Plagiarised content
Today while reading blogs, I came across a blog post that was submitted for Colgate competition. I had opened it with great expectation and when I saw the post, I couldn't see beyond the red haze in front of my eyes. Why? Because this story is plagiarized from the famous story that is doing rounds on FB since last few months, if not a year. My question, how can a writer disrespect the intellect of his/her readers by posting such unethical stuff. Secondly, how did his story got accepted? Isn't there volunteers to check on these issues?
I know I might be breaking few rules here by posting the link of the story but I can't make my point without attaching it.
Indipolice: Please delete it if it's going against the rules.
Plagiarized crap:
http://dare-to-think-beyond-horizon.blogspot.in/2013/05/until-death-do-us-apart.html
Reason: Spelling error
By the way I noticed, the ending is different in Ankit's post. The difference is so significant that the entire punch in the original is lost.
this cul-de-sac investigation stole my afternoon nap.... Ahhh 
how?
One apect we must keep in mind is blog-o-sphere is still quite unstructured and informal and works in some ways like an extension of forwarding mails to friends and posting statuses on facebook. So clearly the rules are not defined as to what constitutes plagiarism and what does not. Mostly things work by social consensus - a more of a mobocracy. If lot of people feel something is plagiarism, it is . If not, it isn't.
But things are changing. These kind of lucrative contests are becoming more popular. Revenues from ad sense are probably going up. So in time more well defined norms need to come in for blogging, especially the more lucrative kind of blogging and in all likelihood has to align with the norms of traiditonal publishing and journalism. So in that context Pankti's comments are valuable and it is time all serious bloggers start re-evaulating their content with this lens before posting.
TF, not everything which has similarity can be termed as plagiarized. I remember reading somewhere long ago, that everything question has been answered, everything has been written as the world started thousands of years ago. Do we have anything called original now?
In my opinion, plagoiarism should be linked to the intent.
Animesh - These kind of arguments are meaningless. That is the reason we have laws and rule books to have everyone on same page whether we agree or not. And blog-o-sphere as such has no rule book. So from that angle anything is acceptable in blog-o-sphere.
I can extend your argument and say even theft is not wrong. Everything on this earth is nature's bounty. Humans have started putting walls and boundaries and claiming things as their's and their descendants'. There is no justification for a man born with nothing to call his own to respect these unfair walls and boundaries. But then if he does not, police will kick his ass. So he has to. I would say it is not fair. But that is how the world is.
@TF, nature's bounty?!...that's good one....
Animesh - Possibly in future we may have a bloggers' guild formulating law. Till then, it is going to be mobocracy. People are going to get together on Facebook and lynch whoever they think is a plagiarist. That is why I generally avoid all these plagiarism witch hunts on facebook as it is very much a grey area with no clear lines drawn.
Turned out to be easier than I thought (I underestimated my Googling skills- got it at my first try). Here are a few instances of the SAME story.
http://www.livelifehappy.com/30-days-of-carrying-my-wife/
http://www.snopes.com/glurge/carry.asp
https://www.facebook.com/DeepLifeQuotes/posts/203312683104097
Can someone please tell me now who is the original author of this story?
don't think it's possible to trace it!
Stephen, the key here is "thorough investigation".
Even if I believe that Ankit did it intentionally, he is far behind from Sourav Pandey when it comes to plagiarism. And people are free to read IB blog how they had handled the situation. It was not made public before his side of story was known. All posts in questions were checked and even after that he was given a chance to apologize via that blog post.
I was just going through the thread again. Suddenly I noticed something. You are asking them to step on Ankit's shoes, which is exactly what you don't want them to do I guess. (Guess you meant stepping into his shoes. But stepping on his shoeswould mean just the opposite)
Yes @TF. Absolutely correct. I was thinking what someone was thinking when he asked that we step 'on' his shoes.
The problem with facebook is that its search SUCKS. Secondly, finding the author of that FB story is impossible (unless use crawlers of the level that Google use and that too would guarantee the first post, not the author necessarily)
I can try a few Google searches to try and find a link to the "original" story, but I don't think it's gonna be easy.
I think we should stop disscusing the plagiarism issue until we find that story and give the author a chance to say what he thinks.
Shaumik, I have given the link to the story.
I still stand by my beliefs that this is called plagiarism (as would ANY editor), but if we are going to give a benefit of doubt here, who am I to say anything? I have said enough and I have even given enough evidence to prove my standing. My case rests here.
Ok....here is the story. Have a field day now/
http://community.babycenter.com/post/a23660497/marriage-_a_must_read_found_on_fb
people there saying its giving round since 2004 
OK, read both posts now. Had not read Ankit's post till now.
