MoDo's plagiarism?

[kentuck]

I think it was a unfortunate mistake on her part. She doesn't really need to steal information from anyone. She has her own original style, whether we agree with her or not.

Obviously, the paragraph in question was entirely lifted from a Josh Marshall piece on TPM. What I think has happened is that MoDo had copied and pasted comments from different people with ideas similar to her own and when she was writing her piece, she forgot to delete this copy and the entire paragraph was pasted in her article. It was not anything so original as to be noteworthy of stealing.

Most of us steal ideas from one another but we usually try to put it in our own words or we give credit with quotation marks. I think this was probably just an honest mistake by MoDo? Probably had one too many beverages before she wrote the article? :-)

[lapfog_1]

1. mistake...

1. If she "inadvertently" lifted the paragraph because a friend read it verbatim over the phone to her and Maureen thought it was the original thoughts of her friend...

Why didn't she attribute the friend?

Something like "I was talking to a friend and they made the following point..."


2. Why didn't someone, probably Maureen herself, take the time to "google check" the articles she writes (or an editor).

As a matter of course, if I was a writer, I would have a piece of software that takes every sentence from my article and "google it" to find matches, just so I would not be accused of plagiarism. It's an easy piece of software to write, surely someone at the Times (or other newspapers) has already thought to write such a thing (hell, it's so trivial it could probably be done in 50 or lines of perl or other scripting language).

[islandmkl]

2. in her profession...plagiarism is a cardinal sin...

there is no responsible activity that would have 'caused' the plagiarism...

modo may now have to endure scrutiny of her past writings, for content AND context...

hey, modo...call mike barnicle and ask him how it all works...

[MADem]

8. At her workplace, too--they've danced with the plagiarism devil at NYT themselves.

And, as others have said, she can be a real shitheel when others are "less than perfect," so it's good she's getting her nose rubbed in it.

This is her BUSINESS, her JOB. She needs to triple check and get it right. I don't tolerate "Ooops" from a surgeon or a dentist, why should I put up with it from her?


And WTF is up with her editors? Do they even check this shit? They've got plagiarism programs nowadays--you'd think if college professors can manage to check that stuff to prevent Punky Brewster from handing in a cut-n-paste effort, the editorial staff of the NYT could also give it a whirl.

[frazzled]

3. She had no such graceful explanation for Joe Biden

I'm sorry, but this is a clear case of plagiarism. I just don't think these columnists think anyone reads a site like TPM to notice the infraction. How wrong they are.

I am glad however that she has made a correction and acknowledgment. Once the (very serious) breach of ethics was pointed out.

[cali]

4. she's a talentless piece of crap who gave no such quarter to Biden

screw MoDo.

[Botany]

5. I just heard on the news that MoDo said she talked to somebody who ...

.... read the article in Huffington Post and that is why her piece seemed like such
a copy of what was printed there.

[TahitiNut]

7. IMHO, MoDo showed she's a liar as well as a plagiarist.

:shrug:

[MADem]

10. And the lameass so-and-so didn't credit the FRIEND for the idea, either!

Who can you screw, if you can't screw your friends?

[Botany]

15. Funny how after her friend told her the info she put out a .....

.... word for word copy of somebody else's work.





BTW yes I am still bitter over her hit job on Gore in 2000.

[MADem]

22. I'm not bitter about that Gore stuff. See, I like to think of myself as a CHEF.

And a seasoned chef knows, that REVENGE is a dish best served COLD.

She's having her "What goes around, comes around" moment. And it couldn't happen to a more self-centered, dubiously entitled individual, IMO.

[cherokeeprogressive]

20. So her friend has a photographic memory (minus two words).

And HER memory is perfect. I'll buy THAT for a dollar.

[TahitiNut]

6. (1) "May I quote you?" (2) "As one of my friends said, ..."

