for it?

 

I've always thought that the rule where one line of seemingly plagiarized work in your paper can **** you up hard is somewhat overboard.

 

Minecraft Creator Being Sued By Bethesda - PC News at IGN

Long story short, people do go overboard.

 

^This. Shit happened to me on one of my Abnormal Psychology papers. Professor said one of my lines in the treatment section looked too similar to something else she read and she even showed me it. Even though I properly cited everything, I forgot to cite the author of that line and she accused me of plagiarism like I had plagiarized the entire thing. She gave me a 0 on the paper which dropped my grade in the class from an A to a C. I was super pissed about it and she even had the audacity to say she was doing me a "favor" by not having me expelled over it.

 

Everything is not black and white. There is always a large amount of grey inbetween... it is sort of like a graded scale of "just how bad" was it?

Because in essence, even the very research presented in our newest articles books, etc... is derived from concepts usually very similar to something someone else did.

Such as in neurosurgery and neurological research PET scans, MRI's, fMRI's, angiograms, etc... consistantly used. We have a dedicated and particular format to write papers in. We enjoy seeing histiology and cellular diagrams presented a certain way.

In such a light we can truly say everythings been done before.

Although I still circle my eyes around when I hear Avril Lavigne "Complicated" song... "chill out its all been done before". @_@;



But I do say that in some cases people DO have very similar idea's, ****... if you think about it on the scale of the globe as a whole... over 6 billion residents on this planet... statistically speaking that is... it is in the range of being pretty confident we will have people think up the same, if not just very similar, idea's.

But... in the case of plagiarism there is a fine line... such as in publication's you may make reference to another person's work, or when asked who did this you reply and give their name, information, etc... such is very common in artwork actually if it is based upon another person's work.

Then there is a series of law's and loopholes that allow the free use of material's so long as you do not profit from them. Such as a professor may put a disclaimer (the hell if I remember its exact info off the top of my head) infront of their powerpoint slide presentation telling the students that use, replication, etc.. of the notes may infringe copyright.


But on the other hand there are things that people may have attended to and seen... seen things where their peers have been kicked out due to BRUTALISTIC plagarism rules where they merely thought up a sentence and the professor went through their paper and googled everything (even if the sentence was presented ina different context, merely having the same words like "and then I thought to myself...", and then being expelled from the university...

Such is a horrific case of this particular university (which is near and dear to my heart), in which the medicine dean... THE DEAN OF MEDICINE ... plagirized someone elses speech for the graduating class...

Can you even begin to imagine how many students, medical students, got in and worked their asses off and then got expelled when it wasn't even intentional plagarism? By this very man?

It is almost a nightmare to think of honestly.

University of Alberta dean of medicine in midst of plagiarism scandal | Posted | National Post



Summary:

So in terms of it... because I've probably bored everyone who even bothered to look at this wall of text...

The fact of the matter is nothing is black or white, that is a psychological symptom called "Splitting".

Everything is graded.... but the fact does remain that even in hints of plagarism that this world does seem to overreact and jump IMMEDIATELY to conclusions that are almost nonfounded.

That is why I LOATHE when I hand in papers, I will start getting anxious about it even when writing it... I myself know I can go through and google paragraphs just to be sure that no one by coincidence had the same sentence/etc or format.

Because in reality we jump to conclusions, penalize and there are many people who are almost sadistic about it. Innocent students/etc get wiped every day-to-month for it... and its kind of sad to see when the world becomes so clawed and fanged.

 

yes, i can understand some people wants to protect something they spent time creating , for example intellectual property rights. but for me, too much of it just just kills competition.

take for example the apple vs. samsung case or the oracle vs google lawsuit(please don't get into who is right or wrong in these cases). the design and features of tablets, smartphones and other products have improved over the years.

open-source is one way that linux, android just a few examples have improved in popularity and usage largely over the years.

they say imitation is the highest form of flattery. of course, i consider copying 100% is unethical. at the same time though, i do think innovation benefits greatly from seeing something and using our own creativity and imagination to improve it.

correct me if i'm wrong but, i think information should be free. anyway, just my thought on the topic.

 

@Aegis

Where did you steal this from? XD

 

i dont get why plagiarism should be punished. its fact that every person is a different person actually but this world is not that huge for everybody to think and act opposite to others. as for books and art and etc, in one of nietzsche books, nietszsche himself lent a lot idea from greek philosophers, or about music, even today a lot bands are using beatles chords or hendrix licks.

 

I giggled xD!

 

Its complicated to make an objective approach over the subject. First and foremost we need to consider the current global situation, information is free and everyone has access to most of it, so is not imposible to say that what you just think, wasnt though by someone else before. Second, you belong to a race of of similar individuals, so its quite possible that a current and specific line of thinking would be followed by someone else in some part of the planet. Being original nowdays its a very difficult thing, considering that we are also constantly being bombarded by visual information. Is not unthinkable to to end thinking and reasoning in a similar way.

Thats twice true when we talk about graphics arts, you can recognize the influences of an artist just by looking at his/her job, or the mainstream style that he/she is using. Many artist learn by copying the art of someone else, many cant get out that stage. Many have the ability to draw and paint, but not to create.

Originality in these times comes from taking ideas and mixing them to make something different, almost never something new. The difference comes from what does the maker of any giving work, adds to it that belongs to him/her-self. How do you imprint your uniqueness as a person to a work, is what can make it fresh.