Circular plagiarism
-
- Majordomo
- Posts: 13410
- kołdry
- Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2012 5:07 pm
- Wikipedia User: Thekohser
- Wikipedia Review Member: thekohser
- Actual Name: Gregory Kohs
- Location: United States
Circular plagiarism
A comment in another thread said, "I was accused of finding circular plagiarism."
From a bit of chance, I discovered an interesting one today.
Back in February 2009, a user at MyWikiBiz "imported" (plagiarized) a Wikipedia article entitled Disney Vacation Club. The Wikipedia edit summary must have caught the eye of the MyWikiBiz editor: "Rmv material. This is far too much information with a commerical (sic) motivation".
That's a sure sign a Wikipedia article is about to get the "not all information wants to be free" treatment.
Anyway, fast-forward to February 2014. Another Wikipedian continues the years-long rage against commercial content on Disney Vacation Club (T-H-L). Geraldshields11 declares that the Wikipedia article reads too much like an advertisement, saying that the text came "from http://www.mywikibiz.com/Disney_Vacation_Club".
How about that?! Blame MyWikiBiz for the "advertising" that Wikipedia was happy to be the publisher of between 2005 and 2009. Gerald, if you are looking for a culprit, you need to look back to this French Wikipedian from 2005, my friend.
From a bit of chance, I discovered an interesting one today.
Back in February 2009, a user at MyWikiBiz "imported" (plagiarized) a Wikipedia article entitled Disney Vacation Club. The Wikipedia edit summary must have caught the eye of the MyWikiBiz editor: "Rmv material. This is far too much information with a commerical (sic) motivation".
That's a sure sign a Wikipedia article is about to get the "not all information wants to be free" treatment.
Anyway, fast-forward to February 2014. Another Wikipedian continues the years-long rage against commercial content on Disney Vacation Club (T-H-L). Geraldshields11 declares that the Wikipedia article reads too much like an advertisement, saying that the text came "from http://www.mywikibiz.com/Disney_Vacation_Club".
How about that?! Blame MyWikiBiz for the "advertising" that Wikipedia was happy to be the publisher of between 2005 and 2009. Gerald, if you are looking for a culprit, you need to look back to this French Wikipedian from 2005, my friend.
"...making nonsensical connections and culminating in feigned surprise, since 2006..."
-
- Posts: 10891
- Joined: Wed Mar 14, 2012 11:32 pm
- Location: hell
Re: Circular plagiarism
We ought to find more examples of this and post them.
I wonder if Jean-Paul Ollivier would qualify as a "circular plagiarist". He plagiarized Wikipedia and claimed it was plagiarizing him....
https://twitter.com/J_P_Ollivier/status ... 4724415488
I wonder if Jean-Paul Ollivier would qualify as a "circular plagiarist". He plagiarized Wikipedia and claimed it was plagiarizing him....
https://twitter.com/J_P_Ollivier/status ... 4724415488
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 2389
- Joined: Wed Mar 14, 2012 11:43 pm
- Wikipedia User: Cla68
Re: Circular plagiarism
I have a book on the Battle of Guadalcanal which uses Wikipedia as a source on a tidbit about the movie South Pacific. I should have used the book as a source in the South Pacific article so that I could use it later as an example of circular sourcing.
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 1423
- Joined: Mon Oct 21, 2013 9:58 pm
Re: Circular plagiarism
Cla68 wrote:I have a book on the Battle of Guadalcanal which uses Wikipedia as a source on a tidbit about the movie South Pacific. I should have used the book as a source in the South Pacific article so that I could use it later as an example of circular sourcing.
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 2620
- Joined: Fri Jan 31, 2014 5:05 pm
- Wikipedia User: Johnny Au
- Actual Name: Johnny Au
- Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Re: Circular plagiarism
If now is bad, there are plans to publish Wikipedia in the recycled tree edition under different names.
-
- Posts: 10891
- Joined: Wed Mar 14, 2012 11:32 pm
- Location: hell
Re: Circular plagiarism
Please do. And I'll put it on the book wiki. (Our collection of plagiarism incidents is getting unwieldy, but circular plagiarism is "special".)Cla68 wrote:I have a book on the Battle of Guadalcanal which uses Wikipedia as a source on a tidbit about the movie South Pacific. I should have used the book as a source in the South Pacific article so that I could use it later as an example of circular sourcing.
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 3378
- Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2012 12:30 am
- Location: EN61bw
Re: Circular plagiarism
If we ever blog this topic, that image ought to be used (CC-BY-NC license) in some way. Randall noted this cycle a long time ago.
