It saddens me that there's been a lot of plagiarism going on around the blogging community. It's ridiculous, really. If you can't think of something to write, why steal someone else's thoughts? I suppose, as a writer, I can never find reason behind it. It's just cheap, really. Lazy.
This whole situation reminded me of my favorite plagiarism story. It happened while I was teaching.
While teaching my students about transcendentalism, I had them write a short story about nature. It could be about anything - a game of baseball, a pretty flower on the ground, a picnic date that ended with a younger brother throwing water balloons at the happy couple (true story - that paper got an A). I only asked for a page, a single double spaced page, because I learned earlier in the year that my students' minds shut down after one page, as if they were genetically programmed to not know how to add a few more words. In the end, a little over half of the students did the assignment which really didn't surprise me.
While grading them during silent reading time, I came across a paper that actually had me laugh out loud. It wasn't because the writing was hilarious, a young Sedaris, no, it was because the paper was INCREDIBLY plagiarized. The kid didn't even try to cover it up. Shaking my head, I gave him a zero and waited for the reaction.
The next day, he approached my desk.
"Miss! Why did I get a zero? My paper was awesome!"
"Your paper was awesomely plagiarized."
"No it wasn't!"
"Yes it was."
"How do you know?"
If I didn't already know, the inquiry of "how do you know?" could have somewhat given it away, along with his stuttering and shuffling. Taking the paper from his hand, I pointed to one word on the paper. Among a sea of Times New Roman 12 point black characters was one word. One bold, underlined, blue word.
"You didn't remove the link. You copy and pasted it from your computer screen onto a Word document."
"I, um,"
"You didn't remove the link! Not only did you copy it, but you copied it badly! At least try to hide your plagiarism!"
"Well.."
"Right."
"This was a stupid assignment anyway."
In the end I didn't know what was stupider - the desire to copy an entire paper, or the inability to effectively pull it off.
16 comments:
First of all, who plagiarizes amongst other bloggers? Isn't there enough stuff out there for all of us?
Secondly, that story is ridiculously hilarious. How someone could do that and not think to, you know, cover their tracks, is amazing. I love the immediate dismissal of the assignment though as being "stupid." That's appropriate- when you get caught, just undermine the validity of the assignment itself.
LOL definitely the latter! I mean, come on, if you're GONNA do it, why not do it right??
Seriously though, plagiarism is super lame.
Why bother having a blog if you can't come up with your own stuff???
Always good to hear another inspiring teaching story from you! :P
But has there really been blogging plagiarism? I have a hard time imagining someone using their free time just to plagiarize, but I guess anything's possible.
I'd be so afraid if I tried to plagiarize!
Did you try to click on the link? I bet it would have taken you to Milli Vanilli or something.
haha wow i can't believe he left the link in. definitely not a good copier, haha.
Kind of like writing the kids' name you are copying from at the top of your page...
But yeah. I'm totally with you with this whole blog stealing trend. Anyone who does this is ... well for the lack of a better word... a total asshole.
xo
I wish those had been email submits b/c I would have loved to have known where that link led to haha!
as annoying that incident must have been as a teacher - it kind of made me giggle.
kids!
hahahahaha
While I'm all about not plagarizing these days, I definitely remember figuring out how to change the text colour to eliminate those maroon links from back in the day of Encarta Encyclopedia CD-Roms... Yeah I was a bad-ass grade 7.
Umm, wow. I'm with you -- which is worse? Not being able to hide it or the actual plagiarism?
Ever since a kid, I've been against and appalled by plagiarism, though I know quite a few friends who used the Internet to help them by in high school. As a journalism major, even the THOUGHT of plagiarism was a bad, bad idea. And now, as a professional journalist, it bothers me even more.
Tom - One of the 20SB was caught copying posts word for word from some mommy bloggers. And it happened again the other day with Maxie. Sad! And I agree - I loved his statement of the assignment being stupid. So high school!
Colure - I agree! Ah well.
Kevin - Well, that's what I'm here for. Inspiring stories of today's youth!
Angela - SAME HERE!
Dan - Bahaha! Oh man, if only...
Katelin - No, not at all. Heh.
Mermanda - YES! Ah, one of the classic copying stories. Have you found any other plagiarizers lately? You are the master sleuth and all! :)
Stealthnerd - I know, right? I would have loved to see...
Alexa - Oh, it was hilarious!
Caz - Hahahaha - oh I remember those days! You really were a CRAZY 7th grader.
EP - It's great that you were against it even as a kid. If only more people had those morals!
Plagiarism. The blogger's form of flattery.
Plagiarism is the worst, way to make a fool of yourself. ERGH.
It's amazing what a lack of creativity or self-confidence will lead people to do. Plagiarism is so awful.
When I was a TA, another fellow TA found a student who cut and paste (without citations) a whole bunch of text... without even bothering to change the font to match the rest of her essay. So your story sounded very familiar...
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