Plagiarism

[Hans Tucker (Hans)]

Having just read a thread on the Royal Pardon of Alan Turing and on the attached hyperlink I hit on a hyperlink to another story regarding Shia LaBeouf's plagiarism. (LaBeouf being the well known actor from the Transformer movies).

It made me recall a discussion I had with a young engineer completing his masters just before I went on leave. He was completing a report for his syndicate where he said one member in the group provided a submission that was purely plagiarised from the internet. When confronted this member didn't think much of it. Apparently, from what I was told in the conversation, plagiarism is rife in universities and the penalties harsh if caught. Clearly not harsh enough. This is a kin to drug cheating in the Olympics.

Lucky this young kid checked for plagiarism before he included the material in the syndicates final report otherwise he could of had some bad results for the other members.

Has plagiarism always been part of the university culture and has been bought to light with the computer age which has made it easier to pick out?

[RickS (Rick)]

Plagiarism is easier to perform and easier to identify these days. Otherwise I don't expect much has changed.

As one of my old university colleagues used to say, "if you copy one source it is plagiarism. If you copy three it is research!"

Cheers,
Rick.

[AstralTraveller (David)]

As a non-plagiarizing former student I have strong views on the subject: hanging's too good for 'em.

Originally Posted by RickS

Plagiarism is easier to perform and easier to identify these days. Otherwise I don't expect much has changed.

As one of my old university colleagues used to say, "if you copy one source it is plagiarism. If you copy three it is research!"

Cheers,
Rick.

That depends on whether or not you cite them! [Not that anyone will be impressed by three refs. IMHO that's a fail straight off.]

[Astro_Bot]

I recall regularly filling a page or two (A4) with references, and that was in addition to footnotes.

Academic misconduct was taken very seriously in my time and I hope it's still the same.

Just think if the same strict rules applied on internet forums ......

[GTB_an_Owl (Geoff)]

my nephew (and an associate) in america , wrote a program to check exam papers against the course content and associated reading for plagiarism.

they sold it for a modest sum and it is now used in many universities and colleges (especially the one he works at)

from what i remember him saying, the program read in any text book content and associated reading suggested for the applicable course and checked exam papers for direct usage of any phrasing or wording.

geoff

[pmrid (Peter)]

Originally Posted by GTB_an_Owl

my nephew (and an associate) in america , wrote a program to check exam papers against the course content and associated reading for plagiarism.

they sold it for a modest sum and it is now used in many universities and colleges (especially the one he works at)

from what i remember him saying, the program read in any text book content and associated reading suggested for the applicable course and checked exam papers for direct usage of any phrasing or wording.

geoff

The program of which you speak may be TurnItIn - a very useful method of identifying plagiarised material. I encountered the problem extensively when running postgrad courses for overseas students. The message got through after a while - mainly because of a nil-tolerance policy I imposed, backed up by aggressive academic misconduct proceedings against offenders. But it is rife and is hard to eradicate.
Peter

[Zaps]

Originally Posted by Hans Tucker

Has plagiarism always been part of the university culture...

I wouldn't say it's part of the "culture," exactly, but it's always been there in one form or another, just as it has everywhere else.

...[A]nd has been bought to light with the computer age which has made it easier to pick out?

Plagiarism has been an issue since men began scrawling on cave walls; and, as RickS wrote, the Internet has in many respects made it easier to commit but more difficult to commit successfully.