Newspaper Plagiarizes Blog, Taunts Real Author

iandennismiller writes "I've been keeping an eye on this viral marketing campaign called Petite Lap Giraffe — it's the DirecTV ads with the Russian guy and the tiny giraffe. I was pretty quick to debunk the existence of the giraffes, so a lot of people have been visiting my blog as a result. Today, I noticed a New-York area newspaper that was represented my research as their own, so I asked them to link to my blog (i.e. provide attribution). What ended up happening perfectly illustrates that newspapers just don't understand how the Internet works ..."

Comments

Only one question

[MyLongNickName]

WTF?

Re:Only one question

[im_thatoneguy]

Someone needs to let this blog writer know that writing an article based on knowledge learned in another article is not plagiarism.

Re:Only one question

[jdpars]

Just like writing about Shakespeare and including metaphors interpreted by someone else isn't plagiarism, right?

Re:Only one question

[Anonymous Coward]

You just like, totally don't understand. If it wasn't for this, I'd be on a plane to Africa looking for tiny giraffes. I could sell thousands of them. For me, I'm very glad he debunked it. Now to start paying down my thousands of dollars in debt to research groups about how much I was going to price the giraffes.

Cooks Source worked because the lady ripped off was nice. This site is boring and horribly written. You know, Rosa Parks wasn't the first one arrested on a bus. The NAACP was looking for someone to defend. They turned down a teenage girl because she was pregnant and the father was married. She was also mouthy. Turned down another teenage girl because her dad was a drunk. Rosa Parks was chosen because she was nice and had light skin. All details from Cracked

Re:Only one question

[JustOK]

et tu, jdpars?

Re:Only one question

[Anonymous Coward]

Alas, Poor Yorick, I misquoted him well.

Re:Only one question

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone needs to let this blog writer know that writing an article based on knowledge learned in another article is not plagiarism.

My own original thoughts on this: Someone should tell this blog writer that writing an article based on knowledge learned elsewhere is not plagiarism.

Re:Only one question

[im_thatoneguy]

Copying metaphor is duplication of creative style and thought. Facts aren't covered by copyright. While it's really sleezy to read a news article and write a new News Article based on what you learned--it's not plagiarism.

Re:Only one question

[AvitarX]

I see no evidence someone didn't do the research them-self (except for maybe that they later changed it).

It's hardly impossible data to find, and they didn't life anything the guy actually wrote.

And I tend to agree, it is the type of thing that I would site for a paper, but not an article, it is generally discoverable information, and not at all stealing the wording or anything. Newpapers only site direct quotes or serious research, not 15 minutes bored looking at a site type of thing (that again the paper could very well have done itself, the website would have been reviewed to write the article anyway, and any old intern could randomly have the knowledge to do the same if they thought it interesting).

Next up, loops using i++ are all plagarised.

Re:Only one question

[MoonBuggy]

That's arguable either way - it's certainly not a copyright issue, but plagiarism is a much broader term - but it's gone way beyond that since the newspaper have chosen to act like rude, unprofessional asshats.

They paraphrased this guy's findings, he contacted them and asked for attribution. Had they been reasonable people, they then had the option to say: "Of course, we've added a thank you and a link to the bottom of our article." or (in private, as a direct response to the blogger in question) "It is publicly available information; as such we don't feel that attribution is necessary or appropriate in this case, and therefore we will not be providing it.".

I don't doubt he would've complained if they'd chosen the latter, and I may even have agreed with him, but it would've been an issue with two reasonable points of view in play. What the newspaper actually chose to do was publicly add the following to the article: "A quick domain name lookup...which is free and public information...will give you those details, which we acquired - you know, being a newspaper with research capabilities and all - of our own accord (although some are trying to claim this information as their own “discovery” as a way to promote their own personal website! But enough of that...)". All the evidence suggests that they are snide, rude, and childish - I'm far more concerned about that than about the technicalities of plagiarism.

Re:Only one question

[tomp]

The author thinks he owns facts. It doesn't work like that. What a baby.

Re:Only one question

[MoonBuggy]

Maybe so, I find the newspaper's mocking edit to the newspaper's article to be wholly unprofessional, not to mention having a distinct overtone of the snide, slimy breed schoolyard bully about it:

A quick domain name lookup...which is free and public information...will give you those details, which we acquired - you know, being a newspaper with research capabilities and all - of our own accord (although some are trying to claim this information as their own “discovery” as a way to promote their own personal website! But enough of that...)

Even if the blogger was totally fabricating these claims (seemingly unlikely, given the changes made to the article's presentation) there would be absolutely no call for any journalist to resort to petty mudslinging like this. If they feel they are in the right, wouldn't a personal reply explaining that have been far, far preferable?

Re:Only one question

[MoonBuggy]

Re-reading my post, it would appear that lack of sleep causes me fail English, but hopefully the point still makes it through.

Re:Only one question

[clang_jangle]

Someone needs to let this blog writer know that writing an article based on knowledge learned in another article is not plagiarism.

I think someone needs to let him know that anyone who thought, even for a moment, that there was really such a thing as a "petite lap giraffe" and was over the age of 12 is a complete idiot who has no business ever writing anything. No-one needed him to point out they were fake.

Re:Only one question

[tomp]

Sure, but it's not really a newspaper, it's a glorified blog. This was a big win for everybody involved.
If the snarkiness was in the print version of NYT, it would be noteworthy. As is, not much more than a cat fight.

Re:Only one question

[khallow]

Copying metaphor is duplication of creative style and thought. Facts aren't covered by copyright. While it's really sleezy to read a news article and write a new News Article based on what you learned--it's not plagiarism.

We call it plagiarism because it is plagiarism.

The practice of taking someone else's work or ideas and passing them off as one's own

Re:Only one question

[DNS-and-BIND]

Deal with it. Journalists have to hear complaints all day long about their work from less-qualified individuals. It's not surprising if one acts out from time to time. A little sarcasm never killed anyone, unlike US bombs in Libya.

Re:Only one question

[mwvdlee]

Thank god I always use ++i in my loops.

Re:Only one question

[Permutation Citizen]

Come on. When you read an article about something you know well, you can judge quality of journalism. Usually it's quite poor.

Re:Only one question

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah thats a good idea I'm going to do that from now on

Re:Only one question

[Anonymous Coward]

Also: Welcome to the internet, where everything is copied, pasted, mashed up. View it, coat it, jam - unlock it, Surf it, scroll it, pose it, click it, Cross it, crack it, twitch - update it, Name it, rate it, tune it, print it, Scan it, send it, fax - rename it Touch it, bring it, pay it, watch it, Turn it, leave it, stop - format it.

You get the idea

Re:Only one question

[SharpFang]

Writing article about someone's results of their research is kind of plagiarism but quite common, widely accepted and not illegal per copyright law, especially when it's copying factual knowledge and not creations.

OTOH, claiming authorship of the research behind the article is plain assinine.

Re:Only one question

[mmj638]

Someone needs to let this blog writer know that writing an article based on knowledge learned in another article is not plagiarism.

It's not copyright infringement, but it is plagiarism.

Not that that's a big problem. Plagiarism is not of legal importance in the general world. It is of importance in certain professions where attributing the source of your ideas is important. The academic world is the primary example - not citing the source of an idea, or knowledge learned elsewhere, is fraudulent because by submitting a paper you are usually claiming anything not cited is your own idea.

In the commercial world, however, plagiarism is generally not important, and in this case, it's a pretty trivial idea too. The blog writer has a grandiose sense of importance.

Re:Only one question

[digitig]

I see no evidence someone didn't do the research them-self (except for maybe that they later changed it).

And his server records, which show that they accessed his blog just before they published the article.

It's hardly impossible data to find, and they didn't [lift] anything the guy actually wrote.

And that's the important point.

Re:Only one question

[hab136]

Right. As usual in cases like this, they're both jerks.

Re:Only one question

[delinear]

I suspect they did take the "research" from his blog, but it's hardly bullet proof evidence that they accessed his blog before publishing. If two people come up with the same idea at the same time it's still their idea, even if one of them happens to glance over and see that someone else is thinking the same way (and it wouldn't be beyond the realms of belief to have written the article, then notice a similar article is "trending", and go check it out). Regardless of all that, the blog writer is still getting masses of free traffic from this supposed transgression, so I guess in a way it worked out pretty nice for him.

Re:Only one question

[Anonymous Coward]

taH pagh taHbe'. DaH mu'tlheghvam vIqelnIS.

Re:Only one question

[dominious]

The blog writer should have someone tell him that an article written based on knowledge from another article is not plagiarism.

Re:Only one question

[CharlyFoxtrot]

I think someone needs to let him know that anyone who thought, even for a moment, that there was really such a thing as a "petite lap giraffe" and was over the age of 12 is a complete idiot who has no business ever writing anything. No-one needed him to point out they were fake.

Missing the point. He pointed out who was behind it, a marketing firm, and how it was done showing the stock images they used. That's interesting information and if the "journalist" who lifted it had any common courtesy or professionalism he'd at the very least provided a link back to the original source. It's not like it would have cost them anything to do that. But there you go, actual journalism is pretty much dead and this kind of thing goes on all the time in an effort to prop up the corpse. Read Flat Earth News some time.

Re:Only one question

[WrongSizeGlass]

taH pagh taHbe'. DaH
mu'tlheghvam vIqelnIS.

This again? If I've said it once I've said it a thousand times:
Capital 'H's are not allowed in the middle of a word unless:
- it is an acronym (unless the acronym happens to spell a dirty word).
- it is used to directly reference the title of a showtune from Broadway's heyday which hasn't happened yet so this is moot anyway.
- it was something said by or to Yogi Berra.

Re:Only one question

[flyneye]

He also needs to realize that Newsclowns are the next most worthless lifeform next to critics, yet not as useless as politicians.
News has become so competitive over time that you're lucky if the hyperbole you hear isn't so embellished and spun that the truth is completely obscured.
It has become a contest of liars to win your attention long enough to find actual stories amongst the ads. It's all about the money and no one give a damn about the product so long as it's a better story than the Times/Sun/Enquirer/etc. Beneath this layer of pus are the vermin actually plotting the bullshit; reporters. These bastards eat their own and would forcefeed their mother a dead rat sandwich if only to get "their" article up for print instead of Johnson, two desks over. Good reporter get kept and nurtured, mediocre reporters get the axe and wind up writing human interest stories for the Penny-Power or Garage Sale Weekly.

        So next time you think you're reading about an actual event or real people. Yeahhhhh riiiiiight!
I dont give a damn if it's a small town or New F**king York. These subhuman mutants are here as an infection and mean to stay.

Re:Only one question

[Opportunist]

Taking information from another source and presenting it as your own research is, though.

Re:Only one question

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll agree with this, keeping in mind that the biggest newspaper here in Sweden once said they don't publish the same articles on the web as in the real newspapers, this is because they can keep updating sites and get news out much faster and with maybe less accuracy. I'd imagine most newspapers work that way, so that makes a news published online as nothing significant only more reliable than other news sources.

Re:Only one question

[Anonymous Coward]

I think someone needs to let him know that anyone who thought, even for a moment, that there was really such a thing as a "petite lap giraffe" and was over the age of 12 is a complete idiot who has no business ever writing anything.

Why would you say that? When I heard of the mini-giraffe, I highly suspected it was just editing, but I couldn't be certain. There are plenty of animals that exist in miniature form. How can you expect everyone to be certain which ones are real? Did you know there are miniature horses? Probably...most people seem to know about that one. How about miniature monkeys that are only 5 inches tall as adults? I've never heard of that one. In fact, here's an article with several miniature species I never knew existed: http://webecoist.com/2008/12/17/adorable-cute-miniature-animals-pets

I'm not sure why someone is an idiot for recognizing that they don't know everything about this world, and thus choose to do a little bit of research instead of just making assumptions.

Re:Only one question

[Even on Slashdot FOE]

What about Klingon?

