We have seen an increase in plagiarism here on ATS lately and it STOPS NOW.

Going forward, if you post something that is not 100% your own writing or work you must use the EX TAG, post NO MORE THAN 10% of the original (or three paragraphs, whichever is least), and GIVE A LINK TO THE SOURCE MATERIAL. If the work you are posting is not on the internet, from a book for example, you MUST give a credit for that Book ( the title), its Author and Publisher.

Failure to do so will get you a MANDATORY 3 DAY POST BAN on the first offense, all points and prestige titles (writer/fighter/scholar) will be erased. A second offense will guarantee you a permanent account ban with no appeal and no questions asked. Complete loss of access to AboveTopSecret.com. That's how SERIOUS we are about STOPPING this disgusting activity. Stealing someone else's intellectual property and presenting it as your own mental produce is not only illegal, it's fraud and straight out LYING to the community.

Copyright infringement/plagiarism is a REAL problem especially on the internet where it's so easy to do. This makes the whole plagiarism issue even more serious for us here at ATS. The lawyers who specialize in this field are looking to make a mint by suing people, organizations, companies and any other entity stupid enough to plagiarize.

ATS is in a unique position because we allow "members" to add content to our servers without prior screening for copyright infringements. While our T&C give us some level of protection, there isn't a "set of rules" or document in the universe that will protect us if we don't take severe and proactive steps to prevent it best we can and eliminate it when it "slips through the inevitable cracks".

When you plagiarize someone else's work you are putting the Owner's of this site and the site's future at severe risk. This is not a trivial matter, you can NOT assume since something is on the web it's free for you to copy at will, worse yet, it's intellectually dishonest trying to pass someone else's work off as your own is lying plain and simple.

When in doubt... DO NOT QUOTE! Just post your description and a link.

Springer & SkepticOverlord





[edit on 1-2-2006 by Springer]

post NO MORE THAN the FIRST 3 Paragraphs

I have a question regarding quotes.

What if the quote only contained 3 paragraphs but instead of the quote being the first three it was the most relevant three?

Would this be a problem?

Thanks.

I agree with this and understand the reminder. It's very important.

I would like to ask for clarification on one point...

Originally posted by Springer
post NO MORE THAN the FIRST 3 Paragraphs

If the relevant information is not in the first 3 paragraphs of the quoted material, but found halfway down the quoted material, I take it we still need to quote only from the first 3 paragraphs. Is that true?

Sometimes I pick several relevant sentenses throughout the linked material and quote them, separating them with ellipses (...) . According to this notice, I need to stop doing that and quote only from the first 3 paragraphs. Is that correct?

Thank you.


Edit: D'oh!

[edit on 2-1-2006 by Benevolent Heretic]

plagiarism is for LOSERS!


so yeah don't do it!

It's all about volume and being redundant... It doesn't matter which 3 paragraphs (however it's going to be hard to follow if you grab 3 from the middle) or if they are even complete paragraphs.

There is NO PROBLEM grabbing and quoting several sentences and seperating them like you illustrate.

The point is there is NO REASON to ever quote more than 3 paragraphs. It's not Kosher and it's simply wasting webspace since it's already online at another site.

Springer...

I'm so glad you've brought this to the fore Springer.

Over the month of December I noticed an increase in this practice. I would find myself examining the writing style of a few members so that I could figure out what were their words and what was ripped off.

I agree that the punishment should be harsh for the offending member because we can't put the whole community at risk because of the actions of a few.
In the future, if I find myself reading any plagiarised work I'll be hitting the gripe/complaint button to report it to the mods.

I've refined the original description to make the amount of quoting allowed a little more clear.

Gotcha No plagiarising!! But can I write the words of another and pass them off as my own?

[edit on 2-1-2006 by Freedom_for_sum]

Originally posted by Freedom_for_sum
Gotcha No plagiarising!! But can I write the words of another and pass them off as my own?

This is one of those "zero tolerance" issues... There's no wiggle room or semantics... Plea bagaining is out of the question. Any attempt to mitigate the offense by calling it by another name will be fruitless.

Sorry to seem so harsh, and a less than mirthful regarding this matter, it just is what it is... Unacceptable.

Well, I'm glad that this issue is being dealt with.

I wasn't even aware of the growth of plagiarism on ATS, I guess I just assumed that such an intelligent community wouldn't have to resort to doing that. But, I am definately glad the staff of ATS noticed and are taking action, that means a less chance that the site will get shutdown

UO

Steal from one, it's called plagarism; steal from many, and it's called research...

This may merely be semantics, but is the concept here plagarism or copyright? I mean this in the sense as if I write the lyrics to "Enter Sandman" for example out on my website and claim they're my own, it's plagarism; if I state that it's Metallica's, then without getting permission I've violated their copyrights. Or do I misunderstand the terms?

My understanding is that most of the external quoting here wouldn't be considered plagarism--at least most that I've seen anyways. Most people cite their sources, generally with a link where applicable.

Just so we are all crystal clear on this, how about some concrete examples of what is OK and what is not.

Also:
Is grabbing an image and using it for my avatar prohibited?

Originally posted by MCory1
Steal from one, it's called plagarism; steal from many, and it's called research...

This may merely be semantics, but is the concept here plagarism or copyright? I mean this in the sense as if I write the lyrics to "Enter Sandman" for example out on my website and claim they're my own, it's plagarism; if I state that it's Metallica's, then without getting permission I've violated their copyrights. Or do I misunderstand the terms?

My understanding is that most of the external quoting here wouldn't be considered plagarism--at least most that I've seen anyways. Most people cite their sources, generally with a link where applicable.

What's the problem here? If you post someone else's writing or work on ATS give credit to the author and provide a link to the text. Seems simple enough.....

Originally posted by jsobecky
Also:
Is grabbing an image and using it for my avatar prohibited?

I think that is a really good question and I'm afraid of what the answer will be (or could be in the future).

There is but only a handful of truly original avatars. Meaning the avatar is a personal photo or other work of part. All others are image edits. I have around 200 avatars on this forum that are made by image manipulations almost all of them from comic book covers. Many avatars on here are made from movie images and other media.

Are we on the track where avatars on ATS will never be the same? Virtually no avatars or only images that are proven to be completely original?

Forget the avatars here. Avatars are not plagiarism. "Fair use" and blahblah. It´s another discussion.


If you´re not using your own words, remember to use "" or quote-tags and provide the source.

Originally posted by MCory1


My understanding is that most of the external quoting here wouldn't be considered plagarism--at least most that I've seen anyways. Most people cite their sources, generally with a link where applicable.

HELLO?

READ MY POST there are explicit instructions on what is a quote and acceptable and what is plagiarism and not acceptable..

There is NO MENTION of graphics anywhere in my post thus I think the avatar issue is pretty self explanatory as well.

Springer...

[edit on 1-2-2006 by Springer]

Originally posted by Centrist
I think the mods need to be aware of certain situations where material posted in its entirety can, at times, be the "story" that starts the thread and should inquire

I just wanted to address this in addition to anyone else that has done so. The people that give up their time to help ATS, like the moderators, councilpeople, administration, etc, are great people, and are allways willing to talk to members about stuff like this. There's allways going to be situations where the rules aren't clear, whenever that happens, best to drop any one of us a line.

That goes for everything on the board, not just this plagarism issue. The problem with plagarism in particular is that its just wrong, to present someone else's stuff as your own. Talking to one of us before hand in an usual situation would make it clear what the intentions are, as opposed to one of us perusing the board and stumbling upon something.