-
- Majordomo
- Posts: 13410
- Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2012 5:07 pm
- Wikipedia User: Thekohser
- Wikipedia Review Member: thekohser
- Actual Name: Gregory Kohs
- Location: United States
Re: Circular plagiarism
Related posts are here and here. I apologize for creating yet another thread about the theme. Maybe a grand merger is in order?
"...making nonsensical connections and culminating in feigned surprise, since 2006..."
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 3378
- Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2012 12:30 am
- Location: EN61bw
Re: Circular plagiarism
Recurring issues will generate recurring threads. The fact that this issue recurs so frequently suggests that a blog post is in order. Anybody up to writing one?
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 1260
- Joined: Thu Apr 26, 2012 2:48 pm
- Wikipedia User: Eric Corbett
- Wikipedia Review Member: Malleus
Re: Circular plagiarism
But this has been going on since the first book was written, or maybe the second. Many sources on the Pendle witches, for instance, give an incorrect date for Good Friday 1612, presumably because they've all copied from each other without checking. Nothing to do with Wikipedia, which actually gives the correct date.
-
- Majordomo
- Posts: 13410
- Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2012 5:07 pm
- Wikipedia User: Thekohser
- Wikipedia Review Member: thekohser
- Actual Name: Gregory Kohs
- Location: United States
Re: Circular plagiarism
Has there ever been a case where an author of original content (with publication date clear for all to see) was accused of plagiarizing from a second author who published content (at a later publication date) he'd plagiarized from the first author?Malleus wrote:But this has been going on since the first book was written, or maybe the second.
"...making nonsensical connections and culminating in feigned surprise, since 2006..."
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 3378
- Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2012 12:30 am
- Location: EN61bw
Re: Circular plagiarism
Almost certainly this has happened. The case of Marthe Gautier and credit for the discovery of trisomy 23 as the genetic mechanism underlying Down Syndrome comes quite close to matching this (especially given Jérôme Lejeune's litigiousness), and several of the accounts in the history of mathematics (note especially serial plagiarist Nikolai Lobachevsky) likely involve plagiarists leveling allegations of plagiarism at the very people they stole from.thekohser wrote:Has there ever been a case where an author of original content (with publication date clear for all to see) was accused of plagiarizing from a second author who published content (at a later publication date) he'd plagiarized from the first author?
-
- Genius
- Posts: 25599
- Joined: Wed Jan 02, 2013 8:15 pm
- Nom de plume: Poetlister
- Location: London, living in a similar way
Re: Circular plagiarism
It's quite likely that somone producing say a third edition of a book will have been accused of plagiarising material that was in the first edition.
"The higher we soar the smaller we appear to those who cannot fly" - Nietzsche
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 1260
- Joined: Thu Apr 26, 2012 2:48 pm
- Wikipedia User: Eric Corbett
- Wikipedia Review Member: Malleus
Re: Circular plagiarism
As the history of the authorship of books is far less transparent than that of a WP article it's difficult to say, but back to my example, who was the first author to get the date of Good Friday 1612 wrong? And why did so many others make the same mistake? The only point I was trying to make is that this practice didn't originate with WP.thekohser wrote:Has there ever been a case where an author of original content (with publication date clear for all to see) was accused of plagiarizing from a second author who published content (at a later publication date) he'd plagiarized from the first author?Malleus wrote:But this has been going on since the first book was written, or maybe the second.
-
- Trustee
- Posts: 14094
- Joined: Wed Mar 14, 2012 11:54 pm
- Wikipedia User: Stanistani
- Wikipedia Review Member: Zoloft
- Actual Name: William Burns
- Nom de plume: William Burns
- Location: San Diego
Re: Circular plagiarism
It's true that this practice did not originate with Wikipedia, but there are recent episodes with a unique flavor. One purpose of our site is to bring to the public attention some of the problems involved with Wikipedia's prominence as a source of information. Hence the suggestion of a blog post about circular plagiarism, a la Wikipedia.Malleus wrote:As the history of the authorship of books is far less transparent than that of a WP article it's difficult to say, but back to my example, who was the first author to get the date of Good Friday 1612 wrong? And why did so many others make the same mistake? The only point I was trying to make is that this practice didn't originate with WP.thekohser wrote:Has there ever been a case where an author of original content (with publication date clear for all to see) was accused of plagiarizing from a second author who published content (at a later publication date) he'd plagiarized from the first author?Malleus wrote:But this has been going on since the first book was written, or maybe the second.