Re:Only one question

[Restil]

Not only that, when he complained about it, the newspaper acknowledged the complaint by changing the content of the article to no longer reference material taken from the blog. Sourcing your material is a good idea for some articles, such as wikipedia pages, where someone debating the accuracy of the content will be able to follow the paper trail, and therefore be able to contest the validity of the sources. But a newspaper commentary on a TV commercial does not need to attribute every source for every tidbit of information they discover. For that matter, there's no reason to believe they hadn't done the research themselves and amazingly drew the same conclusions. I dunno.. Just sounds like a lot of whining over nothing.

-Restil

Re:Only one question

[Anonymous Coward]

but it's hardly bullet proof evidence that they accessed his blog before publishing. If two people come up with the same idea at the same time it's still their idea, even if one of them happens to glance over and see that someone else is thinking the same way

No, but server logs are... which he has.

I didn't want to post AC but I modded the hell outta
some of the idjits in here.

-@|

Re:Only one question

[Attila Dimedici]

The thing is, the fact that they could have gotten the information from a quick domain lookup does not change the fact that the blogger in question has logs showing that they did not get the information in that manner. They may have used a domain lookup to confirm the info after they became aware of it from his blog, but his logs make it improbable that they found the info that way in the first place.

Re:Only one question

[v1]

I didn't want to post AC but I modded the hell outta
some of the idjits in here.

I think you're missing the point of "you can't post and moderate in the same discussion". (and if a mod sees this post you may lose your mod pts for good, yes the admins can often internally identify AC posts)

Re:Only one question

[guyfawkes-11-5]

don't forget unprofessional, they cant take the heat. the article is now 404.

Re:Only one question

[AJH16]

Having worked with a gaming news website, I know it is also common place to do a quick search to see if anyone else has similar content up prior to posting an article. The time in the log seems very short to right an article and far more likely to be an editor searching for similar content to determine if it is worth publishing. Not saying that is necessarily what happened here, but one log file record that close in time to the publish time is hardly a strong argument.

Re:Only one question

[khallow]

Writing article about someone's results of their research is kind of plagiarism but quite common, widely accepted and not illegal per copyright law, especially when it's copying factual knowledge and not creations.

In other words, it is legal plagiarism.

OTOH, claiming authorship of the research behind the article is plain assinine.

Wanting attribution for borrowed content is not asinine IMHO though I can see why someone would disagree. Attribution is pretty much the coinage of the blogging world even if it isn't something shared in the more traditional media.

I see here an interesting sociological anecdote. A blogger is operating on some variant of a gift economy. What I'll call the "interloper" has come in and grabbed the blogger's content without attribution and violated the informal rules of the gift economy as the blogger sees it. So now the blogger attempts to punish the interloper by publicly shaming them.

After all, if the content is free and plagiarism of this sort is legal, then how do you enforce the rules of the economy? Some punishment for defection from the group's rules has to be present or the gift economy falls apart. Asinine or not, this is the sort of behavior you'd expect.

It may turn out to be irrelevant because the interloper is fleeting and goes out of business soon (ignoring or abusing rules of group cooperation is often a sign of impending failure). Or this may be an indication of the unenforceable nature of the blogging gift economy and a sign of its imminent dissolution.

But I do see something interesting going on here even if the expectations end up being unrealistic.

Re:Only one question

[digitig]

Yes, it certainly isn't proof, or even persuasive evidence. But it is evidence.

Re:Only one question

[clang_jangle]

Okay, I'm convinced -- uneducated hick is more accurate. Feel better?

Re:Only one question

[dondelelcaro]

In other words, it is legal plagiarism.

What does this even mean? It's either a copyright violation or fraud. There's no such thing as legal plagiarism in any US state I'm familiar with.

Now if your point is that its unethical or immoral, that's fine, but that is orthogonal to whether laws were broken.

Re:Only one question

[Locke2005]

I find it amazing that written Klingon uses only the ASCII character set!

Re:Only one question

[khallow]

What does this even mean? It's either a copyright violation or fraud. There's no such thing as legal plagiarism in any US state I'm familiar with.

You say that in the face of the story, which is a counterexample disproving your assertion.

Now if your point is that its unethical or immoral, that's fine, but that is orthogonal to whether laws were broken.

It was plagiarism by definition. That was my point.

Re:Only one question

[tibit]

If it weren't for the log records and the apparent ineptitude of the plagiarist lady, I'd say that this was a lot of ado about nothing. Checking WHOIS records and JFIF image data is basic web reasearch, done by thousands every day I'm sure. I'd chalk it up to coincidence. With the logs and publication record of the plagiarist lady (not much there, in fact), I'd tend to think it was in fact plagiarism.

Re:Only one question

[HiThere]

If you'd ever read an article that covered an event you had personal knowledge of, you'd *know* what a work of fiction most "researched" news stories are. They damn well should give sources. They don't because most of their stories are a pack of lies, and they don't want it easily proven.

P.S.: I don't know if it's still true, but in past decades, in the stories that I checked out, the lies generally took the form of deliberate omission of information required to form an accurate picture of what was happening, rather than actual fabrication of facts. There have been, however, many indications that they no longer so restrict themselves. The footage of the "Tiamen Square" uprising in China where the people shown were speaking in English was the first indication. Not that it's impossible that this could happen, but there was sufficient question raised about it that the Network (can't remember which one) admitted that it was a "docudrama". The first time I ever heard that word. And they didn't admit it until a week or so after the event.

P.P.S.: Which network: ABC, NBC, or CBS. It was one of those.

Re:Only one question

[AvitarX]

If you were logged in and used the checkbox, it still deletes your mods. Just so ya know.

Re:Only one question

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone needs to let this blog writer know that writing an article based on knowledge learned in another article is not plagiarism.

My own original thoughts on this: Someone should tell this blog writer that writing an article based on knowledge learned elsewhere is not plagiarism.

I often say, "Someone needs to let this blog writer know that writing an article based on knowledge learned in another article is not plagiarism."

Re:Only one question

[dondelelcaro]

What does this even mean? It's either a copyright violation or fraud. There's no such thing as legal plagiarism in any US state I'm familiar with.

You say that in the face of the story, which is a counterexample disproving your assertion.

The story is an example of a newspaper possibly passing of factual statements as having come from research of their own. That could very well be plagiarism, but it's certainly not a copyright violation (since facts cannot be copyrighted), and doesn't seem to be fraud. Thus it doesn't seem to be illegal.

How does the story in any way act as a counterexample to disprove my assertion that plagiarism itself isn't against the law? Furthermore, even if it did, a random article isn't particularly convincing. Cite the code.

Re:Only one question

[mattack2]

Khallow used the term "legal plagiarism".

In this context, legal is an adjective, describing plagiarism. Khallow was claiming that the newspaper was committing plagiarism, however in a way that did not violate the law. They were not describing an actual construct in the law of "legal plagiarism".

(Note, I haven't even RTFAed, but it was clear to me what they meant, by simply understanding the English language.)

Re:Only one question

[khallow]

How does the story in any way act as a counterexample to disprove my assertion that plagiarism itself isn't against the law?

You asserted that you hadn't heard of "legal plagiarism". Now you are claiming that plagiarism itself isn't against the law. What do you call an action which isn't breaking a law or regulation? Legal. What do you call the practice of taking someone else's work or ideas and passing them off as one's own? Plagiarism. What can you call an act that is both legal and an act of plagiarism? Legal plagiarism.

As you have pointed out there are illegal forms of plagiarism in the form of copyright violations and fraud. So the phrase does distinguish in a useful way acts of plagiarism.

Re:Only one question

[MasterPatricko]

"Legal" has two meanings - "to do with law and lawmaking", as in "These are legal papers", and also "in accordance with the law", as in "Is it legal to park here."

So both arguments on this topic have merit.

Worst Formatting Ever

[Supernoma]

That was so impossible to read, I didn't even bother.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[jelizondo]

Right! I see why NO ONE in their right minds would link to that blog!

Jesus! Hire a freaking designer,

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[Anonymous Coward]

I could clean it up a bit for you and rephrase some of the awkward sentences, but then I'd be caught plagiarizing...

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[angel'o'sphere]

I second that ... your blog is unreadable.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[sycomonkey]

I'm not sure what you mean. When I look at the blog, it's black text on a white background, fixed width, centered. The font's kinda big, but that's about it. It's about as simple as you can get. Now if he had a busy background image, he may have removed it to conserve bandwidth, i'm not sure, but as of 8:24pst, it's a pretty dead simple page, and is perfectly readable. If anything it's TOO readable.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[LeinadSpoon]

Here's the details as far as I can tell: - The author of this blog wrote a post on 3/23 about some website which claims to sell "Petite Lap Giraffes" - Among other things he pointed out: - The domain was registered by "Grey Global Group", which is a marketing firm in New York - One image in particular on that site was clearly photoshopped. - He guesses it's somehow a secret DirecTV marketing campaign - On March 28th, some newspaper published a story about the same website, including all three of the above mentioned details. - He commented, asking that they credit him - They edited the story to argue that they did original research - His comment is "awaiting moderation" From my perspective, it seems like he has a pretty strong case, although technically there isn't enough evidence to assume they plagiarized. It's possible they could have just happened to make all of his observations (as the edited version of the article points out, the domain lookup aspect is trivial. That coupled with the other two things is pretty suspicious though...)

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[RedACE7500]

Agreed. I also found his blog to be TOO readable, so I didn't read it. I like to challenge myself with my reading material. That's why I stick to Where's Waldo?

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[milbournosphere]

It's not the simplicity that's the problem. For me, it's the lack of white space in relation to the massive font size. Make the font smaller, and space the 'paragraphs' out a little bit more. Also, it could stand to be a little wider... on my screen he could easily fit three columns of the article's size on the screen. He still has plenty of horizontal white space to work with; he should use it. Just my $.02

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[nomadic]

Pretty strong case for what?

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[Seumas]

I don't know what the complaining is about, either. It looks fine, though I'd maybe reduce the default font size a couple notches and maybe use a different background color for the quoted pieces just to set it off from the main article content itself. Hardly anything to get off track of the real story here, over. I mean, seriously, Press CTRL and flick the little wheel on the mouse a couple times and it looks just fine.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[iandennismiller]

I changed the line-height to 1.6em - I think it's a little more readable now.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[iandennismiller]

Er, I meant to reply to this - I changed the line-height to 1.6em, and it spaces it out a little. I shouldn't have tweaked the design over the weekend without taking a closer look at it, but I like your suggestions. Maybe next weekend...

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[topham]

For plagiarism... as defined in the educational context, not copyright context. Leaving the blogger with nothing.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[JanneM]

Um, even if they'd seen his blog post and decided to write an article about the same thing, they have no obligation to credit him or defer to him.

If you see a wire piece about some news, you can look up the same sources then write about the same news without having to acknowledge whatever piece alerted you to the thing in the first place. Copying others text is a definite no-no. Follow others lead to write about the same thing is something every news organization does every day. You don't own the news even if you're first to write about it, no matter how much AP may be lobbying to change that.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[Mr. Slippery]

Um, even if they'd seen his blog post and decided to write an article about the same thing, they have no obligation to credit him or defer to him.

It's not just that the saw his post and decided to write an article about the same thing, it's that they used specific facts that he had worked to uncover in their story.

Does that create a legal, copyright obligation? No, facts are not copyrightable. Does it create an ethical obligation, in an journalistic or academic context where citing sources of information is important? Yep.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[Tolkien]

I read the linked blog post and from what I understand he says, they initially copied his article ver batim, then when he found out they reworded it.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[NitroWolf]

It's not the simplicity that's the problem. For me, it's the lack of white space in relation to the massive font size. Make the font smaller, and space the 'paragraphs' out a little bit more. Also, it could stand to be a little wider... on my screen he could easily fit three columns of the article's size on the screen. He still has plenty of horizontal white space to work with; he should use it. Just my $.02

You can fix it yourself... Hold down your control key and scroll your mouse wheel... fixed right up for you.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure. And no, I don't want fries with that.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[Hangin10]

Massive font size? First thing I did upon opening the page was zoom way in.

You insensitive clods with your perfect vision...