For a professional columnist, a "mistake" would be a misspelling, NOT the verbatim use of prose obtained from another. I don't give a shit whether she copied Josh Marshall or Joe Schmoe, since the prose was NOT her own. Period. Since when is it less wrong to steal from an unknown person instead of a known person??

It was THEFT.

You say "She doesn't really need to steal information from anyone." So, that somehow makes it better?? Bullshit! I'm far more likely to cut some slack for a bereft, indigent person who steals bread than some fat cat. As far as I'm concerned, that makes it WORSE.

It was THEFT.

[tomreedtoon]

9. Is stealing something that's worthless (writing) theft?

Because writing is worth nothing. Millions of people write amazing things and they don't get paid. Take a look at DU. Writing is worthless, because publishers don't pay for it and writers aren't paid for it. There are a few writers still being paid, but that's going to end fairly soon.

Maureen Dowd is going to lose her ability to make a living, like every other writer. Whether or not she plagiarized a blogger, because that blogger wasn't paid and won't be paid for what he wrote. And I bet she doesn't even have the skills to be a barrista, as if Starbucks was actually hiring those people any more.

[TahitiNut]

16. "Worthless"?? Tell that to the folks who pay for MoDo's "deathless prose."

:eyes:

[tomreedtoon]

24. In her case, she won't be paid for it long.

And when she goes, the Times (if it still exists) will just reprint blogger stuff for free.

[rrneck]

18. Josh Marshall

would disagree. He isn't some faceless, unread blogger. He has one of the most successful blogs out there and makes a good living at it.

http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/

[tomreedtoon]

25. You can't make a living from a FREE website.

In fact, unless he owns the ISP he has to pay for his web space. That isn't earning a living. And all those authors with books...can watch Bittorrent sites provide those books for free. Writing will, very shortly, no longer be a profession or a way to support one's life.

[rrneck]

26. You can't make a living from a FREE website

http://www.google.com/

[tomreedtoon]

27. You prove my point. Google is dying.

You think anybody pays for those ads? You think anybody WATCHES those ads? If you think so, and you can convince people that it's true, you might have a job in television infomercial time sales.

[rrneck]

28. You can't make a living from a FREE website...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larry_Page

[tomreedtoon]

29. And once they ran through their investor's money...

...they started going broke. Because no one is paying anything worthwhile for those annoying ads, people don't watch them, and they are going broke. And some little nobody who writes his opinions, and posts ads on HIS web site, is paying a lot to keep his website free.

[kentuck]

11. Uh....

ok...

[MADem]

13. Yes. Yes. And Yes.

And like I said last night, Could that be MODO jumping a shark????

I sure hope so. I think she's way overrated. Time for a fresh voice that's less mean and snarky.

[madaboutharry]

12. She is lazy.

This is all about laziness.

Seriously, she should have called her "friend" that she heard this from and inquired as to where it came from. She was too lazy to make a phone call. And if she heard it from a friend, then that should have been made clear.

[MADem]

14. She could have credited the "friend," too. Who else has she stolen all her "clever ideas" from? nt

[able1]

17. She can't "afford" to admit she stole information

Wouldn't be prudent.

[cherokeeprogressive]

19. If what you say is true, she's a LIAR, and not necessarily a plagiarist.

Which do you think is worse?

[MADem]

23. I think she's a plagiarizing liar, if that's true. See, she stole the work from her friend

(what, you have to be famous to be credited?) if she didn't steal it from Marshall, and then she failed to credit her friend.

If she had credited her friend, she'd have an excuse for not quoting Marshall, and her friend would be on the hook for not telling MODO where the shit came from.

I think her "friend" was her mouse, and she read that shit on Marshall's blog. I think she's a liar as well as a plagiarist.

[Marr]

21. I wouldn't be surprised if she copy/pasted it from an email a friend sent to her,

and the friend had lifted the paragraph verbatim. This is only a guess, because I cannot believe that anyone would be stupid enough to steal so blatantly from such a widely read source. I may very well be giving Dowd too much credit. She is one of the most vapid political commentators out there, after all.