My avatar is sometimes indicative of my mood:
- Actual mug ◄
- Uncle Cornpone
- Zoloft bouncy pill-thing
-
- Gregarious
- Posts: 513
- Joined: Sun Jun 10, 2012 11:27 am
Re: Circular plagiarism
I can do better than that with a case of a musician sued for supposedly plagiarizing from himself. See Fogerty_v._Fantasy,_Inc. (T-H-L).thekohser wrote:Has there ever been a case where an author of original content (with publication date clear for all to see) was accused of plagiarizing from a second author who published content (at a later publication date) he'd plagiarized from the first author?Malleus wrote:But this has been going on since the first book was written, or maybe the second.
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 1423
- Joined: Mon Oct 21, 2013 9:58 pm
Re: Circular plagiarism
I like the idea.Zoloft wrote:It's true that this practice did not originate with Wikipedia, but there are recent episodes with a unique flavor. One purpose of our site is to bring to the public attention some of the problems involved with Wikipedia's prominence as a source of information. Hence the suggestion of a blog post about circular plagiarism, a la Wikipedia.Malleus wrote:As the history of the authorship of books is far less transparent than that of a WP article it's difficult to say, but back to my example, who was the first author to get the date of Good Friday 1612 wrong? And why did so many others make the same mistake? The only point I was trying to make is that this practice didn't originate with WP.thekohser wrote:Has there ever been a case where an author of original content (with publication date clear for all to see) was accused of plagiarizing from a second author who published content (at a later publication date) he'd plagiarized from the first author?Malleus wrote:But this has been going on since the first book was written, or maybe the second.
I would also like someone to look at how many times a bad en.Wikipedia is propogated thoughout the web and its staying power (I am time cruncher for summers, WalMart, you know).
I corrected the spelling of a plant family article that had 50,000 google misfires courtesy of en.Wikipedia science fact-checking (you can date search--this error originated ith en.Wikipedia.) A while later it had 35,000 g-hits. Who knows how many foreign language hits.
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 1260
- Joined: Thu Apr 26, 2012 2:48 pm
- Wikipedia User: Eric Corbett
- Wikipedia Review Member: Malleus
Re: Circular plagiarism
Blog whatever you like, but don't suggest that this practice originated with Wikipedia.Zoloft wrote:It's true that this practice did not originate with Wikipedia, but there are recent episodes with a unique flavor. One purpose of our site is to bring to the public attention some of the problems involved with Wikipedia's prominence as a source of information. Hence the suggestion of a blog post about circular plagiarism, a la Wikipedia.Malleus wrote:As the history of the authorship of books is far less transparent than that of a WP article it's difficult to say, but back to my example, who was the first author to get the date of Good Friday 1612 wrong? And why did so many others make the same mistake? The only point I was trying to make is that this practice didn't originate with WP.thekohser wrote:Has there ever been a case where an author of original content (with publication date clear for all to see) was accused of plagiarizing from a second author who published content (at a later publication date) he'd plagiarized from the first author?Malleus wrote:But this has been going on since the first book was written, or maybe the second.
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 1260
- Joined: Thu Apr 26, 2012 2:48 pm
- Wikipedia User: Eric Corbett
- Wikipedia Review Member: Malleus
Re: Circular plagiarism
But that's not circular plagiarism, nor is it even plagiarism.enwikibadscience wrote:I like the idea.Zoloft wrote:It's true that this practice did not originate with Wikipedia, but there are recent episodes with a unique flavor. One purpose of our site is to bring to the public attention some of the problems involved with Wikipedia's prominence as a source of information. Hence the suggestion of a blog post about circular plagiarism, a la Wikipedia.Malleus wrote:As the history of the authorship of books is far less transparent than that of a WP article it's difficult to say, but back to my example, who was the first author to get the date of Good Friday 1612 wrong? And why did so many others make the same mistake? The only point I was trying to make is that this practice didn't originate with WP.thekohser wrote:Has there ever been a case where an author of original content (with publication date clear for all to see) was accused of plagiarizing from a second author who published content (at a later publication date) he'd plagiarized from the first author?Malleus wrote:But this has been going on since the first book was written, or maybe the second.
I would also like someone to look at how many times a bad en.Wikipedia is propogated thoughout the web and its staying power (I am time cruncher for summers, WalMart, you know).
I corrected the spelling of a plant family article that had 50,000 google misfires courtesy of en.Wikipedia science fact-checking (you can date search--this error originated ith en.Wikipedia.) A while later it had 35,000 g-hits. Who knows how many foreign language hits.
