Plagiarism occurs when someone uses another person\u2019s intellectual property and doesn't give them credit. Intellectual property is defined as material or ideas envisioned and created by another person. There are many kinds of intellectual property, including books, articles, essays, stories, poems, films, photographs, works of art or craft, or even just ideas. For example, if you copy text out of a textbook or article and use it in your homework assignment so it looks like you wrote it - that's plagiarism. If someone else thought of an idea and brought it into the world, they own it, and if you use their idea in your work, you have to acknowledge them as the actual owner. If you don\u2019t, you\u2019ve committed plagiarism. That\u2019s not a good idea!<\/p>\n
Plagiarism is a kind of academic dishonesty\u2014a kind of theft. Colleges and universities take plagiarism seriously; assignments can get a grade of zero, and many institutions discipline or even expel students who are found to be plagiarizing.<\/p>\n
Many educators used to believe that students plagiarized either because they were lazy or because they just didn\u2019t care about anything but getting that final piece of paper: the degree or certificate. Both of these reasons are still true sometimes: we\u2019ve all met people who don\u2019t like to work hard (or at all!) or who, in the case of college, just want that piece of paper and don\u2019t care how they get it.<\/p>\n
But today, thanks to the work of innovative educators, instructors know that plagiarism and cheating are often motivated by more complicated factors.<\/p>\n
As for you: how can you avoid plagiarism? It\u2019s actually quite simple:<\/p>\n\n
Exercise: Identifying Plagiarism<\/p>\n\n<\/header>\n
In today\u2019s digital age, with information seemingly at our fingertips, it\u2019s important to understand some of the guidelines and restrictions that affect how we use that information. This is another important part of using sources correctly and avoiding plagiarism.<\/p>\n\n
Copyright<\/strong>\u00a0is a legal term that refers to the person (or people) who own and distribute a piece of information. The copyright holder has rights to that material, and if others use the material without getting permission first, they may be in violation of copyright. This is not good! And it can result in fines.<\/p>\n What is the most important thing you need to know about copyright? Simple: If something is copyrighted, you cannot use it without getting permission; this may involve paying for permission.<\/p>\n\n Otherwise, the Canadian Guide to Copyright<\/a> is your go-to location for everything you need to know about copyright in Canada.<\/p>\n\n The concept of fair use<\/strong><\/a> allows students and teachers to use small amounts of copyrighted materials for a short-term, limited purpose\u2014particularly for study, teaching, or research. The rules of fair use apply to the United States. The four factors determining fairness include purpose and character of the use; nature of the copyrighted work; amount and substantiality of the portion of the work used; and the effect of the use on the potential market or value of the work.<\/p>\n In general, the following should be true if you claim fair use to work with copyrighted materials:<\/p>\n\n Creative Commons<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0(creativecommons.org) is a not-for-profit organization that collects all sorts of materials and makes them available to the public for free use.<\/p>\n When a user creates a piece of content (writing, art, photography, or just about anything), they may choose to put a Creative Commons licence on the material. The licence explains how people share, remix, re-purpose, or in other ways use the material.<\/p>\n As a student, the Creative Commons has made a world of materials available to you. If you use any of the materials in your work, you should include the Creative Commons in your source citation.<\/p>\n\n A BitTorrent<\/strong>\u00a0site is a website that encourages peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing. Files can consist of books, periodicals, music, film, data (many scientists use Torrent files to distribute large data packages) or virtually anything.<\/p>\n A major problem with these sites is that many of them engage in illegal file-sharing\u2014 particularly of music and film and lately of graphic novels. Notwithstanding the ethics involved, most of the sites are not secure, which raises the risk of users being implicated in illegal file-sharing activities. Most BitTorrent sites do not provide user anonymity and most can track (or at least record) IP addresses.<\/p>\n The best advice with BitTorrents: stay away from them unless you\u2019re really good with technology and know exactly what you\u2019re getting into.<\/p>\n Why is this worth mentioning? You\u2019ll often be asked to watch film or access other resources as part of your classes. And, you\u2019ll be asked to buy textbooks. You may be tempted to download a free book or movie through a Torrent site. Beware, and consider the implications first.<\/p>\n\n Exercise: Reverse Image Search<\/p>\n\n<\/header>\n Plagiarism occurs when someone uses another person\u2019s intellectual property and doesn’t give them credit. Intellectual property is defined as material or ideas envisioned and created by another person. There are many kinds of intellectual property, including books, articles, essays, stories, poems, films, photographs, works of art or craft, or even just ideas. For example, if you copy text out of a textbook or article and use it in your homework assignment so it looks like you wrote it – that’s plagiarism. If someone else thought of an idea and brought it into the world, they own it, and if you use their idea in your work, you have to acknowledge them as the actual owner. If you don\u2019t, you\u2019ve committed plagiarism. That\u2019s not a good idea!