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[mug funky]

is this the strangest slashdot troll we've seen here?

or is it proof that microsoft really has the subtlety of a grenade in a primary school classroom? if their search logic is this useless there's no way in hell i'm ever using Bing, even if it does give me the exact (ie stolen) result that google gives...

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[wagnerrp]

When I look at the blog, it's black text on a white background, fixed width, centered.

White backgrounds are bad. Nothing in nature is every such a bright white, and your eyes really don't handle it well. Using a light grey background like CC or DD is much better for preventing eye strain from long term use. Dark (but not black) backgrounds with light (but not white) text is even better, but is generally recommended against as it can be more difficult for users with vision problems to read. The only problem with non-white backgrounds is that it wastes a lot of ink if the site does not have a similar "printer friendly" version of the page.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[Clsid]

Nah, it's not just the fonts. It isn't that hard nowadays, just take a look at http://www.blogger.com/template-editor.g?blogID=4010125631613458355 for designs that look just right. Hard contrast, as opposed to common belief, is actually pretty bad when it comes to the screen. That was why computer shells had gray text on a black background until recently (among other color combinations).

In fact some people argue that the view that WordPerfect had with that blue and gray, is something that makes MS Word look like a retard's project. I don't know if they still do it today but that point to me, is perfectly valid.

So remember, right colors, right fonts (and size) plus if you use trendy layouts, that can only help you look like a champ. I have a relative who majored in Graphics Design and they taught them a lot about colors and one of the few things I learned is that, more often than not, pale shades make for more pleasant reading. Check this site for a list of colors:

http://www.designbyjoyce.com/colors2.html

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[davester666]

Once you click through enough articles, the nytimes.com also becomes an interesting challenge to read the articles...

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[TRRosen]

Actually that's just his piss poor writing. He quotes them twice showing the changes but on first glance you will think he's comparing his story to theirs. If you read each their isn't a single thing the same but the facts of the story. Note this is the third story the newspaper has done on the Giraffes.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure, I prefer green on black, but if we assume that every black on white web site is below average formatting, then we've already overpopulated the bottom 50% of formatting with more than 50% of the web sites. I also don't see what people find so alarming about the formatting on this site, so maybe it's been fixed in the last couple of hours?

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[pspahn]

Personally, these days, I kind of prefer a lot of the simpler and narrower width sites with larger fonts. They become a lot more usable on small touch screens without having to worry much about different layouts for different devices.

Of course, many sites have no business being visited on small screen devices.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[JanneM]

"Does it create an ethical obligation, in an journalistic or academic context where citing sources of information is important?"

In an academic context, maybe, maybe not. If he's not the original source of the fact, you're free to - in fact, encouraged to - check out the same sources and refer to those directly.

In a journalistic context, no way. Just as you have zero ethical obligation to refer to a newspaper story that first got you the idea for a blog post.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[Mike Buddha]

Is it important to cite sources in every filler human interest story? No.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[sempir]

He guesses it's somehow a secret DirecTV marketing campaign

WTF is a secret Direct TV marketing campaign........it's in a web site so where's the secret?

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[delinear]

The font is ridiculously big and it really needs some spacing. Readability on the web is not just about contrast, it's about giving visual hooks and cues that the reader can use to pick up where they were if they get distracted momentarily. A slightly higher line height and some proper spacing between paragraphs helps immensely here - even if you lose where you were it's easy enough then to pick up which paragraph you were at by scanning the first few words. Since this just looks like a huge block of text you lose those helpful tools.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[osgeek]

For a front page /. story, I guess.

Lame story, though.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[Anonymous Coward]

Being correct that it is plagiarism.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[Anonymous Coward]

Not at all. If I see on ESPN that the score to last night's game was 80-78, I don't need to credit them. You don't need to credit facts which you have checked yourself. If you haven't checked them, then you don't use them as facts, you say, "BlogX reports the score as 80-78."

Facts are facts. The domain is owned by someone. The blogger didn't "discover" this. He looked it up. He made it public. He created nothing and has no ownership of this fact. Whether his work is newsworthy is an editorial decision, but being the first to look up a fact doesn't give him lifelong ownership of that fact.

When you cite where the information about the domain came from, you cite the registrar.

Re:Worst Formatting Ever

[zmollusc]

Spacing be damned! I hate the white space and pointless images. Give me as much text as you can cram on the screen FFS! It doesn't help readability if most of the text is several scrolls away.
If only I wasn't so lame I would be able to configure my browser to overrule this pointless duhsigner meddling.

crap

[Anonymous Coward]

on top of crap on top of crap.

Cooks Source?

[dcollins]

So is this where Judith Griggs, formerly of "Cooks Source" magazine, landed?

Great.

[mikkelm]

Ah, Slashdot. Where pointless and petty feuds between nobodies is front page material.

Re:Great.

[winkydink]

Exactly. My first reaction was, "Sheesh. Get over yourself."

Re:Great.

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, Slashdot. Where pointless and petty feuds between nobodies is front page material.

ah the lazy moron, who hasn't bothered to rate potential stories on the firehose, instead just a prefers to be a whiny doucher.

Re:Great.

[tsm_sf]

... and your second reaction was to log in, scroll down the posts until you found one tangentially related to your mood, and post a snotty reply.

At the least you could clue us in as to what fame threshold you're looking for in your plagiarism news. I have my account options set to .25 deciSheens, so I usually see everything.

Re:Great.

[Seumas]

My first reaction was "what the fuck is anyone talking about?".

The plagiarism part, I get. The whole thing about people wondering about some giraffe they saw in some ad I've never seen . . . whatever.

Re:Great.

[black3d]

Indeed, but one is a private individual and one is an accountable business. I found it hard to read as well, but was amazed when I got to the part where the newspaper actually does pretend that it wrote the content itself rather than stealing it, and MOCKED the original author for even trying to lay claim to his own work.

A quick domain name lookupwhich is free and public informationwill give you those details, which we acquired–you know, being a newspaper with research capabilities and all–of our own accord (although some are trying to claim this information as their own “discovery” as a way to promote their own personal website! But enough of that)

For a "professional organisation" that is absolutely incredible. First of all they steal his content. Then they edit it to try and make it look like it wasn't stolen. And then they edit it again to actually make fun of the guy they stole it from.

Re:Great.

[nomadic]

That's not content. It really isn't. It's a simple fact that can be ascertained from the source.

Re:Great.

[mug funky]

i believe the SI unit is milliDianas

Re:Great.

[Seumas]

Just because something contains some facts, doesn't justify wonton lifting of entire content, verbatim.

Re:Great.

[hedwards]

The issue isn't that they independently came up with the same fact. The issue is that they stole the fact along with the text that surrounds it then tried to pass it off as their own work by editing the article. Since they edited the article I can't read it as it originally appeared, but if that's what really happened, then yes, they ripped the blog writer off for hist content.

Re:Great.

[shermo]

Mmm... wonton lifting

Re:Great.

[snowgirl]

i believe the SI unit is milliDianas

I think they updated to the Sheen since the measurements were more consistent...

Re:Great.

[torstenvl]

LULZY newb.

Re:Great.

[mug funky]

how do i convert to Britneys?

Re:Great.

[adamofgreyskull]

Except they didn't do the leg-work. He did. They lifted the facts and some surrounding text from his blog and republished it without even the courtesy of a link by way of attribution. So what if they're facts? They wouldn't have had any idea what the facts were had he not done the work for them. All he wanted was a little courtesy, and they responded by trying to cover up what they'd done. Then they edited again to mock him.

So, even though you think they did nothing wrong by cribbing from him, they obviously think so.

Re:Great.

[DNS-and-BIND]

It's just a hipster being ironic. Don't get your nose bent out of shape about it.

Re:Great.

[snowgirl]

Sheens are on a logarithm scale, compared to Britneys, so it takes a bit of work... I think wikipedia has an article about it.

Re:Great.

[jrumney]

It could be ascertained from the source, and if it hadn't been for the other simple fact allegedly from the same source which was quietly removed from the article at the same time they added the comment about getting it from nslookup, I might give them the benefit of the doubt.

Re:Great.

[black3d]

LOL!

Also, lol @ your sig. I've often thought the same. I've decided that it's a trap and if you click it, you never get 15 mod points again. ;)

Re:Great.

[definate]

Do you know anything more nerdy, than two nobodies arguing over pointless details?

I sure as fuck don't.

This is TRUE news for nerds.

Re:Great.

[DeathElk]

Whilst I'm not overly tall, I truly envy short people - less distance to lift wontons.

Re:Great.

[Anonymous Coward]

I modded this down. Didn't stop it from being greenlighted.

Re:Great.

[dzfoo]

Mmm. You know, I could for some wonton lifting right now. The problem is that I always feel like lifting more again in half an hour.

        -dZ.

Re:Great.

[dzfoo]

Wait! That's truly news by nerds. There's a big difference.

          -dZ.

Re:Great.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, it's not his fault Slashdot thinks his fight with Long Island Press is as important as articles about iPhone 4.

Re:Great.

[definate]

Also for nerds. I like to be kept apprise of nerd fights!

Re:Great.

[delinear]

This is the key thing for me. If they'd just sent him a response saying we understand your point but it's standard practise not to cite sources for pieces like this, even without an official acknowledgement on their page, it'd be fine. The fact that they're acting like they did something wrong and trying to cover it up just makes them look like they either did do something wrong, or that they're just massive idiots.

Re:Great.

[Theaetetus]

First of all they steal his content.

1) Evidence? They visited his blog 6 minutes prior to publication. You're telling me they did that, read it, re-wrote and paraphrased everything, had an editor review it, and publish it within those 6 minutes? You've never worked for a newspaper, huh?

2) Why is it that we rabidly attack people who use the word "steal" in relation to copyright infringement ("It's not stealing! The original material is still there! If I 'stole' it, you wouldn't have it anymore!"), but have no qualms about it here? Hypocrisy?

Re:Great.

[gfreeman]

The issue is that they stole the fact ...

Maybe they stole the text, but you cannot steal a fact that's in the public domain.

Re:Great.

[PReDiToR]

I think it means that stories tagged "slashvertisement" are filtered from all your pages.

As I suspect is the case with GP, and yourself, ABP takes care of the commercials for IBM, Dell, Xerox and HP that used to take up a square of contentless space on the front page before pointing ads to 127.0.0.1.

Re:Great.

[cdrudge]

Maybe they stole the text, but you cannot steal a fact that's in the public domain.

So if anyone does research and determines some type of fact, that gets you out of having to cite your source?

I wonder if Woodward and Bernstein would want credit for the facts they uncovered in Watergate, or if you can just run with everything as your own since it's just facts...

Re:Great.

[gfreeman]

I don't "own" any public domain facts. Barack Obama is POTUS, but do I have to claim to own that fact? Do you need me to cite my source on that?

Feel free to STEAL that fact from me ... not.

Re:Great.

[loshwomp]

Mmm. You know, I could for some wonton lifting right now.

I think you should for some.

Re:Great.

[dzfoo]

Thanks for out my error.

Re:Great.

[spidr_mnky]

"We" is a large set. You're almost certainly right, as people are, generally, hypocrites. There are also certainly some people who would frown on this kind of activity but still not refer to it as theft.

The activities you're comparing are not the same, though. Without getting into which is worse, etc: When someone offers a song for download over the internet, the offer could generally be summed up as, "Here, this is [song name] by [band name]. Enjoy!" and not, "Here is a song I wrote last week. I call it Stairway to Heaven." Even if you don't believe information can be stolen, you might still say they stole credit.

Re:Great.

[Actually, I do RTFA]

A quick domain name lookupwhich is free and public informationwill give you those details, which we acquiredâ"you know, being a newspaper with research capabilities and allâ"of our own accord (although some are trying to claim this information as their own âoediscoveryâ as a way to promote their own personal website! But enough of that)

For a "professional organisation" that is absolutely incredible. First of all they steal his content. Then they edit it to try and make it look like it wasn't stolen. And then they edit it again to actually make fun of the guy they stole it from.

It is incredible. Not because they refused to give attribution to a blog; it's a human interest piece where attribution isn't really necessary. Instead, it's incredible because it is truly horrible writing. I don't normally correct grammar online. If people communicate information effectively, I can overlook grammar. But newspapers should be held to a higher standard, donchathink?