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 3378
- Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2012 12:30 am
- Location: EN61bw
Re: Circular plagiarism
Not exactly what he was accused of; more a case of infringing on a work he originally created and then assigned to a third party. To be "self-plagiarism" he would have to have been plagiarised by someone else and then accused of plagiarising the plagiarism when the original work (re)surfaces. Nobody seriously questions that Fogerty was the actual creator of both works in Fogerty v. Fantasy.Newyorkbrad wrote:I can do better than that with a case of a musician sued for supposedly plagiarizing from himself. See Fogerty_v._Fantasy,_Inc. (T-H-L).thekohser wrote:Has there ever been a case where an author of original content (with publication date clear for all to see) was accused of plagiarizing from a second author who published content (at a later publication date) he'd plagiarized from the first author?Malleus wrote:But this has been going on since the first book was written, or maybe the second.
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 1423
- Joined: Mon Oct 21, 2013 9:58 pm
Re: Circular plagiarism
I like the idea of a blog post on circular plagiarism.Malleus wrote:But that's not circular plagiarism, nor is it even plagiarism.enwikibadscience wrote:I like the idea.Zoloft wrote:It's true that this practice did not originate with Wikipedia, but there are recent episodes with a unique flavor. One purpose of our site is to bring to the public attention some of the problems involved with Wikipedia's prominence as a source of information. Hence the suggestion of a blog post about circular plagiarism, a la Wikipedia.Malleus wrote:As the history of the authorship of books is far less transparent than that of a WP article it's difficult to say, but back to my example, who was the first author to get the date of Good Friday 1612 wrong? And why did so many others make the same mistake? The only point I was trying to make is that this practice didn't originate with WP.thekohser wrote:Has there ever been a case where an author of original content (with publication date clear for all to see) was accused of plagiarizing from a second author who published content (at a later publication date) he'd plagiarized from the first author?Malleus wrote:But this has been going on since the first book was written, or maybe the second.
I would also like someone to look at how many times a bad en.Wikipedia is propogated thoughout the web and its staying power (I am time cruncher for summers, WalMart, you know).
I corrected the spelling of a plant family article that had 50,000 google misfires courtesy of en.Wikipedia science fact-checking (you can date search--this error originated ith en.Wikipedia.) A while later it had 35,000 g-hits. Who knows how many foreign language hits.
I agree the purpose of Wikipediocracy is to bring attention to problems at Wikipedia.
Another problem I would like to see addressed in a blog post to point out problems on Wkipedia is errors perpetuated into the Googledom.
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 1260
- Joined: Thu Apr 26, 2012 2:48 pm
- Wikipedia User: Eric Corbett
- Wikipedia Review Member: Malleus
Re: Circular plagiarism
Hopefully the blog post will manage to make a convincing case then that this circular plagiarism issue is a uniquely Wikipedia problem.
-
- Posts: 10891
- Joined: Wed Mar 14, 2012 11:32 pm
- Location: hell
Re: Circular plagiarism
Perhaps this should be restricted to clear cases of source > WP > new source > WP again, which are difficult to find.
There is plenty of simple plagiarism to/from WP. I don't think it's really "circular" until it's gone through at least a double WP citation.
There is plenty of simple plagiarism to/from WP. I don't think it's really "circular" until it's gone through at least a double WP citation.
-
- Trustee
- Posts: 14094
- Joined: Wed Mar 14, 2012 11:54 pm
- Wikipedia User: Stanistani
- Wikipedia Review Member: Zoloft
- Actual Name: William Burns
- Nom de plume: William Burns
- Location: San Diego
Re: Circular plagiarism
Malleus wrote:Blog whatever you like, but don't suggest that this practice originated with Wikipedia.Zoloft wrote:It's true that this practice did not originate with Wikipedia, but there are recent episodes with a unique flavor. One purpose of our site is to bring to the public attention some of the problems involved with Wikipedia's prominence as a source of information. Hence the suggestion of a blog post about circular plagiarism, a la Wikipedia.Malleus wrote:As the history of the authorship of books is far less transparent than that of a WP article it's difficult to say, but back to my example, who was the first author to get the date of Good Friday 1612 wrong? And why did so many others make the same mistake? The only point I was trying to make is that this practice didn't originate with WP.thekohser wrote:Has there ever been a case where an author of original content (with publication date clear for all to see) was accused of plagiarizing from a second author who published content (at a later publication date) he'd plagiarized from the first author?Malleus wrote:But this has been going on since the first book was written, or maybe the second.
Malfeasance isn't unique to Wikipedia either. But we can still blog about it.Malleus wrote:Hopefully the blog post will manage to make a convincing case then that this circular plagiarism issue is a uniquely Wikipedia problem.
My avatar is sometimes indicative of my mood:
- Actual mug ◄
- Uncle Cornpone
- Zoloft bouncy pill-thing
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 1260
- Joined: Thu Apr 26, 2012 2:48 pm
- Wikipedia User: Eric Corbett
- Wikipedia Review Member: Malleus
Re: Circular plagiarism
So long as you blog about it fairly, which I doubt you will.