The fact is that this story is a very old one. This may be doing rounds on FB today, but it is older than FB itself! So, obviusly who shares it on FB saying his/her own is also lieng. But, anyway that's not the question here. The question here is about the intention of Ankit. Though he has said that he did not know about this story being already published, believing him or not is on people.
As TF said, it's like getting inspired from the famous Rabbit and Tortoise story. Do you call it plagiarized? You may, you may not. I would once again request to get in touch with the blogger personally before putting a gun onto him/her. Someone's reputation is at stake here.
Ok I have noting against the blogger personally...but as per me this is what happened....
"I found a post of someone else through someone else (Doen't matter if it was published or not), tweaked it, put it on my blog, claimed it was my work (Not even put a caption that it can be inspired)....people found out, questioned my intent....I apologised"
Its good that the blogger has apologised...good for him....and what action Indiblog takes, their decision..... but if you are saying....it was okay to copy because he was ignorant the work was published, I am really not getting the point...really??
But like Pankti....now I am out of this discussion obviously my line of thinking is very different from others!!!
Just a little correction to what you said:
"I found a post of someone else through someone else (Doen't matter if it was published or not),
In this case, the writer did not know that this was a post. He was narrated a story by a friend and he posted it. It's your decision to be out of this discussion which I think is the easiest thing to do. But then I have to think twice before writing every post. If I write based on some discussion with someone, do I write a disclaimer everytime that this is based on a discussion with so and so and that it might have been post eralier, too?
it was okay to copy because he was ignorant the work was published
As far as I undestand, the word copying can be used only if someone has got an inspiration from some post. In this case, when one was not aware that there has been any post of this sort and truly believed what his friend said, how can it be copy?
Accusing someone of plagiarism without knowing his side of story, then expecting an action to be taken against him and then leaving the discussion half-way, is that OK?
My 2 cents.
I read through the post. It clearly does not meet the blog-o-sphere's definition of plagiarism. It is highly plausible as he said he has heard the story somewhere and based on that tried to make his own story. People often write hare and tortoise story and such popular stories on their blog with just the intention of sharing. Since they make no money out of it, nothing wrong with it.
But definitely the post lacks originality and there is no value added contribution from the blogger except for Indianization and the pictures. So definitely not fit to be a contest winner. But it is upto the organizers to decide what they are looking for. So many organizers have so many arbitrary criteria. If they want to pick a cliched entry as winner, so be it. And with the blogger openly stating it is picked from a circulating FB post, organizers have full choice whether to choose him as winner or not.
This is a general post floating on FB like so many others and hence I doubt if we will ever find the original authors.
TF agree with you
Exactly my point TF. If we start screening posts like this, every other posts will be plagiarized. All ideas have been already written during last thousands of years. we need to use this word cautiously.
As far as winning is concerned, as you said we have no say on that. That's a totally organizer's decision.
Unless the facebook page is found, can we really hold the blogger guilty for anything ?? Specially when he came foward to explain him self and agrees to accept guilt if it is proved ??
Hunky, agree. We're talking in dark. We have not seen the original yet but one has been found guilty of copying it.
@Sfurti this is a question of honour and responsibility. When Ankit accepted he has given all options. But until the investigation is completed, he is not tampering wth critical evidence in the blog post and comments.
That is what any investigation does and it gives IndiPolice the chance to solve the issue. Once resolved, it will be taken down.
As for traffic, that is momentary. If its high today then its momentary spike and Ankit is putting his reputation on the line too. Many may not accept his story, that too is a reality he has to deal with.
I do not think people have read the comments where Ankit has asked for links of similar stories.
@Pankti we are not professional writers or editors but certainly we need your help and guidance in improving but we surely can use civil language and some patience in identifying responsibility.
I recommended not removing the post for the reason that leaving it on the blog with the acceptance can also help find the true author.
As for the contest, I think with that acceptance on the post, it gets barred from getting any prize. So that should not be an issue at all.
@Sriram, where did I use uncivilized language. Please point that out to me as I would really appreciate it. I might be bit harsh but I don't think I was uncivilized.
@ Sriram...If its not my original post...and I dont know who the author is..why should it remain on my blog?? Anyways its given the blog enough publicity and pagehits..
One thing is sure this topic made the blog a little bit popular noticed a high blip in the visitors graph just now
I personally know this blogger and he knows very well the consequences of copying content. We have had discussions and also shared past stories of plagiarism and he knows the severity of plagiarizing.
Please find the true author and let him know about it and he will give credit for it. He is also putting it on his blog post that the post has been identified as copied content and leaving the post on his blog for direction.
Unlike in the past where many disputed, this blogger has accepted his error and is asking for help. Let us help him do the right thing.
