WRD 104: Composition & Rhetoric II Rotating Header Image

Professional research and plagiarism

Since we’re working on our contextual analyses and research this week, I thought you might be interested in this article from the Washington Post, which raises interesting questions about both academic and non-academic research and writing:

“Flock says that in haste she read about 10 stories about Mars life, including some of the research papers, and forgot to credit and link to the originator of the story, Discovery News. It appears that she copied, pasted and slightly rewrote two paragraphs from the Discovery story. Plagiarism perhaps, but also a perpetual danger in aggregated stories.

“After Discovery News raised objections, Flock resigned voluntarily. She said that the mistakes were hers. She said it was only a matter of time before she made a third one; the pressures were just too great.”