Featured Article: My First Plagiarism Battle
By Jonathan Bailey • May 13th, 2006 • Category: Articles, Featured ArticlesFirst off, I’d like to again welcome all of the new readers to Plagiarism Today. I’m very glad that you are here and hope that you will participate in the conversation. I look forward to hearing what you have to say.
While most entries on PT do not build on anything in the past, there are some entries which have become cornerstones for many current articles. So, to help ensure everyone is on the same page, I’ve decided to take advantage of Saturdays updates, where very little is happening anyway, to post featured article pieces discussing some of those older entries.
This weeks featured article is: My First Plagiarism Battle
My First Plagiarism Battle (Part One)
My First Plagiarism Battle (Part Two)
My First Plagiarism Battle (Part Three)
My First Plagiarism Battle (Epilogue)
These articles tell the story of how I discovered that I was being plagiarized and how I handled my first case of it. It’s a textbook case in how NOT to handle plagiarism and has become a story I reference back to somewhat regularly, including on the About the Author page.
Long story short, if you’re interested in learning how I got involved in this fight, this is the story to read.
[tags]Plagiarism, Content Theft, Copyright Infringement, Copyright[/tags]
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Jonathan Bailey is The Webmaster and author of Plagiarism Today, which he founded in 2005 as a way to help Webmasters going through content theft problems get accurate information and stay up to date on the rapidly-changing field. He is also a consultant to Webmasters and companies to help them devise practical content protection strategies and develop good copyright policies.
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I really appreciated the chance to read through the journal of your first battle with plagiarism. Your description of your emotions reminded me of something that happened to me years ago, and which I had largely buried in my memories.
When I was about 16, about 1980, I wrote a bulletin board program for my Apple II. This was back in the days of CP/M based single phone line BBSes. To the best of my knowledge, I was the first person to write BBS code for an Apple using native AppleDOS. I was very proud of my effort, since I had written some machine language code to deal with control of the modem and to enhance performance- heady stuff for a 16 year old in 1980! I made my BBS code available to several other folks who wanted to run their own bulletin board, and asked nothing in return other than credit for my work.
A year or so later, I was rifling through the AppleShare disk library. Apple back in those days had a collection of “owner-submitted” freeware. Coders would submit their creations to Apple, who would in turn put their logo on it and distribute it via Apple dealers. The coders got the “pride” of having their creation, along with their name, distributed by Apple. I had never submitted anything to Apple since I didn’t think my work was good enough.
You guessed it…there, in the AppleShare library, was my BBS software. But instead of my name appearing, there was someone else’s name.
I was angry- I was heart broken- I felt like I’d been violated. It wasn’t just a “thing” that had been stolen, it was a piece of me. I eventually was able to confront the guy who stole my code, but he basically told me I was a sucker and a loser. Apple said they had no proof of who wrote the code, and they didn’t care to investigate. I was never able to get any real satisfaction, and it severely crushed any desire I had to code anything for “free” ever again.
The emotions you recount in your posting echo what I felt and had largely forgotten all those years ago. I personally don’t have the energy to fight the sociopaths who feel that it is their right to steal the work of others and call it their own, but I’m glad to see others do.
Keep up the good fight!
I really appreciated the chance to read through the journal of your first battle with plagiarism. Your description of your emotions reminded me of something that happened to me years ago, and which I had largely buried in my memories.
When I was about 16, about 1980, I wrote a bulletin board program for my Apple II. This was back in the days of CP/M based single phone line BBSes. To the best of my knowledge, I was the first person to write BBS code for an Apple using native AppleDOS. I was very proud of my effort, since I had written some machine language code to deal with control of the modem and to enhance performance- heady stuff for a 16 year old in 1980! I made my BBS code available to several other folks who wanted to run their own bulletin board, and asked nothing in return other than credit for my work.
A year or so later, I was rifling through the AppleShare disk library. Apple back in those days had a collection of “owner-submitted” freeware. Coders would submit their creations to Apple, who would in turn put their logo on it and distribute it via Apple dealers. The coders got the “pride” of having their creation, along with their name, distributed by Apple. I had never submitted anything to Apple since I didn’t think my work was good enough.
You guessed it…there, in the AppleShare library, was my BBS software. But instead of my name appearing, there was someone else’s name.
I was angry- I was heart broken- I felt like I’d been violated. It wasn’t just a “thing” that had been stolen, it was a piece of me. I eventually was able to confront the guy who stole my code, but he basically told me I was a sucker and a loser. Apple said they had no proof of who wrote the code, and they didn’t care to investigate. I was never able to get any real satisfaction, and it severely crushed any desire I had to code anything for “free” ever again.
The emotions you recount in your posting echo what I felt and had largely forgotten all those years ago. I personally don’t have the energy to fight the sociopaths who feel that it is their right to steal the work of others and call it their own, but I’m glad to see others do.
Keep up the good fight!
Kelly,
I’m sorry that happened to you. However, I think you might have just described one of the earliest incidents of plagiarism involving what would become the Web.
It’s fascinating in a very morbid way. Things have evolved so much in terms of the Internet but changed so little when it comes to plagiarism.
I guess this is how some people welcomed the brave new world…
Kelly,
I’m sorry that happened to you. However, I think you might have just described one of the earliest incidents of plagiarism involving what would become the Web.
It’s fascinating in a very morbid way. Things have evolved so much in terms of the Internet but changed so little when it comes to plagiarism.
I guess this is how some people welcomed the brave new world…
Wow, what a story.
If you don’t become a rich copyright lawyer you should become a famous writer at least, Jonathan.
It’s so good you are addressing this wide-spread problem. I’ll do anything to support your work, and am planning to investigate and invest in this subject myself as well. I’m sure the stories we read here from you and others are the tip of the iceberg. So giving more recognition to this problem will help many people.
Wow, what a story.
If you don’t become a rich copyright lawyer you should become a famous writer at least, Jonathan.
It’s so good you are addressing this wide-spread problem. I’ll do anything to support your work, and am planning to investigate and invest in this subject myself as well. I’m sure the stories we read here from you and others are the tip of the iceberg. So giving more recognition to this problem will help many people.