Re:Great.

[Anonymous Coward]

For a "professional organisation" that is absolutely incredible. First of all they steal his content. Then they edit it to try and make it look like it wasn't stolen.

As a 3D artist offering a few quality samples of my work at sites like Sharecg or $0 items at Turbosquid, I've had that happen as well. It's annoying as hell when somebody cops your highly detailed free model and sells it for $50. I don't mind too much the selling since I've released under terms similar to, if not under GPL. Often the re-sellers add extra content like texture sets and .CR2 or .FBX for rigging that saves work when doing animation. But damn, at least give some attribution to who made that original mesh and where the bare-bones model can be obtained. It's only the lack of attribution and saying that their model is original when it's not that pisses me off. (Getting in a legal battle is hard, since I'm essentially a "starving artist" without the means of a big company. Also by shifting edge loops, scales, and chopping up a model, it's possible to throw off the easy evidence of direct copying like vertex or edge order, even though it's visually obvious in similarity. Even if I were to bring it to court I don't care about the money, just put proper attribution on the thing, make a public apology statement, and be done with it.)

I won't name names and remain anonymous, but if you do enough research, you may be able to find a lot of evidence for this in the 3D field and marketplace. (It's not just a problem with the written word and web content.) It's also likely that I'm not the only one getting gypped this way by some bigger names in the 3D content business.

(And you may ask why does a guy annoyed by this give away free models? Sometimes these things lead to future "work for hire" gigs. The biggest market for exposure is when something is free. Same reason why programmers like having their names on open source projects. I tend to not be greedy anyways. Most of the other selling items I've offered are cheaper than ordering a pizza.)

So I can see where this guy has a decent argument, even if it's probably not much in the way of Slashdot material.

Re:Great.

[black3d]

You're telling me they did that, read it, re-wrote and paraphrased everything, had an editor review it, and publish it within those 6 minutes?

'
No, not at all. They re-wrote hardly anything, and then proceeded to make incremental edits over the next couple of hours to try and make their copy/paste job look more original. No editor reviewed it. Editor review is becoming increasingly rare in online news formats. Furthermore, if you're unaware what can be done in 6 minutes of crunch time prior to starting printing, you have never worked for a newspaper. And no presses are involved here. This is online.

2) Why is it that we rabidly attack people who use the word "steal" in relation to copyright infringement ("It's not stealing! The original material is still there! If I 'stole' it, you wouldn't have it anymore!"), but have no qualms about it here? Hypocrisy?

Oh please. "We" don't. You may. I'm happy to use the term "steal" to describe copyright infringement. It's a colloquial usage, that's well understood to mean "take something you don't have permission to take". People who do argue the term are just anal retentives like the individual I'm replying to, whom are usually simply looking for more ways to justify their crimes. Like most criminals.

Re:Great.

[Theaetetus]

You're telling me they did that, read it, re-wrote and paraphrased everything, had an editor review it, and publish it within those 6 minutes?

' No, not at all. They re-wrote hardly anything, and then proceeded to make incremental edits over the next couple of hours to try and make their copy/paste job look more original.

What copy/paste? At best, you can claim they paraphrased and re-wrote, not copy/pasted. The incremental edits are explicitly responding to the accusations after the fact.

No editor reviewed it. Editor review is becoming increasingly rare in online news formats. Furthermore, if you're unaware what can be done in 6 minutes of crunch time prior to starting printing, you have never worked for a newspaper. And no presses are involved here. This is online.

You just argued against yourself - this is crunch time and they had only 6 minutes prior to going live... and this is online, they had no crunch time. We're not talking about a major scoop or breaking news here... but you're still telling me that someone was furiously typing in an effort to get this story out within 6 minutes? What is this, the 24 of blogs?

2) Why is it that we rabidly attack people who use the word "steal" in relation to copyright infringement ("It's not stealing! The original material is still there! If I 'stole' it, you wouldn't have it anymore!"), but have no qualms about it here? Hypocrisy?

Oh please. "We" don't. You may. I'm happy to use the term "steal" to describe copyright infringement. It's a colloquial usage, that's well understood to mean "take something you don't have permission to take". People who do argue the term are just anal retentives like the individual I'm replying to, whom are usually simply looking for more ways to justify their crimes. Like most criminals.

I think it was pretty clear that "we" referred to Slashdot posters. It's a common colloquial usage. It's clear I didn't mean myself, since I was criticizing the practice. Only someone who's anal retentive like the individual I'm replying to would respond with a snippy "I don't, but you may," which is pretty hypocritical when said person is throwing names about.

Re:Great.

[black3d]

What copy/paste? At best, you can claim they paraphrased and re-wrote, not copy/pasted. The incremental edits are explicitly responding to the accusations after the fact.

Only the LAST edit is in response to the accusations. Did you not read the article correctly? Read the part about the picture. They previously had two paragraphs COPY/PASTEd, and then started removing parts which could be obviously identified as coming from an original source. After publishing. It sounds like you actually missed the entire scope of the infraction so are arguing from a different point of view from reality. They didn't merely paraphrase. They copied his page directly, and then edited after publishing, and then edited it further to mock the original writer they stole the content from.

You just argued against yourself - this is crunch time and they had only 6 minutes prior to going live... and this is online, they had no crunch time. We're not talking about a major scoop or breaking news here... but you're still telling me that someone was furiously typing in an effort to get this story out within 6 minutes? What is this, the 24 of blogs?

No, I didn't argue against myself. I corrected two incorrect positions you had. The first incorrect position being that its impossible to push a story through in 6 minutes. It's certainly possible. The second incorrect position being that the story had been held up to the finest editorial rigours, which it clearly had not been. I know you're keeping up with this and are simply arguing for the sake of it.

It's clear I didn't mean myself, since I was criticizing the practice. Only someone who's anal retentive like the individual I'm replying to would respond with a snippy "I don't, but you may," which is pretty hypocritical when said person is throwing names about.

It's clear? On Slashdot? No - most folks around here change their position on any given topic every 3 seconds depending on what they're arguing about. Around here, when Joe Public "steals" music "omg it's not stealing.. its just 1s and 0s... you can't steal information!", yet if Microsoft "steals" some GPL code, "OMG THEY NEED TO BE HUNG.. BASTARDS!".

But anyhow, I carefully avoided saying you supported the practice. I said "are anal retentives like the individual I'm replying to". Not "people who support it like the individual I'm replying to". I'm implying only that you're anal retentive, not that you support the practice. ;)

Duh, its LI

[Anonymous Coward]

As Clemens pointed out, "Never argue with an idiot..."
LI has an abundant idiot supply --- just get off the LIE (great acronym -- who thunk that one up?) and take some other route down the island -- what do you find between the city and the ritzy end? Strip joints, chop shops, the occasional decent deli, and burned out restaurants are what grow from the sand.

Re:Duh, its LI

[vlueboy]

Actually, that also happens in the heart of nearby New York city, though under the covers of a non-english paper of good reputation. There were a couple lines that said "Edit" or something similar and I immediately knew they had stolen it from Wikipedia's spanish page. Googling the first sentence or so confirmed my suspicions.

This is seen as a "victimless" crime where I stand in the sidelines with the bitter knowledge that complaining to the big fish does nothing other than bring undue attention to myself and/or the actual victim of plagiarism... as best case scenario everyone's already read the same plagiarized information so an apology is printed only after the fact and will miss X percentage of the original readers. Content might be removed by the "criminal"* without comment if it is online and you're not lucky... but the scarrier thing that in USA whims might land you and the victim in court to give proof that the material is yours or whatever.

A smaller example of this problem is how impossible it is to kill name/backgroundCheck/credit report scrapers that clone your defunct geocities / Usenet pages and so on. Google, mylife et al make money off bulk-cloning our age, myspace posts, phone numbers and past and present addresses and employers. Since almost nobody hosts personal stuff on their own webservers "protected" by 'no-robots.txt', it's a wild west of "shoot first and inquire later" against webcrawlers. Worse, they provide no useful way to wilfully update bad data or remove unwanted entries, even if they're in housed in your local country.

* Stealing text I own copyright to NOT equally criminal as RIAA's copyright violation standard. Writers are better backed up by USA laws than individual bloggers and copyleft publishers just because cash and publishers+lawyers are a given.

Get even!

[ISurfTooMuch]

You aren't going to be able to make them admit to their plagiarism or post your comment on their site, so forget about that. However, you can make damn sure that, should anyone search for petite giraffes or longislandpress.com, they'll have a good chance of reading about this incident. So go out there and work to get this into Google's search results for one or both of those searches.

Re:Get even!

[gman003]

Step one in that process, of course, being "get on the front page of /."

Re:Get even!

[blankinthefill]

I would think that having a story posted to Slashdot is a pretty good way to go about doing that... .

Re:Get even!

[Inda]

And we did, via the same forum they stole content from.

The BBC and TalkSport have been guilty of lifting thread topics, word games (puns on player names normally) and passing off insightful opinions as their own. No big deal as we often expand their content to the extreme. One day we ran with it.

We post on a football (soccer) forum.

Our "get even" moment was the deliberate posting of player transfer rumour. A rumour started on another forum they obviously have no knowledge of. The Sun printed the rumour a day later and all the other media outlets picked up on it after that. Each one adding a little bit more bullshit to their stories as the day went on.

Their embarrassment was our "get even". Hopefully they'll be less trusting in future and actually create their own content... and maybe they'll feed my unicorn while they're at it.

Re:Get even!

[gfreeman]

So you started a rumour, big whoop. It's their job to report on transfer rumours.

Re:Get even!

[Anonymous Coward]

However, you can make damn sure that, should anyone search for petite giraffes... they'll have a good chance of reading about this incident.

Fucking right! Those sons of bitches will be swamped with calls from angry petite giraffe lovers all over the country!

Attention Whore.

[Virtucon]

So, somebody is worried about somebody plagiarizing their blog about fictional creatures? WTF? What an attention whore!

Re:Attention Whore.

[black3d]

Maybe you haven't had your original content lifted wholesale from your website and then republished by an organisation making a PROFIT off it. I have. It's not cool. They copy-pasted content without attribution (bad enough - you're only meant to do so for illustrative purposes - not as the basis for your article), and then turned around and started mocking the guy they stole it from, whilst still not providing attribution.

If another blogger stole his stuff, it wouldn't be much of a news story. The talentless scum do that on a daily basis. When a news organisation does it, it becomes newsworthy.

Re:Attention Whore.

[SlayerofGods]

Of course this is someone that took the time to debunk 'Petite Lap Giraffes' in the first place; so, is it really so suppressing?
Now maybe if he could take the time to look into a real hard hitting issue like where jack links gets such great footage of big foot or how geico taught a caveman english maybe he'll be on to something worth reading about.

Re:Attention Whore.

[Anonymous Coward]

No they didn't; they arrived at the same conclusion he did and he just assumes they ripped him off.
He has no proof they even knew of his blog other then the fact that he can do a DNS lookup and managed to find the stock photo used in the obvious photoshop? That barely even counts as original research let along something that can be plagiarized.

Re:Attention Whore.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes they did, RTFA! They looked at his blog 10 minutes before they posted their 'article'.

Re:Attention Whore.

[Anonymous Coward]

in defense of the poster above, blogdude buried the lead.

That said, it's okay to rip off facts. No ethical rule to the contrary.

Re:Attention Whore.

[delinear]

I don't know what the editorial life cycle is for an online news site, but 10 minutes seems like a ridiculously short lead time to go from having no story to having a story approved by the journalist's editor (or whoever is responsible for approving content - I don't believe for a second they would just let journalists upload stuff without at least reading to make sure they won't get sued or the guy isn't publishing an elaborate FU resignation message) and published to live. That could quite easily have been whoever was reviewing his story doing a search on the subject and reading a couple of blogs to make sure it all made sense before hitting "approved".

Re:Attention Whore.