As for past competitions, let us deal with that separately.
My question to all is, if there is genuine effort to improve and accept responsibility publicly, are we still going to victimize or guide?
Yep I believe what Sriram says is correct. If somebody gives an apology it should be accepted and the way forward is to disregard the entry for the contest.
@Sriram, this is not the case of victimizing anybody...this is the case of a blogger being responsible for his/her actions. It's good that the blogger has accepted his mistake and readers will definitely appreciate it. Now what he should do will be debatable, and so I am not saying anything over here.
In his place, I would have removed the whole post because the inspiration can go only to a certain limit. Being a professional writer/editor, we have a simple rule: no matter how damned impress we are, we cannot internalize those pieces in our writings. In my old publication, one of my colleagues was threatened to be sued by another journalist of international caliber over the plagiarism of couple of sentences (It was not even a para, let alone an entire piece). So I follow those damned stringent rules. But then, bloggers may not agree with me over here. So now this is up for discussion.
My point of view is...if the blogger knew about plaigiarism and knew that he is not presenting his own work, he should have given due credit to the author at first place....I even remember one comment on the post telling him about the FB post.....he knew it was not his original work and he knew the consequences of copying.....So he should face the consequence now!!!!
But thats what I think..
@Ranjith, why didnt the orginal content owners file a DCMA against that guy Saurav and get his blog banned. He is still online and posting. I tried to check it for plagarism with checker but my net is too damn slow so couldnt get results. Maybe later.
I think we need to see the bigger picture.
The blogger has apologized and is asking for direction to give due credit to the original author. Do we know who that is?
I don't think the blogger won anything as the contest is still ongoing if my understanding is right. Correct me if I am wrong.
@Sriram, I would be glad to be of help but this story is somewhere buried in FB stories... Sfurti (another IB member) is going to try to search for the original content. In the meantime, what should be the appropriate course of action only Indipolice can say...
Well I am surprised that the post won! Usually, in such contests, the judges run a plagiarism check before they let the post pass up to the next level of evaluation. But evidently, here that does not seem to be part of the agenda at all!
Hi Guys,
I am the one whose post you all are talking about.I would want to say few things1. Seriously speaking I had no idea that such a story is making rounds on FB, it was something shared by a friend of mines and I was so much inspired from it that I thought of presenting it with my own emotions attached to it.2. I apologize for hurting the sentiments of fellow bloggers and my readers, it had whatsoever no intensions of doing so.3. Can you please provide me the link and name of the true author of this story, so that I can give him full credit.4. If you guys want I will remove the post right now. Also I have added the following lines on my post
"I was not aware that this story is making rounds on FB. Can you please provide me with the link and name of the true authorso that I can give credit to that person."
Morning Ankit..
It seems some bloggers feels that the post is very similar to something what they have read on FB, so lets wait till that FB page is found.. Secondly, I dont think you should remove the post yet as original story URL is still not found..
Fight is suppose to be against Plagiarised content, not against you or any individual..
Thank you for commenting and clearing your end also..
Presenting any story in your own words is not plagiarism. So chill if it is not copy paste.
There were a few other instances of plagiarism in Indi Contests. And also, there was one person whose plagiarized posts won several contests!
.
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Now, every time I see a huge post on Facebook ( when my friends are browsing their feed ) lifted from somewhere else without giving any credit, I just wonder how the poster could they do such a thing and the same applies for those who share those posts! 
Why was the issue not raised when the plagiarized content won the contents? I believe I'd have raised hell...How can anyone put up with such unethical practices?
Actually, people knew that the entry was a plagiarized one many days after the declaration of results. I wasn't there on Indi at that time. You can read about it here.
I got access denied. I thought I would have to go home and check it out 
My network department knows 
But i don't want to ask them, least they block this IB too 
The person inflicted had become a great friend of mine at indie itself, and still is. This person could have taken the prize on a blank post as only vote s mattered then. We had serious talks then on vote begging issues. He was grand vote getter. The way this was dealt, downed the position of indie. It was a flawed judgement and they oughta have banned silently, but the humiliation process was unwarranted.
Just my personal views.
One can be inspired though and reword and present a post in his own manner, that is allowed methinks.
@Rio, if you reword an idea and express it in the way you think, it's not plagiarism..but the day you start lifting idea, sentence formation AND flow of the work, it DOES become plagiarized content...BTW, famous journalists and budding authors have lost their credibility through this practice. I don't remember the name of the author but there was this American author who used to write on psychological issues. He plagiarized his second book from his own first book. When everybody realized it, his books were removed from the shelves and all the contracts for furture book writing were taken back. I know about other such instances too.
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