All-You-Need-To-Know About Plagiarism
Posted by admin in Plagiarism on July 21st, 2010
With the incest of online media in our everyday lives the diversity of the written contents is one thing that every media producer looks for. The dotcom bubble has really expanded with leaps and bounds in these past years and people all-round the globe prefer the online written media to be their source of information. Moreover, with the advent of terms like infotainment and the online news portal, written contents on the internet have some real magnitude.
Plagiarism is an act of a person to copying work of someone without giving him credit of his written words, and this is a serious crime on the internet world. With the advent of internet the academia has shifted its medium of instruction mainly to the web and its offshoots. The students now use this online medium to either carry on their course work or for research and they are graded on the same very variants. Within academia, plagiarism is as a heinous crime and sometimes labeled as academic fraud and the culprits are dealt severely resulting in academic seizures or expulsions.
When we talk about journalism, the plagiarism also has seeped into this profession resulting in the scrutiny of online journalism before reaching the desktop of masses. As far as the dominion of Journalism is considered, plagiarism in the journalism is considered as the violation of the journalist’s ethics, and journalists resorting to plagiarism either ends up losing their jobs or with the decline in the popularity index. Various plagiarism checker tools are available online.
Plagiarism and copyright infringement are not supposed to be confused because they both fall in different transgressions, where copyrights is basically the violation of the rights of the holder, plagiarism is the unearned popularity that the author earns through the claims of false ownership. Plagiarism on some instances is also termed as unearned reputation that adds up to the plagiarizing author or freelance content writers.
Half A Truth
Posted by admin in Plagiarism on May 7th, 2010
A stressed and frazzled student may say, Plagiarism is something that just happens — it is like asking directions. Plagiarism is a Latin derivative of ‘plagiarius’, a kidnapper. Abducting the ideas, work, passages of work by someone else, and passing it off as own work by an individual is what a plagiarist do. Plagiarism can be done in many ways, but the most convenient method is to paraphrase words of someone else. Perhaps the reason that plagiarism has become so prevalent is the superabundance of knowledge material availability on the internet, and it is easy, and free excess. Many people consider it genuinely legal, and reasonable to seize brainwork of someone else, alter it, and present it with their own credentials.
Just to make a few words of assuagement, it is a compliment to your literary skills that someone is compelled to snatch your work, and plagiarises it with the surety that it will be appreciated. However, that is just a little consolation. If somebody is making his/her living from writing on the Internet, or spending his/her life time in research just to right a few words of authentic information, plagiarism could be the greatest threat to his/her perseverance.
Plagiarism has not been declared a crime in most countries. The reason is that plagiarism is so difficult to define. So taking advantage of its legality, many of the students and even professors are found to be engaged in it. Internet plagiarism is one other thing that has been flourishing. Many of the websites provide students with model term papers, essays, and even complete thesis for the purpose of plagiarism.
This raising trend of plagiarism is probably due to the erosion of ethics on the part of students, and due to do not care attitude of the teachers. The best baits developed to deal with the snatchers are the websites, and software designed to detect plagiarism. It is hoped that these tools would prevent generating a generation of cheaters, and the plagiarists would soon stop prospering.
Best Way To Ask Answers Of Your Problems
It’s not too long ago that people would seek answers to their problems from friend, relatives or peers. At times people turned for answers to professionals. Now with the deluge of websites that can provide answers to your problems, it’s become easier to seek answers. You can get answers without disclosing your identity and you can get answers for the most intimate problems. Professional advice and help is also available on a large number of websites. The search to find the correct answers via a search engine can be frustrating at times. But a lot depends on how you ask your question. If your question is long and winding don’t expect a search engine to return quality sites to you. You must explain your problem in the briefest of words. A properly put question will get you a quality search.
There are a number of question answer web sites that are quite easy to use and you can get good answers from them. Question answer web sites are also categorized which makes it so much easier to find answers for particular problems. If you have a medical problem you can pose your question on question answer websites that deal with health issues. The web has definitely made life easier for people to find answers for their problems. I prefer those question answer websites that give correct answers in simple understandable language. If I were to ask a health related question and get an answer that is full of medical gibberish which I don’t understand, it will just leave me frustrated. This, I think is not what people want. I look for answers that are explained in layman’s words. Also I am averse to question answer sites that use search engines to point me to sites where I could find an answer. I expect someone who understands my question to give me a correct and truthful answer. I also detest getting answers that have been plagiarized. A good question answer site manned and monitored by professionals is what I want. I am sure that’s what we all look for when we want answers to our problems.
