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Ask HN: Which bloggers are blatant plagiarists?
4 points by tokenadult on May 23, 2009 | hide | past | favorite | 4 comments
I was looking up articles on a particular subject, to respond to an HN participant who asked me to please come up with a new source for a new idea, and by a Google search I came upon an article by a researcher on that idea. I also came upon a blog post by a college professor who quoted just about that entire article, but without any citation to the original author's article at all. (Wouldn't that violate the standards of faculty conduct at any accredited college?)

I'm wondering how often you do a search for good articles on a particular subject, and find not only the original article by an eminent scholar but also blog posts that plagiarize that scholar's work. Which bloggers are especially likely to steal other people's words and work?

Naturally, I'd like to submit primary sources to HN whenever possible, so I'd like to know where NOT to look for original, thoughtful articles on important subjects of interest to hackers.




I don't think that is so much of an issue here as submitting a fluff summary instead of going another click and submitting the link to the original article. I find that, for most part, summary articles link to the original. The only reason that I might submit the summary is if the comments are particularly good.

If you really suspect foul play, Google for the key terms and see what comes up.

OTOH a list of bloggers to avoid, because they are most often just wrong would be useful. But maybe it's apparent after a couple of paragraphs.


If you really suspect foul play, Google for the key terms and see what comes up.

The example I found is where the blogger quotes darn near the entire article, but without ANY outlink or mention of the original author's name. Blogging is easy if someone else writes all the content of the blog posts.

OTOH a list of bloggers to avoid, because they are most often just wrong would be useful.

I'd be happy read such a list to know what not to surf over to.


Lots of bloggers I find do this, and it's highly annoying in my book. Sometimes getting filler information is good, if the blogger can intelligently pull out key points from another article when they're trying to drive a central point home. But, for the most part it's a practice I get frustrated with when I'm looking for actual articles to read and gain perspectivef rom.


Blogging is for the most part an echo chamber of regurgitated information. Period.




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