<\/p>\n Plagiarism is a kind of academic dishonesty\u2014a kind of theft. Colleges and universities take plagiarism seriously; assignments can get a grade of zero, and many institutions discipline or even expel students who are found to be plagiarizing.<\/p>\n Many educators used to believe that students plagiarized either because they were lazy or because they just didn\u2019t care about anything but getting that final piece of paper: the degree or certificate. Both of these reasons are still true sometimes: we\u2019ve all met people who don\u2019t like to work hard (or at all!) or who, in the case of college, just want that piece of paper and don\u2019t care how they get it.<\/p>\n But today, thanks to the work of innovative educators, instructors know that plagiarism and cheating are often motivated by more complicated factors.<\/p>\n As for you: how can you avoid plagiarism? It\u2019s actually quite simple:<\/p>\n There are a number of different practices which could lead to or be defined as plagiarism, so it’s important that you understand what constitutes plagiarism and what doesn’t.<\/p>\n Exercise: Identifying Plagiarism<\/p>\n<\/header>\n Which of these would be a kind of plagiarism?<\/p>\n Answers<\/p>\n All of the examples are kinds of plagiarism. Did you get them all correct? Remember, any time you use someone else’s intellectual property\u2014of any kind\u2014you must give them credit by acknowledging their name and giving information about the source.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n There is no need to cite common knowledge. Common knowledge does not mean knowledge everyone has. It means knowledge that everyone can easily access. For example, most people do not know the date of George Washington\u2019s death, but everyone can easily find that information. If the information or idea can be found in multiple sources and the information or idea remains constant from source to source, it can be considered common knowledge. This is one reason so much research is usually done for university writing\u2014the more sources you read, the more easily you can sort out what is common knowledge: if you see an uncited idea in multiple sources, then you can feel secure that idea is common knowledge.<\/p>\n In today\u2019s digital age, with information seemingly at our fingertips, it\u2019s important to understand some of the guidelines and restrictions that affect how we use that information. This is another important part of using sources correctly and avoiding plagiarism.<\/p>\n Copyright<\/strong>\u00a0is a legal term that refers to the person (or people) who own and distribute a piece of information. The copyright holder has rights to that material, and if others use the material without getting permission first, they may be in violation of copyright. This is not good! And it can result in fines.<\/p>\n What is the most important thing you need to know about copyright? Simple: If something is copyrighted, you cannot use it without getting permission; this may involve paying for permission.<\/p>\n Otherwise, the Canadian Guide to Copyright<\/a> is your go-to location for everything you need to know about copyright in Canada.<\/p>\n Fair dealing<\/a> is a legal term pertaining to users’ rights in Canada under copyright law. There are provisions that allow people to use parts of copyrighted material for specific purposes. Fair dealing applies to common law jurisdictions in the Commonwealth such as Britain, Australia, and New Zealand. The United States has a similar provision called fair use<\/em> (see below). The six factors defining fair dealings include purpose, character, amount, effect of the dealing, nature of the work, and alternatives to the dealing. Canada’s provisions have become more flexible particularly after an amendment process that took several years with extensive public consultation. In July 2012, the Federal Government of Canada amended fair dealing (Section 29) as follows: Fair dealing for the purpose of research, private study, education, parody or satire does not infringe copyright.<\/p>\n Fair dealing provides ways for people to use others’ copyrighted work without infringing on the author’s copyright. This is especially important for students and educators when using and sharing information in research assignments and projects.<\/p>\n The concept of fair use<\/strong><\/a> allows students and teachers to use small amounts of copyrighted materials for a short-term, limited purpose\u2014particularly for study, teaching, or research. The rules of fair use apply to the United States. The four factors determining fairness include purpose and character of the use; nature of the copyrighted work; amount and substantiality of the portion of the work used; and the effect of the use on the potential market or value of the work.<\/p>\n In general, the following should be true if you claim fair use to work with copyrighted materials:<\/p>\n Creative Commons<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0(creativecommons.org) is a not-for-profit organization that collects all sorts of materials and makes them available to the public for free use.<\/p>\n When a user creates a piece of content (writing, art, photography, or just about anything), they may choose to put a Creative Commons licence on the material. The licence explains how people share, remix, re-purpose, or in other ways use the material.<\/p>\n As a student, the Creative Commons has made a world of materials available to you. If you use any of the materials in your work, you should include the Creative Commons in your source citation.