[Virtucon]

I agree with your points but not in this case. Also I don't think the "news organization" in this case has much more creds than the blogger who's whining about it. This whole thing sounds like two kids arguing in a school yard over who likes the teacher more. I'm not disagreeing with giving credit where credit is due here, but honestly here I don't see the argument and this guy is just whining to whine.

Re:Attention Whore.

[Virtucon]

LOL, suppressing or surprising? and Jack Links teaching Sasquatch! But I want to see that article! Besides everybody knows the Geico Gecko is really trying to get Sasquatch to get a hair removal treatment.

Re:Attention Whore.

[Quirkz]

So true. Ten minutes before an article is being published, it's in the hands of the last line of defense, getting the final copy edit or fact checking. Is it crazy that a fact checker would google for and visit some sites that might corroborate the things being claimed in an article? Doesn't seem weird to me. If I'm researching stuff, I'll often check multiple sources. This should not be construed to mean that the last page I visited is the sole source of all of my materials.

On the other hand I haven't been in journalism in a few decades, and with budget crunches I also thought they'd thrown out most of the copy editors and fact checkers along with anyone else, so it's impossible to say for sure. Still, a page hit on one site is not proof that the site was the sole source of information.

Looks like commercial infringement

[Maow]

And as such they ought to be (IANAL) liable for a fair amount, similar to how the RIAA has sought many multiples of "damages".

I encourage you to get a free initial consultation with a lawyer. Once they were called out on it and still refused to attribute their story, it should be a slam-dunk to be awarded something financial (whether or not it would be collectible) plus expenses.

Still, that's the only thing they and future infringers understand: monetary penalties.

My 2 worth...

Re:Looks like commercial infringement

[nomadic]

You can't copyright, trademark, or patent a fact. This guy is being ridiculous.

Re:Looks like commercial infringement

[black3d]

No, but you can copyright content. Such as this post for instance. It's now copyrighted. It can be quoted - that falls within fair use. However it's illegal for you to take my post and claim it as your own work.

Re:Looks like commercial infringement

[nomadic]

Ah, but if I were to post on one of MY posts that "quoting other people's slashdot posts is fair use and isn't copyright infringement," you wouldn't have a cause of action. That's the difference here.

Re:Looks like commercial infringement

[camperdave]

You can't copyright, trademark, or patent a fact. This guy is being ridiculous.

True, but you can copyright a story, and when a newspaper copies a story word for word without citation, it is plagiarism. In the newspaper biz, it's a big deal.

Re:Looks like commercial infringement

[nomadic]

But that's not what happened here.

Re:Looks like commercial infringement

[IICV]

He would be acting in a ridiculous manner if he had mentioned taking legal action at any point in the blog post. He didn't. He is merely pointing out the newspaper's unethical actions.

There is nothing ridiculous about saying, "hey, you copied my research, could you at least give me a link back?"

I mean, what do you expect him to do? Roll over and take it without comment? On a blog? Those guys will carefully annotate their most recent dump if they think it'll bring in readers.

Re:Looks like commercial infringement

[camperdave]

But that's not what happened here.

You're right. I misunderstood the complaint. The way he told it, it sounded like they copied him verbatim, which would be a no-no. However, they took his research, validated it themselves, and paraphrased him. Still, a word of acknowledgement would not have been out of order.

Re:Looks like commercial infringement

[hellop2]

Actually you can copyright content. Such as this post for instance. It's now copyrighted. It can be quoted - that falls within fair use. However it's illegal for you to take my post and claim it as your own work.

Copyright 2011 hellop2

Re:Looks like commercial infringement

[black3d]

lol - that was the reply i was expecting.. took long enough! ;)

Re:Looks like commercial infringement

[delinear]

If we should take anything from this story, it's that we should be grateful that journalists actually thought to independently validate information they found on a random blog instead of just immediately posting them as fact.

Re:Looks like commercial infringement

[delinear]

I guess what he could do is just reprint every story the news site prints from now on, slightly reworded and passed off as his own work. If they're saying that's perfectly acceptable behaviour then surely it works both ways.

Re:Looks like commercial infringement

[gfreeman]

Hear hear. Mod points if I had 'em.

USI and copypasta

[Anonymous Coward]

USI and copypasta all rolled up with some righteous indignation and old paper media. nom nom nom nom........

Wait...

[myrmidon666]

Isn't that what most blogs/news sites do anyway?

Mmm, ironing.

[trawg]

If a blog takes a newspaper story and rewrites it as their own, it's fair use, but if a newspaper does it....

Re:Mmm, ironing.

[MishgoDog]

Actually, I'm fairly sure that to claim the 'fair use' argument, the original article has to be fully attributed. Which is this blogger's gripe in the first place...

Re:Mmm, ironing.

[Cigarra]

If a blog takes a newspaper story and rewrites it as their own, it's fair use, but if a newspaper does it....

No it's not, it's still plagiarizing and mediocrity. Only that "professional" is expected to display much more professionalism than amateur bloggers. And if that's not the case, the deserve to be exposed as what they are: mediocres.

Re:Mmm, ironing.

[cpt kangarooski]

Actually, I'm fairly sure that to claim the 'fair use' argument, the original article has to be fully attributed.

No, attribution is not required for fair use.

Re:Mmm, ironing.

[Demonantis]

I'm pretty sure you can't copyright knowledge so the point is moot. The actual gripe is the blogger wanting recognition. What the blogger has managed to do is paste the issue on a website where people like to talk about copyright. So you can cue the NRTFA comments that have nothing to do with the article. And they paraphrased so the only place, I have seen, that would really care about it is academic journals.

Re:Mmm, ironing.

[LambdaWolf]

Actually, I'm fairly sure that to claim the 'fair use' argument, the original article has to be fully attributed.

Nope, citation actually has next to nothing to do with it, at least under U.S. law. This is a critical difference between copyright infringement (a legal matter) and plagiarism (an ethical convention held among academics and journalists), and is commonly misunderstood.

Re:Mmm, ironing.

[mysidia]

No, attribution is not required for fair use.

If there is a source, Attribution/credit of the source is required for it to not be plagiarism.

The article is not about copyright law; it's about professional misbehavior by journalists.

Re:Mmm, ironing.

[cpt kangarooski]

I agree. But the previous question was about copyright, and copyright infringement and plagiarism are not the same thing.

Re:Mmm, ironing.

[Jason Levine]

If I were to take a newspaper's investigative report and re-report the facts on my blog making it seem like I did the investigating personally, that would be plagiarism. In the beginning we had a blogger and a newspaper which may or may not have been guilty of plagiarism. Their actions afterwards, though, seemed like the actions of a guilty party, not an innocent one.

no worries

[Anonymous Coward]

Now the righteous armies of slashdot will invade the long island press and avenge the blogger who has been wronged.

Newspapers don't understand the internet?

[sourcery]

How could you expect journalists (newspapers, TV, magazines,..) to understand how the internet works, when they lack any substantive understanding of how just about anything works?

Re:Newspapers don't understand the internet?

[Seumas]

No, you see -- they're better than the rest of us.

Some guy with a blog just gets his information and stories from another guy with a blog.

Newspaper journalists and news anchors and radio news people get their information and stories from daily newspapers and the AP and regurgitate it. *Totally* different. . . .*totally*!

Re:Newspapers don't understand the internet?

[hedwards]

Newspaper journalists typically get those stories off the AP wire service, something which the paper pays for and contributes to in order to use the content. Typically you'll see at the top of such stories a byline crediting the AP as the source.

TV and Radio is a little different, I'm not familiar enough to know how they handle or don't handle that situation.

Re:Newspapers don't understand the internet?

[Seumas]

Yeah, the AP service is a paid-for service, but it's still an issue of "journalists" not doing research, investigation, or any original work anymore. 99% of what you consume news-wise originats elsewhere and is merely being parroted. Almost everyone in all forms of the news business are *REPORTERS* . . . meaning that they report what they read on an article linked from drudgereport or the AP or another news paper. As opposed to a "journalist" who, presumably, explores and writes their own stories.

And in that light, there's not much of a difference between most news persons and bloggers.

fair use

[Anonymous Coward]

Out of curiosity, if it's a free newspaper, couldn't they just argue fair use because they're educating their readers? I mean, it worked for that portland group against righthaven. And that group didn't have to credit the newspaper did they? Just ripped the article word for word.

Re:fair use

[Seumas]

But did they claim to have done the research within and to have authored the piece?

House Hippo

[Anonymous Coward]

Meh, the commercials kind of ripped off the old House Hippo classic

Or maybe they did their research?

[Peganthyrus]

Why yes, obviously the only place the newspaper could have discovered this is your blog. Nobody involved in as non-technical field as the *press* could ever have heard of whois, or the many web interfaces to that command. You are right in assuming that you are the only person who was curious about this ad campaign to do even the most rudimentary amount of research.

Unless you have logs showing hits from IPs that resolve as being at the paper, I think Occam's Razor applies.

Re:Or maybe they did their research?

[Em Adespoton]

I guess you didn't read the article; he had content on his blog that showed up nowhere else, and they copied it verbatim. He really should produce the logs though.

Along the same lines, doing a search for Missy Yates will show you that she normally does cooking articles. My guess is that she hadn't heard of whois until she read the blog.

No matter which way you look at it though, the paper's handling of the incident is extremely unprofessional. Her "article" (and its updates) read more like a vanity blog than the original blogger's.

Re:Or maybe they did their research?

[dcollins]

"Along the same lines, doing a search for Missy Yates will show you that she normally does cooking articles."

Earlier, I was joking about maybe this was Judith Griggs from last year's (similarly petty, rub-it-in-your-face) copyright infringement case in "Cooks Source" magazine. Hmmmm....

Re:Or maybe they did their research?

[Loomismeister]

Why yes, obviously the only place the newspaper could have discovered this is your blog. Nobody involved in as non-technical field as the *press* could ever have heard of whois, or the many web interfaces to that command. You are right in assuming that you are the only person who was curious about this ad campaign to do even the most rudimentary amount of research.

Unless you have logs showing hits from IPs that resolve as being at the paper, I think Occam's Razor applies.

It turns out he does have logs showing hits from the LIP 10 minutes before they published their own story.

Re:Or maybe they did their research?

[c_sd_m]

Unless you have logs showing hits from IPs that resolve as being at the paper, I think Occam's Razor applies.

But they do:
Update: Since someone asked about my server logs, the answer is: yes, I checked them out. On March 28 (the date their article was published) I did log one request for favicon.ico that originated at mail.longislandpress.com. Here it is:
XXX.XXX.XXX.XX – - [28/Mar/2011:20:56:31 +0000] “GET /favicon.ico HTTP/1.0 304 – “-” “Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1; rv:2.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/4.0
It was served with an HTTP 304 code (meaning “unmodified”) which suggests the favicon was already in someone’s cache. That means the page had previously been loaded. The timestamp is 20:56:31 UTC, meaning it was 4:56PM in New York. The timestamp on the original Long Island Press article is 5:02PM.
To put it in a simpler way: someone from longislandpress.com visited my site less than 10 minutes before they published the article in question. I have to admit I didn’t expect the timestamps to be so close to each other, but there they are!
Update: I kept going through the logs, and what do you know I noticed this entry, which originated from the same IP address as the previous entry:
XXX.XXX.XXX.XX - - [29/Mar/2011:19:40:30 +0000] "GET /blog/2011/03/total-bummer-longislandpress-com-plagiarism-and-coverup/ HTTP/1.0" 200 13398 "http://www.longislandpress.com/[redacted wordpress admin.php]" "Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1; rv:2.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/4.0"

Re:Or maybe they did their research?

[Rary]

From 4:56 to 5:02 is six minutes. This guy thinks that someone visited his site at 4:56 pm and had time to read the page, decide to write an article, write the article, proofread it, send it to the editor, and post it, all in 6 minutes.

He's a looney.

Re:Or maybe they did their research?

[Moses48]

It was served with an HTTP 304 code (meaning “unmodified”) which suggests the favicon was already in someone’s cache. That means the page had previously been loaded.

This means they were going back to check the blog before publishing and it hadn't changed. This could happen from a laptop that had previously read his blog at home and then at work they opened up their laptop to verify they stole his ideas correctly.