A Statement on Plagiarism
Posted by admin in Plagiarism on February 11th, 2010
Plagiarism can be defined as, using the work of someone else without giving proper credits to the originator. Its scope is not limited to research publications only; it may incorporate music, arts, paintings, books, videos, pictures and computer programs. If you use ideas of someone else as your own, it may be regarded as a serious offense. However, if you like the idea, give a proper reference to it and include proper credentials. Inspiring the work of others and sharing it with the rest of the world is a good thing, but only if we acknowledge that, and deliver it through right means; otherwise, it comes under the category of plagiarism.
On a smaller scale, like a student copying projects of other students without their permission, would come under the category of plagiarism as well; however, in this case, the penalty would be less; may be a low grade. But at a broader level like in business, plagiarism is treated as highly unethical and a person may be imposed to the prison as it is considered as committing a crime in some parts of the world.
The concept of plagiarism would be clearer with the help of an example. Let us suppose, for example, that we are doing a research paper on brand preferences of the consumers, and we take some statistics from an existing research paper, without mentioning the source; it would be considered as plagiarism. On the other hand, if we include the same information by following the proper style of bibliography, it would become a part of literature review and would make the research more reliable and authenticated. However, if we gather firsthand information on consumer preferences, either through questionnaires, survey or interview, it would be our own property, and we are authorized to get a copyright on that. Any other person, who wishes to use that information, will then have to take special permission from the author and cite the references according to the given format.
For protection of innovative work and minimize the practice of plagiarism, copyrights, trademarks and patents have been introduced. In a copyright, the owner is given exclusive rights for the reproduction of work or a form of expression, which may be published or unpublished, while a patent is treated like property of a person. It is usually awarded for some kind of invention and has limited life span. After a particular time frame, it may expire. Trademarks are usually used for a name, device, word or symbol, which distinguishes a particular product from others.
These are some means to protect the intellectual property. It has many negative consequences as well. Foremost is that the original work is not appreciated; a person may receive credit for something which was not his/her idea. It may lead to hamper the creativity and innovation. People may feel de-motivated. At different levels of society, steps are taken to reduce plagiarism; however, it cannot be completely eliminated from the society, unless we remove it from grass root and try to minimize its negative consequences.
Various Citation Styles
Posted by admin in Plagiarism on November 24th, 2009
‘Citation’ or providing references in your intellectual work is very important. There are many citation styles, many of them are often created by professional organizations. Following are some of the most commonly used citation styles:
- APA Style
- MLA Style
- AMA Style
- Chicago Style
- Turabian Style
APA Style is developed by the American Psychological Association. They have formulated proper guidelines for citing resources use in the research. In this style the list of resources at the end of the text are called references. Endnotes and footnotes are not provided in APA style. Instead parenthetical citations are used, in which the sources are provided with the references in the text. The APA style also states the citation guidelines for electronic resources.
MLA Style is developed by Modern Language Association. In MLA style the list of sources at the end of the text is called “Works Cited”. Instead of giving footnotes and endnotes, the author’s last name and page numbers are provided within the body of text. MLA style clearly states the rules for citing electronic references.
Chicago Style or the Chicago Manual of Style offers two different styles of citing references. One is known as the notes-bibliography style and the other one is author-date style.
AMA Style developed by American Medical Association. In this style the references are provided in order of their appearance in the text.
Turabian Style is based on Chicago Style and is developed by Kate L Turabian. The list of sources at the end of the text is known as Bibliography. Footnotes are provided at the end of each page.
Plagiarism And Its Various Styles / Adopting Various Styles Of Plagiarism
Posted by admin in Plagiarism on November 18th, 2009
Plagiarism is taken as a serious intellectual offense at all levels, whether it’s in academics or at professional stage. It is considered as a dishonest act, misuse of intellectual property and violation of scholarly ethics. Academic and journalistic plagiarism has been in practice since many years. But with the recent thrust of online information plagiarism has gone beyond control. One can easily find his research topic on online search engines and then just have to copy and paste. This is the most commonly used style of plagiarism. Mostly lazy students or people who are incompetent in their fields adopt this style of Copy/Paste Plagiarism. In this style of plagiarism all work is copied and the person does not have any contribution in the work apart from hitting the copy and paste button.
