What is plagiarism?

Question

Why is plagiarism against the law?
What is plagiarism laws?

Answer 1

copying someone elses words

Answer 2

Plagiarism occurs when you use someone else's original work but you don't give credit. For example, if you are writing a paper for school, or an article for a magazine, and you quote someone else, you should put the quotation in quotation marks and indicate who actually said it. Otherwise, you are taking credit for someone else's work.

This is, in effect, intellectual fraud. It is the intellectual equivalent to claiming that something is, say, gold, when it is really pyrite. You are defrauding the buyer. The same is true of plagiarism; you claim something is yours, when it is really someone else's. You are defrauding the reader.

For example, Martin Luther King Jr engaged in plagiarism in his Ph.D. dissertation. He simply copied word-for-word a substantial section of someone else's dissertation.

Plagiarism is, simply, telling a lie about what you wrote.It is bad for the same reason that any other lie is bad.

Plagiarism might or might not be against the law, depending on your jurisdiction. However, there are usually sanctions against it, depending on the context in which you did it. For example, if you plagiarized in school, you might have been given an F on the paper you plagiarized, or even an F in the class. If you plagiarized in a newspaper or magazine, you might have been fired for it, or made to give back a Pulitzer Prize or other award.

Answer 3

Plagiarism – The act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

To be liable for plagiarism it is not necessary to exactly duplicate another’s literary work, it being sufficient if unfair use of such work is made by lifting of substantial portion thereof, but even an exact counterpart of another’s work does not constitute plagiarism if such counterpart was arrived at independently. (re: O’Rouke v. RKO Radio Pictures) Source Black’s Law Dictionary.

Of course many have varying perspectives on this subject:

“Most writer’s steal a good thing when they can,
And when ‘tis safety got ‘tis worth the winning.
The worst of ‘t is we now and them detect ‘em.
Before they ever dream that we suspect them.”
B. W. Proctor (Barry Cornwall): Dramatic Scenes 1819.

“It has come to be practically a sort of rule in
literature that a man, having once shown
himself capable of original writing, is entitled
thenceforth to steal from the writings of others at discretion.”
R. W. Emerson: Representative Men, V, 1850.

Answer 4

In short, plagiarism is copying another's literary work and ideas to an unreasonable extent. How that last phrase is interpreted is where it gets fuzzy. Copying something entirely is a clear violation. A quote or two within a larger work of your own will be covered by citing the original author. Between those two extremes is for the lawyers to fight out.

Answer 5

Plagiarism is when you use someone's work and claim that it is your own, or fail to acknowledge the true creator/author. Plagiarism violates copyright laws (not to mention the fact that plagiarizing usually ends up costing you a failing grade on whatever you were supposed to be doing for yourself!)

Answer 6

Plagiarism is when you take something written by someone else, copy it and present it as your own work.

It's different than copyright violation, which is any unauthorized copying of protected material. It's more like fraud, because it's passing someone else's work of as your own.

Plagiarism is illegal when it violates copyright law. Or if a particular state has laws against it.

But most often, it's considered an ethical violation, for schools or professions or companies. So, even it's not illegal, it can result in serious consequences.

Answer 7

Plagiarism is when you take the written words of another and claim them as your own in your writing. It is a crime of morality and not against any law.

Answer 8

plagiarism is someone copying another persons work for their own benefit.it is illegal because the real author is not getting credit for it,while the person that just copied and paste it is. You can not plagiaris anything unless you make a source page or some kind of reference. you can get kicked out of college or in some cases severe trouble in highschool and with the law

Answer 9

Plagiarism is basically stealing someone else's written work.

It is illegal in the same scense that if someone stole a song from a musician. The words themselves are not copywritten, but the order and meaning that is derived from them in that context is. Anyone can "refer" to the writing, and you can even quote (giving the author proper credit) the work. But if using the writing in a significant amount means getting permission from the author.

Answer 10

What is plagiarism?

Why is plagiarism against the law?
What is plagiarism laws?

Answer 11

plagarism is the act of taking credit for the written words and/or ideas of another person. This includes:

failing to site the sources you used
failing to identify your source for a quote or paraphrased idea within the text
Paraphrasing someone elses ideas and passing them off as your own
Presenting someone elses whole work as your own.

Plagarism is against the law, because words and ideas are what is called intellectual property. They belong to the person with whom they originated. When you plagarize you are stealing intellectual property.