Re:Or maybe they did their research?

[Anonymous Coward]

Since the logs indicate that it wasn't the first visit, it seems more likely that they checked the blog a few minutes before the article went up to verify the content. This doesn't indicate whether the extent of their research was a cut and paste from a blog, but it does show that the blog in question was likely a primary source used to check the facts stated in the article.

Re:Or maybe they did their research?

[Peganthyrus]

I read both his posts and the newspaper article; the only common point of data at the time I saw them was the result of a whois. His additional research into the headers of the image wasn't cited anywhere on the paper's site except in the comment he left on the article.

Re:Or maybe they did their research?

[Peganthyrus]

Ah, okay then, maybe he actually does have a beef here. Without any mention of the logs it really just sounded like he was assuming that it is entirely impossible for anyone at the newspaper to have the faintest clue about this very basic bit of Internet researching.

THIS is "original research"!?

[Dahamma]

I'm sorry, I just can't take this "feud" seriously, it's a fight between two imbeciles to see who is more clueless or gullible. And Ian is winning that fight hands down.

Can I get credit for debunking this myth 5 seconds after I saw the website, given that it's COMPLETELY OBVIOUS to 90% of the population that it's exactly the same theme as the DirecTV commercials that have been inundating network TV ever since the Superbowl?

slashdot publishes claim of plagiarism...

[MichaelKristopeit408]

the claimed "research" consisted of viewing the jpeg exif data, which included a stock photography company and photo id, and then viewing the referenced stock photo, which looked just like the image with a tiny giraffe less a tiny giraffe.

anyone else that references a published index to a published database is "plagiarizing research"? are you joking me?

slashdot = stagnated.

Re:WTF Taco?

[Anonymous Coward]

Suggest you not become or pretend to be a lawyer. Likewise suggest you try and understand what plagiarism is. While the facts are not protected, their presentation is. Had they stuck to just the facts (apologies to Dragnet) there would be no grounds for argument...

Tone

[Anonymous Coward]

It's seems obvious to me from the defensive tone that she is lying.

Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[gordguide]

Although the original article has been altered somewhat so direct comparison is impossible, I took the time to compare the two blog entries; one, his original entry on the subject, and two, his comments with direct quotes from the article.

Nowhere do they lift his words in the article. Not even one sentence, not even a half a sentence. So, no copyright infringement (at even the most generous definition of the word) and no plagerism. The news author just did some research and wrote an article.

This isn't a college paper, this is a newspaper article, and a brief one at that. (One could argue the newspaper version is a vast improvement, actually).

It may well be certain facts were gleaned from his blog entry .... facts that could have been independently verified by the news author. Verifiable facts do not enjoy copyright protection (deliberate lies inter-spread with facts do, believe it or not, that's how they copyright the phone book ... but if the alleged offender omits the lies, you're case is over).

That leaves lifting his words verbatim, which also didn't happen. Case dismissed.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[snowgirl]

Although the original article has been altered somewhat so direct comparison is impossible, I took the time to compare the two blog entries; one, his original entry on the subject, and two, his comments with direct quotes from the article.

Nowhere do they lift his words in the article. Not even one sentence, not even a half a sentence. So, no copyright infringement (at even the most generous definition of the word) and no plagerism. The news author just did some research and wrote an article.

This isn't a college paper, this is a newspaper article, and a brief one at that. (One could argue the newspaper version is a vast improvement, actually).

It may well be certain facts were gleaned from his blog entry .... facts that could have been independently verified by the news author. Verifiable facts do not enjoy copyright protection (deliberate lies inter-spread with facts do, believe it or not, that's how they copyright the phone book ... but if the alleged offender omits the lies, you're case is over).

That leaves lifting his words verbatim, which also didn't happen. Case dismissed.

Nester's Map & Guide Corp. v. Hagstrom Map Co., 796 F.Supp. 729, E.D.N.Y., 1992, a United States federal court found that copyright traps are not themselves protectable by copyright. There, the court stated: "[t]o treat 'false' facts interspersed among actual facts and represented as actual facts as fiction would mean that no one could ever reproduce or copy actual facts without risk of reproducing a false fact and thereby violating a copyright . . . . If such were the law, information could never be reproduced or widely disseminated." (Id. at 733)

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/07/hot-news-doctrine-defeats-aggregator-site/

You might want to read this.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[cavePrisoner]

Verifiable facts do not enjoy copyright protection (deliberate lies inter-spread with facts do, believe it or not, that's how they copyright the phone book ... but if the alleged offender omits the lies, you're case is over).

Not true, at least in the US. In Feist v. Rural it was ruled that a phone book is simply a collection of fact, and not creative content. The particular phone book in question did have fake entries in it, which is how the copying was identified. The point is to identify and prove infringement with fake entries, not to manufacture justification for copyright.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feist_v._Rural
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fictitious_entry

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[Mike610544]

but if the alleged offender omits the lies, you're case is over

That's clever introducing an error that will be identifiable when someone reposts your +4 comment on the next article about plagiarism.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[the_raptor]

Plagiarism is not about "lifting sentences" it is about presenting ideas/facts from another source as if they are your own. Thoroughly re-writing an essay so that none of the sentences resemble the original IS STILL PLAGIARISM.

In fact in my discipline (psychology) we are expected to re-write sentences from cited sources instead of just copying them.

Plagiarism is plagiarism regardless of where it occurs. And yes it is standard practice in journalism to cite your sources even if you are basically ripping off their content.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[onefriedrice]

Well here's my take on the matter. Although the original article has been altered somewhat so direct comparison is impossible, I took the time to compare the two blog entries; one, his original entry on the subject, and two, his comments with direct quotes from the article. Nowhere do they lift his words in the article. Not even one sentence, not even a half a sentence. So, no copyright infringement (at even the most generous definition of the word) and no plagerism. The news author just did some research and wrote an article. This isn't a college paper, this is a newspaper article, and a brief one at that. (One could argue the newspaper version is a vast improvement, actually). It may well be certain facts were gleaned from his blog entry .... facts that could have been independently verified by the news author. Verifiable facts do not enjoy copyright protection (deliberate lies inter-spread with facts do, believe it or not, that's how they copyright the phone book ... but if the alleged offender omits the lies, you're case is over). That leaves lifting his words verbatim, which also didn't happen. Case dismissed.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Plagiarism is not the same as copyright infringement. It is plagiarism to take credit for other peoples ideas, regardless if this is defined as copyright infringement or not by law.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[Zelucifer]

Case Dismissed? Great! Let me just look up the case number in the docket... wait, there doesn't seem to have been a lawsuit? My legal counsel is suggesting that this might have been a question of "morals" and "ethics".

The newspaper's update seems to make it pretty clear that the author ripped off the blog post, and rather than give than linking to that blog, decided to act affronted that research performed by a third party deserved some modicum of respect. If the author had responded and even gone so far as to actively deny and politely deny the claims, I might be more willing to side with you.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[Anonymous Coward]

plagerism

The correct spelling of this word is in the title of the fucking story.... you really have no excuse here.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[Anonymous Coward]

This isn't a college paper, this is a newspaper article, and a brief one at that. (One could argue the newspaper version is a vast improvement, actually).

It may well be certain facts were gleaned from his blog entry .... facts that could have been independently verified by the news author. Verifiable facts do not enjoy copyright protection (deliberate lies inter-spread with facts do, believe it or not, that's how they copyright the phone book ... but if the alleged offender omits the lies, you're case is over).

That leaves lifting his words verbatim, which also didn't happen. Case dismissed.

I would agree with you, if it was printed article. But being a web one, I prefer and expect to have links where possible. Thus when they chose not to do so and react like that...

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[Mr. Underbridge]

Nowhere do they lift his words in the article. Not even one sentence, not even a half a sentence. So, no copyright infringement (at even the most generous definition of the word) and no plagerism

Direct lifting of actual text isn't required for 'plagerism'. Even half-addled middle school students have the 'copy the article and change all the words' trick down cold. It's still plagiarism.

The news author just did some research and wrote an article.

I'm pretty certain you don't know what 'research' is. Research entails collecting original sources, citing them, and drawing your own conclusions. Taking someone else's work and re-writing it without adding your own thought, and without citing the original is definitely not research. There's another word for taking someone else's ideas and claiming them as your own. Starts with a 'P'.

Verifiable facts do not enjoy copyright protection

Copyright violation and plagiarism aren't equivalent, and copyright isn't the issue here. The definition for plagiarism is looser and focuses on the original thought concept over the 'verifiable facts'.

Considering your response, I think some things are clear. You have no idea what plagiarism is. Certainly if you had ever been involved in original research, your sophomoric take on what it entails would have been corrected by your advisor. Doing what you're defending in an acadamic research environment would certainly result in an ethics violation and potentially dismissal. You also don't have a firm grasp on the boundaries between copyright and plagiarism, nor how they relate to each other, and when it's important to invoke one or the other.

I normally wouldn't respond to a post like this, but apparently a few mods have similar confusion and have promoted it to a level it doesn't deserve.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[dcollins]

"So, no copyright infringement (at even the most generous definition of the word) and no plagerism."

(a) You seem to not realize that there's a distinction between "plagiarism" and "copyright infringement".
(b) You seem to be unable to even spell "plagiarism".

So I would say that your expertise on the subject is suspect.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not a copyright case. It's a plagiarism case. If they did the research independently, and uncovered those facts, they're fine. If they saw that he'd found those facts, verified them themselves, then presented it as their own research ... that's plagiarism.

Unfortunately, plagiarism isn't illegal. (To be honest, I think plagiarism laws would benefit society more than copyright.)

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[Anonymous Coward]

and if that were at issue in this case, you might have a point. I think you just copied and pasted that quote for dramatic effect without knowing understanding the issue at hand. a DNS record is a fact, it is not the same thing as a hand compiled cross street reference.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[snowgirl]

Let me quote solely the important information that I was debating:

(deliberate lies inter-spread with facts do, believe it or not, that's how they copyright the phone book ... but if the alleged offender omits the lies, you're case is over)

In the US, regardless of if someone copies your fake facts, you do not enjoy any copyright protection on a collection of facts.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[delinear]

plagerism

The correct spelling of this word is in the title of the fucking story.... you really have no excuse here.

Unless he didn't want to be accused of copying?

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[Anonymous Coward]

In fact in my discipline (psychology) we are expected to re-write sentences from cited sources instead of just copying them.

So, changing the order of words makes it original research? I really do not get this - if you give attribution to your source, why should you need to change the wording? Oh... psychology, never mind.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[Theaetetus]

I'm pretty certain you don't know what 'research' is. Research entails collecting original sources, citing them, and drawing your own conclusions. Taking someone else's work and re-writing it without adding your own thought, and without citing the original is definitely not research.

I'm not convinced they didn't do original research that resulted in the same conclusions. The "research" here involved getting the properties for the image, and doing a Google search, so we're not talking major first sources. What evidence do we have that the newspaper actually took his work? The fact that they visited his site 6 minutes prior to publication... If it was an hour, perhaps, but 6 minutes? That article was already written and in the hands of an editor.

At best, it's mere circumstantial evidence, not definitive evidence of plagiarism.

Re:Move along ... nothing to see here folks ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Plagiarism is not about "lifting sentences" it is about presenting ideas/facts from another source as if they are your own.

You can't own a fact. If you could own a fact, you could have a copyright on the fact (which you can't). Therefore, you can't plagiarize a fact.

There are lots of ways you could plagiarize the presentation of that fact, though. And if the fact is untrue, it becomes an idea, in which case you'll come to the conclusion that citing your sources is a safer bet to avoid plagiarism.

That raises the question, is plagiarism related to intent? You probably wouldn't cite a source for saying that the world is flat if scholars and mathematicians and encyclopedias are all of one mind on the matter, but when the world is proven to be round, does that mean you committed an act of plagiarism because you were parroting someone else's idea? You believed the idea to be a fact. Everyone who read your papyrus scroll believed it was fact because it didn't stray from their world view, and so it couldn't be interpreted as an original idea of yours.

Re:WTF Taco?