<\/p>\n Open Educational Resources<\/strong><\/a> (OERs) are teaching and learning materials that are available for free use by students and teachers everywhere because they are under an open licence, such as a Creative Commons licence. The move toward OERs has really taken off recently\u2014both to take advantage of the internet and digital publishing and also to help control the skyrocketing cost of textbooks. Open resources are easy to access and use and are continually updated and revised. You\u2019re reading one right now!<\/p>\n A BitTorrent<\/strong>\u00a0site is a website that encourages peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing. Files can consist of books, periodicals, music, film, data (many scientists use Torrent files to distribute large data packages) or virtually anything.<\/p>\n A major problem with these sites is that many of them engage in illegal file-sharing\u2014 particularly of music and film and lately of graphic novels. Notwithstanding the ethics involved, most of the sites are not secure, which raises the risk of users being implicated in illegal file-sharing activities. Most BitTorrent sites do not provide user anonymity and most can track (or at least record) IP addresses.<\/p>\n The best advice with BitTorrents: stay away from them unless you\u2019re really good with technology and know exactly what you\u2019re getting into.<\/p>\n Why is this worth mentioning? You\u2019ll often be asked to watch film or access other resources as part of your classes. And, you\u2019ll be asked to buy textbooks. You may be tempted to download a free book or movie through a Torrent site. Beware, and consider the implications first.<\/p>\n What if you have an image that you found somewhere on the internet and you want to use it in an assignment or some sort of publication, but you don’t remember where you found it. How will you credit the source? You can now do a reverse image search to try and find the owner or creator of images on the Web.<\/p>\n One of the best of these is TinEye<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>(www.tineye.com). Upload a copy of the image in question, and the TinEye engine will search for the original or oldest-known occurrence of the image. Google also has a reverse image search, and others are appearing on the Web all the time.<\/p>\n Exercise: Reverse Image Search<\/p>\n<\/header>\n Not only is it correct and ethical to avoid plagiarism and give credit to authors and sources, but it also adds credibility to your paper. When your paper cites reliable sources, it looks good on you that you have done good research and backed up your information.<\/p>\n This chapter is a remix of the following chapters:<\/p>\n\n \t
Fair Dealing<\/h2>\nFair dealing<\/a> is a legal term pertaining to users' rights in Canada under copyright law. There are provisions that allow people to use parts of copyrighted material for specific purposes. Fair dealing applies to common law jurisdictions in the Commonwealth such as Britain, Australia, and New Zealand. The United States has a similar provision called fair use<\/em> (see below). The six factors defining fair dealings include purpose, character, amount, effect of the dealing, nature of the work, and alternatives to the dealing. Canada's provisions have become more flexible particularly after an amendment process that took several years with extensive public consultation. In July 2012, the Federal Government of Canada amended fair dealing (Section 29) as follows: Fair dealing for the purpose of research, private study, education, parody or satire does not infringe copyright.\n\nFair dealing provides ways for people to use others' copyrighted work without infringing on the author's copyright. This is especially important for students and educators when using and sharing information in research assignments and projects.\n
Fair Use for Academic Purposes<\/h2>\n
\n \t
Creative Commons<\/h2>\n
Open Educational Resources<\/h2>\nOpen Educational Resources<\/strong><\/a> (OERs) are teaching and learning materials that are available for free use by students and teachers everywhere because they are under an open licence, such as a Creative Commons licence. The move toward OERs has really taken off recently\u2014both to take advantage of the internet and digital publishing and also to help control the skyrocketing cost of textbooks. Open resources are easy to access and use and are continually updated and revised. You\u2019re reading one right now!\n
Torrent and BitTorrent Sites<\/h2>\n
Reverse Image Search<\/h2>\nWhat if you have an image that you found somewhere on the internet and you want to use it in an assignment or some sort of publication, but you don't remember where you found it. How will you credit the source? You can now do a reverse image search to try and find the owner or creator of images on the Web.\n\nOne of the best of these is TinEye<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>(www.tineye.com). Upload a copy of the image in question, and the TinEye engine will search for the original or oldest-known occurrence of the image. Google also has a reverse image search, and others are appearing on the Web all the time.\n
\n \t
\n\nText Attributions<\/h3>\nThis chapter is a remix of the following chapters:\n
\n \t
\n
\n
Common Knowledge<\/h1>\n
Guidelines for Using Information<\/h1>\n
Copyright<\/h2>\n
\n
Fair Dealing<\/h2>\n
Fair Use for Academic Purposes<\/h2>\n
\n
Creative Commons<\/h2>\n
Open Educational Resources<\/h2>\n
Torrent and BitTorrent Sites<\/h2>\n
Reverse Image Search<\/h2>\n
\n
\nText Attributions<\/h3>\n
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