Is Plagiarism this Common?

[artlifeoriginal]

Another late opinion here, but I’m going to share it anyways:

I agree with @triciak, when I write something original, I would absolutely despise it if someone just swooped in and copied my piece exactly as it was written—barely changing the words so that it would not technically be plagiarizing.

However, if someone were to be inspired by my work, get the general gist, and then write something essentially new, I’m fine with it (maybe even crediting me). This is what I believe @emmaki, @fonthaunt, @artlifeoriginal, and others mean by the term “spinning” and “rewriting”.

I think the real debate is finding a definition of the terms “spinning” and “rewriting”, as well as identifying the line where it’s just plain plagiarism.

Buuuuuut… what do I know about this topic?

I think the real debate is finding a definition of the terms “spinning” and “rewriting”, as well as identifying the line where it’s just plain plagiarism.

I agree.

Actually, when I started participating in this discussion, I assumed spinning was altering something until no one could tell it was copied, rewriting was changing some words but leaving the majority intact, and plagiarism was just plain old cut-and-paste, and all of them were a no for me. Now I can’t even figure out the definition each person is using. 😕 I don’t like ambiguity.

[fitrigwrites4u]

I think spinning is totally fine. For instance, when you are about to write about chemical engineering, I don´t think you do the research yourself like them chemical engineers do in the lab, unless the writer is a chemical engineer, but then he/she will also need some references. Everyone starts somewhere from other people´s information. What? Do you wanna do everything from zero? I don´t think so. But of course,if it´s a plain copy paste without changing the words at all, that´s obviously plagiarism.

[fastcopywriter]

Well, look at romance books. It’s the same generic product every single time with a facelift. Same for Hollywood movies. We all know how thrillers work. We all know that Angela Lansbery is going to go to a posh place where someone will murder someone and we all play guess the murderer and it’s not the obvious evil guy but maybe the–shock, it was the antagonised butler whose motive was revealed 10 minutes towards the end! I could go on.

When I speak of devalued writing, I’m talking about people who can’t write, getting paid to write junk–or simply just outright plagiarize other content without even bothering to edit it, all for the sake of $5. My position is that if it’s well written and edited, it will be a fresh new piece. Derivative from the original–sure. I usually add in a couple of new opinions (because I am opinionated!). These clients don’t want to pay full rates for fresh content, but they do want good content. This is a way to give it to them. Beyond that, the ethics and morality is down to each person. It’s not writing an academic paper (not for pay–that I do disapprove of) where quotations, bibliographies and all the rest of it are the norm. I guess the online equivalent is the good old hyperlink, but if you’re rewriting smart, you’re not going to do that–you’ll find some other sources, and better sources. Not that I do this when I rewrite–that’s the client’s job, though I doubt many considered it.

Plus, there are a few people out there who just want a rewrite because while they’ve written something, they just feel that it’s not good enough and that a good writer can breathe some fresh new air into what feels like stale content.

I mean, we’re talking “Top 10 Ways Cats: The Musical Changed The Way We Eat” internet crap here. Nobody really cares, do they? Even with more business stuff like “Why You Need To Sit Up and Take Notice of Big Data’s Big Brother” is just going to be some tech article that gets rehashed. Press Releases these days: just throw that up on the site.

I mean, this is probably more to do with Google’s insistence on better quality content–I’m sure we remember the days when any old crap was thrown up and somehow ranked despite being as informative as a broken toaster. Now, they’re at least written in OK English (generally) and although it’s one of many very, very similar articles, it’s a step forward.

Perhaps Google will further develop its ability to detect similarities in rewrites and penalize newer spins/rewrites/etc (to the howls of anguished website owners across the globe). But until the day that doing this actively harms those website owners, they’re not going to stop. Ethics isn’t going to win here–but it rarely does outside the ivory towers of academia.

Here finishes the sermon 😉

EDIT: @fastcopywriter’s correct about the news-jacking. Hm, could be a gig idea…

I was a fan of Murder She Wrote growing up. I admit those shows in the 80s-90s were formulaic, but what was interesting was seeing how they got from point A to point B.

Today’s shows have at least two stories going on at the same time, sometimes more. They require a lot more attention, but I find them very interesting. I also like how they grow. Anyone who has watched The Big Bang theory from season 1 will remember that Sheldon didn’t have a girlfriend and Raj had selective mutism with women unless he was intoxicated. It’s good that the writers allowed them to evolve.

I’m a bigger fan of TV than I am of film, and even critics are admitting that TV has gotten a lot better than film. TV is also faster, when you only have 30-60 minutes minus commercials, you don’t have time to waste with long shots, and stupid silent moments. The only exception is The Walking Dead, the story is so good that I have no choice but to put up with their flaws.

[tomrubio]

Hi there,today plagiarism is the common thing.

[Guest kemmie]

;Hello everyone, my two cents on this conversation…

A lot of article writers on fiverr are spinning articles. I also did some ghost writing for a while, and tried my hands on article spinning for a client, per his request. I did not enjoy the process, yes the writing process was faster because you only have to modify the article and not write a new one, but for creative people like myself, spinning articles gets very boring after a while, because creatives thrive on generating new content and using their brain cells. 😀

Article rewriting and spinning will not generate much income because the client is aware that you are only rewriting someone else’s article, so most clients pay peanuts.

I think writing original content is a dying art 😔

[triciak]

;Hello everyone, my two cents on this conversation…

A lot of article writers on fiverr are spinning articles. I also did some ghost writing for a while, and tried my hands on article spinning for a client, per his request. I did not enjoy the process, yes the writing process was faster because you only have to modify the article and not write a new one, but for creative people like myself, spinning articles gets very boring after a while, because creatives thrive on generating new content and using their brain cells. 😀

Article rewriting and spinning will not generate much income because the client is aware that you are only rewriting someone else’s article, so most clients pay peanuts.

I think writing original content is a dying art 😔

I’ve sure learned a lot from this thread. Thanks for all the input. I agree

with Kemmie, writing original content might just be a lost art. I’ll stick

with it, though. I’m uncomfortable with spinning and rewriting.