DO NOT SIMPLY COPY AN ENTIRE ARTICLE

[mthrnite]

Please summarize in your own words, the essence of the news you are reporting. Please read the stickies in this forum for a guide. Simply copying the entire source article verbatim is lazy, and tantamount to plagiarism.

I expect users to take a few minutes to write something in their own words. most of the internet is news which has been mirrored from other sources. let us try to act more professional than the next site by writing our own descriptions, and then link back to source posts for "more information."

Proper USN Template
Discussion on Plagiarism

Thank you Urza for bringing this to my attention.

 

[Quietlyawesome94]

I myself have been guilty of this a few times. I'll make sure I don't do it again.

 

[notmeanymore]

One does not simply copy-paste into Mordor.

 

[Foxi4]

Agreed. If I ever want to read an article as it is with no summary at all, I can just click the "Source" button and read it on the Source site.

Excerpts are good. Complete copy-pasta is not.

 

[prowler]

before the end of september there will be 10 stickys in the usn

 

[mthrnite]

before the end of september there will be 10 stickys in the usn

Sure it's redundant, but then again, it's redundant!

 

[Rydian]

Can we get the template sticky fixed up too? With the P code fixed (it's using the old codes), and with the template modified to have the download icon/link as well?

 

[mthrnite]

Can we get the template sticky fixed up too? With the P code fixed (it's using the old codes), and with the template modified to have the download icon/link as well?

Yes we can.

 

[Zerosuit connor]

I love the word Verbatim

 

[Heran Bago]

Are we allowed to both summarize and quote the article? I ask because I usually don't care what the user has to say and if they don't quote the article I'll just click/read the soure instead.

 

[mthrnite]

Are we allowed to both summarize and quote the article? I ask because I usually don't care what the user has to say and if they don't quote the article I'll just click/read the soure instead.

Absolutely. The problem we're having is that people are quoting the entire article. I think perhaps submitters want to get it up first and thus take no time at all in presentation. In deciding what to prune when faced with duplicate news submissions, I will look for best over first.


Good to see you btw.

 

[KingVamp]

1) I feel sourcing the article is what keep you from Plagiarism.
2) Do mean do a page copy or a small section when you say didn't copy the entire article?
3) Summarizing in your own words, could lead to people spinning the news to their bias
and not give you the whole information.

Not saying take the lazy and quick route such as making a title and then fixing up the post properly later,but just to keep from messing up the reported
news.

Kinda sleepy, so if that doesn't make sense then...

 

[Rydian]

There's times when you do need to quote a while paragraph (for example to show specific wording), the main issue is when people copy-paste a 5-paragraph article and nothing else makes it into the post.

 

[RupeeClock]

If I ever post a news article, I don't paste the ENTIRE article, I take the most relevant section of it and trim the fat, make sure it is quoted, and then provide a source to the full article with my own editorial at the bottom of the post.

But I don't do it all that often either. Part of the problem with asking people to write their own USN articles is that they're going to mis-word things, or lack any proper writing skills to convey the significance of something.

It is NOT plagiarism if you site your source and quote properly. Of course it isn't to Harvard APA Standards but whatever.

 

[mthrnite]

Thank you [m]Densetsu[/m] for adding the relevant links to the initial post

@[member='RupeeClock'], the way you describe how you do it sounds good to me.

My issue was merely in the wholesale copy/pasting of the complete source article.
Plagiarism is a very "hot" word, and I'm not inclined to use it, or define it to everyone's satisfaction. Common sense will absolutely do in this case, and I appreciate everyone's effort who actually does make an effort. We're not not looking for perfection, and even in the extreme cases of the articles that were no more than a copy of the original, we appreciate the gathering of the news, just not it's presentation.

We're not setting a very high bar, but we are setting a bar.

To everyone who submits news, thank you for being an asset to our site.

 

[RupeeClock]

Of course, news posts should be made to some sort of standard that is actually useful to the reader.
Allow them to follow up where the article came from, read the full story, actually understand what the hell is going on.

Copy-pasting the entire article makes you look like a spam-bot with sites that do that just for page-hits.

 

[MEGAMANTROTSKY]

OP, thank you for the useful guide. Perhaps this too should be stickied...?

 

[gloweyjoey]

I just generally followed the template sticky, which said copy the article into a paragraph tag and then put your source and then whatever you input is was to go under that.

Looking at it now, its been changed.

 

[Gahars]

I try to follow the guidelines with all the posts I make. If I'm actually disobeying one of the rules or anything, please feel free to let me know.

 

[Another World]

if anyone has questions about how to post, how to write up the article, bbcode, etc, don't hesitate to ask us. its why we are here!

Looking at it now, its been changed.

guess you didn't look for a long time. i made changes and added the "no quote policy" on 1/7/2011.

-another world