Canonist is a religion blog authored by Steven I. Weiss.
Miriam Shaviv: "Commonly regarded as the doyen of the Jewish ‘blogosphere’."
Andrew Silow-Carroll: "On a personal crusade to save Judaism and journalism from, well, folks like me."
Jeff Sharlet: "If you crossed Jorge Luis Borges and Isaac Babel, and forced the monstrosity that resulted to write on deadline, you might wind up with something like the journalism of Steven I. Weiss -- erudite and two-fisted, obsessive-compulsive brilliance expressed in broad strokes. Weiss is a case study in how the internet can foster nonfiction writing that's deeper, smarter, and more entertaining than that manufactured through the chain of command at the dailies."
Jeff Jarvis: "One of the most energetic, talented, dedicated people I've met in this world."
Cecile DuBois: "Suprisingly young to have such a good reputation."
The Latest From Canonist Blogs |
|
|
|
| CGFR: Feed contains invalid format.br |
Someone’s researched a lot of DovBear’s posts and found a number of blatant examples of plagiarism. Should you care? Only if you gave DovBear much credibility in the first place, which, with his being anonymous, you shouldn’t have.
December 21st, 2006 at 3:49 pm
About half of the alleged plagiarisms are not that at all. If you look at them, you’ll see they’re made up of a large quote from a common third source, a source that is not unique and whose unse is not unique. The text indroducing or following the quote has the same meaning in both cases, but the wording is different.
Anyway, most of the valid plagiarisms seem to have much more to do with poor writing (or, more likely, rushed writing) than stealing.
The AP “plagiarizes” more on any given day than what DB is alleged to have done, and the AP does it to make money. Same for the JTA, who rips from the Forward and other news sources without attribution.
DB certainly has some explaining to do, but criticising him for his anonymity while citing his anonymous critic with authority seems a bit over the top.
December 22nd, 2006 at 12:06 am
There are some blatant examples of db taking credit for writings and ideas that he ripped off other websites. Considering how hypocrisy and honesty are the strongest themes in his blog, i would say this is rather ironic.
December 22nd, 2006 at 12:31 pm
Shmarya - I don’t understand your take. There are numerous instances of ripping-off entire paragraphs without any sort of citation at all.
December 22nd, 2006 at 3:31 pm
That’s amazing; it’s 100%, bona-fide, get-you-kicked-out-of-school plagiarism.
December 24th, 2006 at 2:43 am
SIW –
Some are, some aren’t. I’m not saying DB was right here. I’m only saying that his *anonymous* attacker has found examples of plagiarism that are not plagiarism and lumped them together with those that are.
You know, the Federalist papers were originally (for the most part) *anonymous* pamphlets, kind like anonymous blogs.
December 24th, 2006 at 11:36 am
Shmarya,
“I’m only saying that his *anonymous* attacker has found examples of plagiarism that are not plagiarism and lumped them together with those that are.”
Im not sure what the point of this statement is. Even if this were true, its quite obvious that dovbear has committed many clear acts of plagiarism. And not minor infractions such as improper citation, or copying work with regard to factual accounts. This was, as the previous poster put it, %100 get you kicked out of college plagiarism. And not simply using other peoples wording or phrases, but the copying of complete ideas. Even highschool students know this is plagiarism.
December 24th, 2006 at 8:42 pm
Not that I needed to read this to prove my point, but it does strengthen my contention that he is scum.
December 25th, 2006 at 12:02 am
The Weasel has found 14 posts (out of 3000) with problems. Of those 14, at least two of them are fine (the weasel’s accusations are flat-out wrong.) So that leaves us 12 posts that have some problems in them. For the most part these are examples of forgotten attribution; and the others contain lifted passages. I think DB should certainly be held accountable for those small mistakes, but we’re performing an injustice of our own if we pretend (out of our own jealousy or hatred) that these are anything but small mistakes.
December 25th, 2006 at 3:21 pm
shmarya, i think every example on dovweasel is pure plagiarism. very egregious and indisputable plagiarism, as a matter of fact. i am shocked at the extent.
December 26th, 2006 at 7:43 pm
Well, if DB were writing a college paper, he’d get into trouble, but my standards are lower for a blog….
January 3rd, 2007 at 10:19 am
“The Weasel has found 14 posts (out of 3000) with problems.”
Weasel writes that it took him all of 2 hours to find those 14. In other words, he didn’t exactly kill himself looking. I’ll bet there are many more in the 3000, though I doubt they’ll last long, now that DB has been alerted. He’s probably been busy sanitizing the archives since the scandal hit.