[nomadic]

IAAL; this is ridiculous. The presentation was not taken. All this guy is complaining about are the facts.

Independent verification

[Anonymous Coward]

It's entirely possible, and entirely acceptable in my mind, that the paper wanted to do the story, found your interesting post, and then independently verified the information, which agreed with your findings. If you found it, so could they. It's all fine.

Re:Independent verification

[Em Adespoton]

It's entirely possible, and entirely acceptable in my mind, that the paper wanted to do the story, found your interesting post, and then independently verified the information, which agreed with your findings. If you found it, so could they. It's all fine.

I don't think he had a problem with that... he had a problem with how they handled it (didn't mention how they found it, and then removed the bit that nobody else mentions, THEN added a snarky comment about him).

A professional journalist would have posted his response, and responded to it with a "yes, we did come across your article while doing our research; thank you for assisting us!" and left it at that. Or, if they didn't see his blog article, they would have done the same but responded to the comment with "we're sorry, we found that information by doing x; I'm glad we're not the only ones to have discovered that however!"

Journalists should never treat the public as their enemy, and they should never edit articles in the heat of the moment. Newspapers should never let a journalist edit an article without it going through an editor first -- even online. If this article's changes were vetted both time, it's shame on the newspaper editor, not just the author.

Stating Facts not Plagiarism

[Roger W Moore]

Just like writing about Shakespeare and including metaphors interpreted by someone else isn't plagiarism, right?

Wrong. That would be presenting another's ideas as your own. However presenting facts gleaned elsewhere is not plagiarism. So if the article has said words to the effect of "we know they are not real because look they use this stock footage photograph" that is not plagiarism because they are reporting knowledge gained from elsewhere, not someone else's thoughts or ideas. Even if they claim that they discovered the photo is is still not plagiarism - that would just be a lie.

As far as facts are concerned it is not plagiarism to repeat them. However it is good practice (and in science essential) to cite the sources of such information but newspapers typically do not do this because journalists use many sources and it would clutter and confuse the article to have multiple citations everywhere, at least in print, online they could, and arguably should, do this....but not doing so does not make it plagiarism anymore than I plagiarize J.J. Thomson if I mention an electron in a scientific paper without a citation to his discovery paper.

Re:Stating Facts not Plagiarism

[jdpars]

You really need to read more academic (probably focus on literature) rules on plagiarism. They're pretty strict, and if you can't show your original thought, and what you wrote is the same as what someone else wrote, it's plagiarism. Journalism has a nice little habit of avoiding academic rules, though, because they actually get paid and can use that money for lawyers.

Re:Stating Facts not Plagiarism

[MokuMokuRyoushi]

Would that still hold true if you copied a paragraph from his paper word-for-word? I'm asking, not being sarcastic, because I want to know what your feeling is on the subject. The newspaper, Long Island, copied his work directly in one paragraph, though altered it later when he called them out on it.

Re:Stating Facts not Plagiarism

[Anonymous Coward]

So THAT's why big-money applied research always seems so unoriginal!

Re:Stating Facts not Plagiarism

[digitig]

The rules are pretty strict, but as Baigent and Lee discovered they don't extend to (supposed) facts. Had they used his actual words he would have a case but they don't seem to have done that. And anyway, the academic rules are not the law. A failure to attribute that might get you into trouble on a term paper would probably still be entirely legal.

Re:Stating Facts not Plagiarism

[digitig]

I can't see that -- which paragraph did they copy word-for-word? I can't see the paragraph they edited out in the blog post.

Re:Stating Facts not Plagiarism

[Anonymous Coward]

Journalism has a nice little habit of avoiding academic rules, though, because they actually get paid and can use that money for lawyers.

Actually, journalism manages to avoid academic rules by not being part of an academic institution. The lawyers are largely unnecessary since no laws are broken.

Re:Stating Facts not Plagiarism

[i-linux123]

It sounds similar to huffingtonpost exclusively uses other newspaper's articles.

Re:Stating Facts not Plagiarism

[Roger W Moore]

You really need to read more academic (probably focus on literature) rules on plagiarism.

I am an academic so I am very familiar with the rules! Literature is a particularly bad example when talking about facts because that is primarily a subjective discipline and deals far more in opinion rather than fact. If we consider physics then I can easily state in a paper that "top quarks decay primarily into b quarks" without having to cite the first paper that measured the branching ratio, although I might do so if I thought that it might be a contentious claim without the link to the research showing it to be true.

News at 11.....

[Anonymous Coward]

Guy with no idea about how media works complains that media has no idea how internet works.

Re:WTF Taco?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey jackass, he didn't make a "legal claim" he just stated that they "borrowed" his fact checking without acknowledging the source.

Re:WTF Taco?

[hedwards]

You might want to tone down the libel yourself.

May I point out

[Anonymous Coward]

That the subject of this hubbub, the Direct TV viral marketing campaign, is actually incredibly more interesting than any of the people or interests in this sotry. I actually applaud Direct TV for making the giraffe site. It's very clever, and clearly they are using some great special effects for their "live" video and photos. It's actually very funny. Viral videos have no effect on me when it comes to actually making any purchase (as far as I know) but I do generally find very clever marketing campaigns something of interest.

I had seen the commercials out here in San Francisco with the mini-giraffe; I did not realize they went so far as to create a site to imply you could BUY the mini-giraffes. Pretty funny.

Everything else associated with this story is stupid as hell.

Re:WTF Taco?

[TRRosen]

the truth is an absolute defense for Libel and the guy is a Dumbass so i think im ok.

Re:WTF Taco?

[snowgirl]

IAAL; this is ridiculous. The presentation was not taken. All this guy is complaining about are the facts.

I have to call up to what someone else above said, there is no legal obligation on the newspaper's part here, but that doesn't mean that there is no ethical or moral obligation.

you're almost right...

[dAzED1]

"What ended up happening perfectly illustrates that newspapers just don't understand how the Internet works "

The minor detail that you missed is that it's not the newspaper that doesn't get "how the internet works." You're suggesting instead that they learn about plagarism, yet that is - in fact - how the internet works.

Re:WTF Taco?

[hedwards]

The truth is a defense for libel, but you have to prove that you're posting the truth. I don't think that you can do that, because the article definitely does not reflect what you've said.

Send it off to ...

[rac44]

Let's refer this puppy to the Poynter Center, hm?

Re:WTF Taco?

[Anonymous Coward]

This guy has no basis for his claims. The newspaper however does have a rock solid case for Libel. Dumbass.

This is like claiming someone plagiarized your report on George Washington because they said he was the first president and that was obviously copied from your writings.

Not really, you don't need a source for information that is considered to be common knowledge. I don't think that the information that was used can be considered commonly known.

Re:WTF Taco?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually its more like saying they plagiarized your report on George Washington because you said that George Washington preferred busty asian women due to some highly obscure information you found.

Conspiracy Theory?

[DavidD_CA]

What if ALL this.... the original video... the blog posting... the plagerized article in some obscure newspaper... and the backlash that followed..... were ALL part of the marketing campaign?

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[Anonymous Coward]

Then it was a horrible failure. I didn't bother to RTFA and I merely skimmed the summary. The comments make it sound like some blogger thinks they own facts and nobody knows if the paper researched them on their own, so I'm going to have to consider this a he-said/she-said kind of thing and go back to not giving a damn.

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[Anonymous Coward]

What if there never was a Daryl?

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[Anonymous Coward]

obviously you have no idea how marketing works

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[echucker]

Then you'd think they could do better than the Long Island Press. They need to reach a wider audience.

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[klapaucjusz]

Hanlon's razor.

--jch

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[Anonymous Coward]

You may have a point. I'm skeptical a large number of people thought the tiny giraffe was real.

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[Anonymous Coward]

Are the facts - that the /. summary links to the advertiser's website and the blog article, supposedly about debunking the existence of tiny giraffes(!), links twice to said website within the opening paragraph - adequately explained by stupidity?

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[Anonymous Coward]

certainly part of a marketing campaign

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[Anonymous Coward]

What if ALL this.... the original video... the blog posting... the plagerized article in some obscure newspaper... and the backlash that followed..... were ALL part of the marketing campaign?

Why, they might even be posting comments on Slashdot! And then replying to them as AC!

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[Yaur]

hes got the logs to prove it.

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[geekoid]

It would be awesome.

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[Anonymous Coward]

What if ALL this.... the original video... the blog posting... the plagerized article in some obscure newspaper... and the backlash that followed..... were ALL part of the marketing campaign?

Then we are doomed.

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[DavidD_CA]

Yet here we are, discussing it on Slashdot.

If their market was 100,000 single men living in their parents' basements, they've succeeded.

Re:Conspiracy Theory?

[Anonymous Coward]

And you are part of it!

Re:WTF Taco?

[TRRosen]

Proof
This guy has no basis for his claims.(the only similarity between the two articles is the topic covered)
The newspaper however does have a rock solid case for Libel.( he accused them of Plagiarism which isn't true(see above))
Dumbass.(see any page on his blog)

Re:WTF Taco?

[nomadic]

Honestly, there might be some SLIGHT moral obligation to give him credit, but it's not even that strong. Finding/figuring out a fact first doesn't give you some right to that fact. Newspaper reporters will get information from each other all the time.

Re:WTF Taco?

[snowgirl]

Honestly, there might be some SLIGHT moral obligation to give him credit, but it's not even that strong. Finding/figuring out a fact first doesn't give you some right to that fact. Newspaper reporters will get information from each other all the time.

Consider an investigative report though... if one news source took the facts and such from that report and presented it as their own, without really kind of indicating that someone else is doing it, it seems just kind of bad form to me.

However, arguing moral obligations and such are pretty much nearly impossible... all we can argue is that there should have been a note in a bibliography... and there is little that actually means anyways... journalists don't usually publish bibliographies.

Not the First Time This Has Happened

[laughingman4929]

I simply googled a few lines from some of her other posts, and saw that has happened before. For Example googling "Michelle and their two-year-old daughter are dragged into the fray, the No" from her article http://www.longislandpress.com/2011/03/13/no-impact-man-screening-panel-discussion-march-13/ Pulls up a summary from this site, which was published months earlier. http://bkfreestore.tumblr.com/post/1336085827/no-impact-man-an-outdoor-film-screening-with-colin

Re:Not the First Time This Has Happened

[turtledawn]

Someone mod this up, please.

Re:Not the First Time This Has Happened

[Yaur]

Wow! Its pretty damning when you copy the grammatical errors.

Re:Not the First Time This Has Happened

[unitron]

Unless Missy Yates actually wrote that copy for the Brooklyn Free Store, that's flat out plagarism, unless the BFS lifted it from somewhere else where she had written it, but I suspect that those words come from a press packet distributed by whoever's behind this guy's movie.

And sure enough...

http://www.noimpactdoc.com/about.php

The following copypasta is taken directly from the above mentioned site.

Colin Beavan decides to completely eliminate his personal impact on the environment for the next year.

It means eating vegetarian, buying only local food, and turning off the refrigerator. It also means no elevators, no television, no cars, busses, or airplanes, no toxic cleaning products, no electricity, no material consumption, and no garbage.

No problem – at least for Colin – but he and his family live in Manhattan. So when his espresso-guzzling, retail-worshipping wife Michelle and their two-year-old daughter are dragged into the fray, the No Impact Project has an unforeseen impact of its own.

Laura Gabbert and Justin Schein's film provides an intriguing inside look into the experiment that became a national fascination and media sensation, while examining the familial strains and strengthened bonds that result from Colin and Michelle’s struggle with their radical lifestyle change.

So either Yates wrote the above copy and recycled it at LIP, or she's a you-know-what-ist.

Re:Not the First Time This Has Happened

[Yaur]

never mind... the original source (probably for both) is the films website

Re:Not the First Time This Has Happened

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a rewriting of a press release. Depending on the context in which that article showed up on the printed page (was it in the events listing, with all the other generically written events, or a separate article?), I may cut her some slack -- in this instance.

Re:Not the First Time This Has Happened

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's some more results from google.