-
- Trustee
- Posts: 14094
- Joined: Wed Mar 14, 2012 11:54 pm
- Wikipedia User: Stanistani
- Wikipedia Review Member: Zoloft
- Actual Name: William Burns
- Nom de plume: William Burns
- Location: San Diego
Re: Circular plagiarism
Does someone pee in your bran flakes every day?Malleus wrote:So long as you blog about it fairly, which I doubt you will.
My avatar is sometimes indicative of my mood:
- Actual mug ◄
- Uncle Cornpone
- Zoloft bouncy pill-thing
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 1260
- Joined: Thu Apr 26, 2012 2:48 pm
- Wikipedia User: Eric Corbett
- Wikipedia Review Member: Malleus
Re: Circular plagiarism
You? The unpalatable fact, to you at least, is that you run this site as if it's a nursery school full of compliant children. Now put me on your naughty step (again) and see if I care.Zoloft wrote:Does someone pee in your bran flakes every day?Malleus wrote:So long as you blog about it fairly, which I doubt you will.
-
- Posts: 10891
- Joined: Wed Mar 14, 2012 11:32 pm
- Location: hell
Re: Circular plagiarism
Somewhere, a ferret needs cuddling.Malleus wrote:You? The unpalatable fact, to you at least, is that you run this site as if it's a nursery school full of compliant children. Now put me on your naughty step (again) and see if I care.Zoloft wrote:Does someone pee in your bran flakes every day?Malleus wrote:So long as you blog about it fairly, which I doubt you will.
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 1260
- Joined: Thu Apr 26, 2012 2:48 pm
- Wikipedia User: Eric Corbett
- Wikipedia Review Member: Malleus
Re: Circular plagiarism
Almost certainly, but all of mine are asleep, so I'm currently cuddling a cat.EricBarbour wrote:Somewhere, a ferret needs cuddling.Malleus wrote:You? The unpalatable fact, to you at least, is that you run this site as if it's a nursery school full of compliant children. Now put me on your naughty step (again) and see if I care.Zoloft wrote:Does someone pee in your bran flakes every day?Malleus wrote:So long as you blog about it fairly, which I doubt you will.
-
- Majordomo
- Posts: 13410
- Joined: Thu Mar 15, 2012 5:07 pm
- Wikipedia User: Thekohser
- Wikipedia Review Member: thekohser
- Actual Name: Gregory Kohs
- Location: United States
Re: Circular plagiarism
There's something different about men who love cats.
"...making nonsensical connections and culminating in feigned surprise, since 2006..."
-
- Genius
- Posts: 25599
- Joined: Wed Jan 02, 2013 8:15 pm
- Nom de plume: Poetlister
- Location: London, living in a similar way
Re: Circular plagiarism
Not to mention men who love dogs, or is that getting NSFW?thekohser wrote:There's something different about men who love cats.
"The higher we soar the smaller we appear to those who cannot fly" - Nietzsche
-
- Habitué
- Posts: 1423
- Joined: Mon Oct 21, 2013 9:58 pm
Re: Circular plagiarism
One thing I just learned is they're not gentlemen, and this means they don't make love on their elbows.thekohser wrote:There's something different about men who love cats.
-
- Gregarious
- Posts: 572
- Joined: Mon Apr 02, 2012 5:24 am
- Wikipedia User: David J Wilson (no longer active); Freda Nurk
- Wikipedia Review Member: lonza leggiera
- Actual Name: David Wilson
Re: Circular plagiarism
Apart from careless copying, which you have already mentioned, there is also the problem of calendar confusion. If you enter the year 1612 in many Easter date calculators (such as this one, for instance) they will tell you that Good Friday occurred in that year on April 20th. And so it did in the Catholic parts of Europe which had already adopted the Gregorian calendar. However, at that time England was still using the Julian calendar, according to which that same day was dated April 10th.Malleus wrote:As the history of the authorship of books is far less transparent than that of a WP article it's difficult to say, but back to my example, who was the first author to get the date of Good Friday 1612 wrong? And why did so many others make the same mistake? ...thekohser wrote:Has there ever been a case where an author of original content (with publication date clear for all to see) was accused of plagiarizing from a second author who published content (at a later publication date) he'd plagiarized from the first author?Malleus wrote:But this has been going on since the first book was written, or maybe the second.
E voi, piuttosto che le nostre povere gabbane d'istrioni, le nostr' anime considerate. Perchè siam uomini di carne ed ossa, e di quest' orfano mondo, al pari di voi, spiriamo l'aere.