With the recent use of plagiarism detection softwares and online plagiarism checkers, many smart writers are employing Word Switching in their writings. They copy content from 3 to 4 different sources. Then they change a few words, at times just the introduction and present this as their original work. But of course such tricks cannot exclude the copied work from the category of plagiarism.
Recycling, rewriting or republishing one’s own work is also considered as a plagiarism style. With the massive increase of online publishing this style of Self Plagiarism is increasing. They are providing same written stuff to different ezines and different article sites.
No matter which plagiarism style is adopted, it will be taken as an act of intellectual dishonesty and can always lead to severe consequences.
What Is Citation?
Citation is basically to supply proper references of all the sources you have used in your writing. It is to mention the name of the author, publishing details, and also the title of the source.
In other words citation means being honest both with your work and with others. A person who includes proper references acknowledges other authors and gives credit to intellectual work produced by others. Honest and dedicated writers always take extra pain in providing citations. They are cautious and try their best to avoid any chances of plagiarism by giving citations in all their writings.
Citation can be done in different styles. Some of the most popular citation styles include APA style, Harvard referencing, ASA style, MLA style, Vancouver system etc. There are different guides and systems about citation writing styles. One can adopt any whichever fits his type of research work and writing style. No matter which citation style you adopt, citation should be there in your work.
There are many advantages of citation. The cited references also help the readers to revert to the source for any additional information. Citation is also important to make a work look credible and reliable. A work with proper citation and references gains popularity and credibility. Properly cited works have better standing than those with improper citations which are mostly graded as plagiarised content. Citation shows the effort you put into your work. It shows number of resources you have consulted to support your writing. Citation builds your reputation as a trustworthy writer and helps you stand out amongst others.
What If I Have Plagiarised Unintentionally?
Posted by admin in Plagiarism on November 13th, 2009
As an honest and truthful writer, you will never want to be involved in any form of plagiarism whether intentional or unintentional. Plagiarism is taken as an intellectual offense and leads to severe consequences. You can be terminated from your job if you get caught in plagiarising any content, words or even ideas.
I have always been very conscious about all my writings when ever it comes to the issue of plagiarism. I wanted to establish a good repute in online publishing industry. When I first started up writing I was not very sure of what plagiarism is all about. Once my ezine editor told me that I got some plagiarised content in one of my research report. I was shocked as I was sure that I had not stolen anyone’s work and idea. Then my editor told me that I did not identify the source of one of the quotations I used in my work. That is when I came to know about unintentional plagiarism.
Unintentional plagiarism is when you do not include proper references in your work or in other words careless citation when you borrow some one’s work to support your writing. Although unintentional but it is also taken as an intellectual dishonesty and an offense. To save yourself from unintentional plagiarism you must keep in mind following key points:
- Always use quotation with proper quotation marks.
- Provide proper footnotes for all quotations you use in your work.
- Properly paraphrase if you want to reword / use ideas, facts and opinions of others.
- Provide footnotes for paraphrased content.
- Include all references of the sources you used for your search.
- Never forget to acknowledge the author.
Detecting Plagiarism – Imperative To Achieve Credibility
Posted by admin in Plagiarism on November 10th, 2009
Original and creative content is imperative to acquire a credible position in online publication business. To keep online content authentic and genuine one must keep an eye on copied and plagiarised materials. Checking all online publications for possible plagiarism is essential yet tricky. Here is when Plagiarism Detecting Software come in. Identifying plagiarised content, copied material and unacknowledged quotations; this and much more is what plagiarism detecting software is all about.
Being a writer of various articles sites, I often face the problem of keeping my content original and plagiarism free. Hundreds of articles are submitted daily on my sites. Initially it seems to be impossible for me to keep a plagiarism check on all these written materials. But I wanted to ensure originality and novelty in all published materials. Then I came across a wonderful site – a free plagiarism detection site.
Since the day I started using plagiarism checker everything seems to be lined up. By just submitting content to the online plagiarism detector I can easily detect and identify any form of copied or plagiarised content. Online Plagiarism software has made my life easier and hassle free.
Majority of plagiarism software available online provide 100 % accurate information. Thousands of industries and millions of people are relying on these plagiarism software to detect plagiarised content. Most of online plagiarism software are marked with these quality features; instant results, accurate information and easy usage. These amazing anti plagiarism software are ensuring authenticated and plagiarism free written materials free of cost.