Most searches provide no results, which indicates that Yates write her original texts at least most of the time. I find several instances where a single sentence is identical to one found on a celebrity news website, but the rest of the text is original. This merely indicates that she tends to find her inspiration for articles from loads of different celebrity news websites. Below are the most suspicious cases that I've found.

Not quite plagiarism (right?), she's merely reposting the event description without changing a single word (but not referencing her source either):
http://www.bookrevue.com/SusanLucci.html (original)
http://www.longislandpress.com/2011/03/28/susan-lucci-coming-to-huntington-book-revue-march-30/ (yates)

Couldn't find a time stamp, so this might as well be the blog copying Yates words:
http://talkingnewsreleases.com/2011/03/29/what-do-you-think-about-the-wwe-using-real-life-issues-in-kayfabe-storylines/ (blog)
http://www.longislandpress.com/2011/03/28/lady-gaga-born-this-day-happy-birthday-lady-gaga/ (yates)

Again, a complete repost of event description (without reference):
http://www.liunet.edu/CWPost/About/News/Press-Releases/2011/March/CWP-PR-Mar8-2011.aspx (original)
http://www.longislandpress.com/2011/03/28/long-island-vegetable-orchestra-to-perform-at-c-w-post-march-30/ (yates)

A funny example of Yates text ending up in the middle of a wikipedia excerpt:
http://teamlst.com/trends/vegan-diet/ (automatic page thing - who does this stuff?! It looks like a robot trying to learn what veganism is)
http://www.longislandpress.com/2011/03/25/vegan-diet-vegan-snacks-that-dont-suck/ (yates)

Yates copies parts of a press release and changes some words (without reference to source):
http://www.kioli.org/longisland/announcement/dark-sky-advocate-honored-as-long-island-environmentalist-of-the-year/ (probable original)
http://www.longislandpress.com/2011/03/27/dark-sky-advocated-honored-as-li-environmentalist-of-the-year/ (yates)

Uncertain what this should be labeled as, check the links and think for yourself:
http://www.tmz.com/2011/03/25/teen-mom-fight-jenelle-evans-not-pressing-charges-punching-north-carolina-shoving-da-investigation/10/ (TMZ)
http://community.babycenter.com/post/a26980869/jenelle_fist_fight_caught_on_tape?cpg=2&csi=2321083010&pd=1 (only exact phrasing found)
http://www.longislandpress.com/2011/03/25/jenelle-evans-fight-birtany-truett-not-pressing-charges/ (yates)

I love copying. Copying is great. Copy as much as you want. Just give credit.
I did this work because I have an exam tomorrow and this gave me a (poor) excuse not to study for it. Back to the books now, I guess...

Re:WTF Taco?

[Zorque]

The guy stated what he believes to be the truth too. And the evidence is piling up that you're a stupid piece of shit, so I'll go ahead and claim that as truth until you prove otherwise.

Re:WTF Taco?

[Anonymous Coward]

TRRosen you are the dumbass! Where did you go to law school? When did you pass the NY Bar? There is no libel here. Ian restated facts as they occurred and added his opinion. No libel. Long Island Press changing their original article would be viewed by most judges as an admission of plagiarism. So just how do you know Missy Yates? I am guessing you also live on Long Island. Loser.

Feedback!

[wahming]

Let the people who matter know - their fans and readers. http://www.facebook.com/board.php?uid=63558643546

Public backlash only happens when the part of the public who matters know about it.

Stop whining

[Anonymous Coward]

Share more. If you want the copyright police to tax your school note books, doodles and bed time songs to your children just go on like this. Ideas should not be exploited. Write a book and you are protected. Write a blog and publish it immediately and you really did not try to package and sell it did you?

Re:Stop whining

[kimvette]

I'd like to see you use this argument in reverse, in respect to what the rag The New York Times has been pulling:

Share more. If you want the copyright police to tax your school note books, doodles and bed time songs to your children just go on like this. Ideas should not be exploited. Write a book and you are protected. Write a an online "newspaper article" and publish it immediately and you really did not try to package and sell it did you?

One phrase: "DRM takedown"

[niftymitch]

If you feel strongly issue a DRM take down. ;-)

My guess is that you have to be clevar to catch them
at the act. You also need to post some fare rules
in a fair way on your blog and add a link to your
copyright and terms at the end of
each entry.

The reality is that bigger guns than you are suffering
and looking for relief because it hits them in the pocket book.

I see links that say "read more" way too often. I sometimes
follow these "news" articles only to find that 60+% of the content
had been copied and at times I find a chain of "read more" links
that can be four or five links deep. Worse advertiser first
touch $$ belongs to the bogus copy cat.

Too bad "Cuil" search went bust they did seem
to track attribution trees well ( See Cpedia).

Re:One phrase: "DRM takedown"

[wahming]

In this case there is no copyright issue - the only issue here is that ethically, they should have attributed him *instead* of mocking him.

Too Hip for the Room

[srussia]

Exactly. My first reaction was, "Sheesh. Get over yourself."

Cut the guy a break, he says it right there in his blog title "I am Dennis Miller".

newspaper reporters are jerks

[eples]

Guess what, newspaper reporters can be jerks! They often dash off at warp speed with poor information, and see conspiracies and evils where they do not exist.

That's why they work at ... small local papers.

OMGWTFSANDWICH

[Monoman]

Plagiarism? Arguable
Copyright violation? Not at all
Crappy journalism? You bet.

The paper making snide comments reminds me of when Jon Stewart was on Crossfire and they tried accuse Jon's show of being part of the problem. Of course he pointed out the name of the channel his show is on and that his lead in was a show where puppets make prank phone calls. So now we have a supposedly legitimate newspaper publisher commenting about the guy's personal blog. They should have simply provided a link to his site as one of their sources which his web logs prove they went to his site before publishing the article. Big deal it isn't like he was going to get famous from being source linked in that paper's article. Now if he could someone get some real exposure by getting his blog linked to on a big tech site like Slashdot ..... errr, nevermind.

Either that or it is yet another stealth marketing campaign for a yet to be determined product/service.

Re:OMGWTFSANDWICH

[Rary]

They should have simply provided a link to his site as one of their sources which his web logs prove they went to his site before publishing the article.

You missed the key point here: the web logs proved somebody went to his site 6 minutes before the article was published.

Generally speaking, newspaper articles don't get written, edited, and approved for publishing in 6 minutes. This guy is just full of himself. He did the simplest research that anyone could've done, and now he thinks that anyone else who did the same research must have stolen it from him.

Re:OMGWTFSANDWICH

[Monoman]

You are correct. Newspaper articles generally do not. However, short online hack/copy jobs can probably be done easily in less than 6 minutes. We aren't talking about the NYT or WSJ here.

Obvious Self-Promotion?

[warGod3]

I'm going to say "yes" to generate hits... Judging from what I have read from other posters, yeah, I'm not going to add to his hit count...

Re:Obvious Self-Promotion?

[GameboyRMH]

Agreed. This guy's trying to make his own Cook's Source-style scandal to promote his blog. The newspaper is right for mocking him.

Did they copy your words?

[pacergh]

All I read about was them copying your factual information. While they should have attributed you because of basic journalistic ethics, that's all this is about.

This guy is way too serious about information. Here's a clue: No one has monopolies on facts or ideas. While not attributing things may be impolite (and violate codes of ethics), it's certainly not theft.

slashfool

[Anonymous Coward]

Evil corporations.

Axe to grind...

[flanders123]

...he has it.

Where is my attribution

[Anonymous Coward]

I am pretty sure all newspapers have ripped off a lot of my comments. But, do they ever quote "Anonymous Coward"????

Expect to see the Lawsuit Anonymous Coward vs Fox News.

Obvious joke

[Kosi]

The story fails to mention the name of the newspaper, here it is: The Guttenberg Post

puulleeeeeez

[Anonymous Coward]

No shit its fake, its a goddamn commercial for satellite TV.

even the NY Times does this

[Anonymous Coward]

They ripped off a story from The Indypendent, a local non-profit paper. Sure, they rewrote it and redid the interview for themselves but they basically stole the Indy's "scoop". But I guess that's how the overpriviledged ivy league pricks who work at NY Times got through school so why not do it as adults too? On the other hand a lot of people who worked on the Indy where rich Columbia journalism grad students living off trust funds so I guess it was douchebag on douchebag crime...still stands that even a "respected paper" like the NYT has been caught with their hand in the cookie jar.

OMFG

[mcmonkey]

It's not just that the saw his post and decided to write an article about the same thing, it's that they used specific facts that he had worked to uncover in their story.

Really? He uncovered the fact that the tiny giraffe isn't real? He also uncovered the fact that a site claiming to sell tiny giraffes is part of the same marketing campaign?

If I set up a blog and write that water is wet, can I claim anyone else referring to the wetness of water is using specific facts I worked to uncover?

The facts this guy is claiming to uncover are so bleeding obvious. Does it really take "work to uncover" that any web site dealing with tiny giraffes is related to the DirectTV marketing?

If there's some verbatim use of his words, that's something. Restating the obvious, that's nothing.

There is no story here.

Feeding the Beast

[tekrat]

Blogs are a monster that needs to be constantly fed. I have one friend with a blog who is lucky to post something once a month, another friend is paying other people to write posts for him. We all have lives and there's only so many original thoughts in the world. It's hard to keep feeding the beast.

So, it comes as no surprise that even professional writers will take the easy way out if they are having a bad day, or just hit a wall on writer's block, or, they have too many other projects on their plate, or whatever. Plagarism is now the nature of the web, and half the blogs on the internet point to other blogs on the internet for their stories.

Welcome to dot-com 3.0, *the echo chamber*.

Re:Feeding the Beast

[geekoid]

"...nly so many original thoughts in the world. "

not, there are actually many many original thoughts. What we have is people who stopped thinking.

What next, Genius?

[geekoid]

debunk the existence of Vampires? Will you also take such fantastic leap of deductive genius, like looking at the meta data and domain registrars? Way to go, Batman.

I don't know what's worse, that someone felt the need to 'debunk'* an obvious fictional character, or the fact that a newspaper thought it worth their time to copy it.

* Not really debunking. debunking is generally thought of as disproving a charlatan, not just proving false. This would be like saying you debunked a magicians card trick.

Updates

[Anonymous Coward]

The blogger updated his post to report that he found the Long Island Press IP address in his server logs 6 minutes before the article was original posted, and now the Long Island Press has removed their article from the site. This is now a dead link: http://www.longislandpress.com/2011/03/28/petite-lap-giraffes-real-or-directv-marketing-campaign/

Re:Updates

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.longislandpress.com/2011/03/25/petite-lap-giraffes-are-petite-lap-giraffes-real/

Oblig

[Isarian]

But honestly, Monica...

So what's new here?

[jc42]

In the decades that I've spent reading newpapers and news magazines, I've noticed that citing sources is something that tends to stand out - because it is rarely done by those publications. You mostly only see such attributions in "editorial" content, not in "news".

You and I may think that "journalists" should cite their sources, or link to them in online stories. But a brief search through archived newspapers and other news publications show clearly that the people who produced those publications didn't think that such citation was necessary.

So this "newspaper" is actually just following traditional newspaper practice. The online world has developed a somewhat different standard, since (as TFA and others have pointed out) it's very easy to include links to sources in your HTML. But we shouldn't be surprised that journalists from a newspaper background don't think this way. Those archived newspapers show that they never have.

So we should approach this as a "teaching moment". We should treat them as n00bs in the online news arena, and patiently explain to them that their age-old practice of not mentioning the sources of their information is not socially acceptable in the brave new world of Internet journalism.

Perhaps a way to encourage them might be: Whenever we read a news article that contains no links, we send them a link to a description of the syntax of a hyperlink. If they get enough of these, they might get the idea and start including links in their news articles.

It might not hurt to reply to a lot of comments here on /. with the same link.

Anyone got other URLs that would be as good as that one for explaining how hyperlinks work?

Nothing good ever comes out of Long Island

[Noel249]

Not surprised at the ineptitude and flagrant plagiarizing. "New York" is not New York, it's really Manhattan. That's where the brains and big guns are.