Sometimes, when you're moderating articles...
-
...it's difficult to decide what to vote for: "Accept" or "Needs help". But I've just met one that gave me the same problem, but in a different direction. 1) The article is rubbish. :thumbsdown: 2) The article is spam. :thumbsdown: 3) The article is plagiarised.:thumbsdown: So what should you vote when someone has taken a badly written advert and copy'n'pasted it as his own article? :laugh: Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear... Triple fail!
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
I don't think any of the solutions is what should happen. There are people who do not know what plagiarism is. There are currently authors on CP who do not reference the work of others to the extent they should. Mentoring is important. If you are moderating then I would argue that you must also be mentoring. Explain the problems to the author. Let him know that as it stands the article cannot be published. If the subject treatment is too shallow, tell the author to deepen it. If you think something is plagiarized, provide the author with a link to the original. Note this requires that there actually was plagiarism. So help the author out. At least he took the time to try to supply information.
Gus Gustafson
-
I don't think any of the solutions is what should happen. There are people who do not know what plagiarism is. There are currently authors on CP who do not reference the work of others to the extent they should. Mentoring is important. If you are moderating then I would argue that you must also be mentoring. Explain the problems to the author. Let him know that as it stands the article cannot be published. If the subject treatment is too shallow, tell the author to deepen it. If you think something is plagiarized, provide the author with a link to the original. Note this requires that there actually was plagiarism. So help the author out. At least he took the time to try to supply information.
Gus Gustafson
I do all that.
gggustafson wrote:
So help the author out. At least he took the time to try to supply information.
No, he didn't. He copied some rubbish, pasted it into an article template and submitted it as his own work. At the very least, if it was information that would be plagiarism, or "stealing" someone elses work. You have articles here of your own, so you know how much work goes into producing one. Should we let people "get away" with taking that from you just so they can artificially inflate their reputation? And I did. I left him a message that it was rubbish, that it was spam, and that it was plagiarised, and that none of those are acceptable.
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
-
OriginalGriff wrote:
So what should you vote when someone has taken a badly written advert and copy'n'pasted it as his own article?
Can you have their article posting privileges banned for a while? If its truly spam or plagiarized, there's no sense in letting them keep retrying until they find a moderator that accepts their efforts. If not, then can you at least flag their account for extra scrutiny by future moderators for a while?
We can program with only 1's, but if all you've got are zeros, you've got nothing.
No. Only Admins can do that - I'm glad to say. Even us Protectors have limited powers in what we can delete / edit / mangle / spindle/ mutilate / destroy. But, he got an "Spam or Abusive" vote on his account as a result from me, and I suspect from others. It doesn't take a lot of those for your account to disappear! :laugh:
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
-
...it's difficult to decide what to vote for: "Accept" or "Needs help". But I've just met one that gave me the same problem, but in a different direction. 1) The article is rubbish. :thumbsdown: 2) The article is spam. :thumbsdown: 3) The article is plagiarised.:thumbsdown: So what should you vote when someone has taken a badly written advert and copy'n'pasted it as his own article? :laugh: Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear... Triple fail!
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
-
I do all that.
gggustafson wrote:
So help the author out. At least he took the time to try to supply information.
No, he didn't. He copied some rubbish, pasted it into an article template and submitted it as his own work. At the very least, if it was information that would be plagiarism, or "stealing" someone elses work. You have articles here of your own, so you know how much work goes into producing one. Should we let people "get away" with taking that from you just so they can artificially inflate their reputation? And I did. I left him a message that it was rubbish, that it was spam, and that it was plagiarised, and that none of those are acceptable.
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
But did you offer to mentor? I realize that it takes a great deal of time but, in the end, it may turn a poor author into a great one. Way back when I first started writing User Manuals, Functional Descriptions, Grammar Specifications, and articles to be published in the journals and publications of the day, I was fortunate to have a colleague who would edit my work. He never suggested that what I was writing was rubbish. Rather he might suggest a different approach. Inevitably when I followed his advice, my writings improved. After some time, we parted ways. To this day I will always fondly recall the way he made his criticisms, suggestions, and comments. He made me a better author.
Gus Gustafson
-
Nope: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/nought[^] Nice try though - I'm a noughty boy! :laugh:
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
-
But did you offer to mentor? I realize that it takes a great deal of time but, in the end, it may turn a poor author into a great one. Way back when I first started writing User Manuals, Functional Descriptions, Grammar Specifications, and articles to be published in the journals and publications of the day, I was fortunate to have a colleague who would edit my work. He never suggested that what I was writing was rubbish. Rather he might suggest a different approach. Inevitably when I followed his advice, my writings improved. After some time, we parted ways. To this day I will always fondly recall the way he made his criticisms, suggestions, and comments. He made me a better author.
Gus Gustafson
No, I didn't. Because I don't believe that the OP was interested in good article quality, or improving himself, or anything useful. All he wanted as far as I could see was to get rep points for sod all. If he had tried to produce the best article he could, then he could have responded to the message I left, defending himself in some way - or even swearing at me. But he didn't - which kinda shows me that he didn't care in the least because he hadn't put any time or effort in and wasn't about to start.
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
-
No, I didn't. Because I don't believe that the OP was interested in good article quality, or improving himself, or anything useful. All he wanted as far as I could see was to get rep points for sod all. If he had tried to produce the best article he could, then he could have responded to the message I left, defending himself in some way - or even swearing at me. But he didn't - which kinda shows me that he didn't care in the least because he hadn't put any time or effort in and wasn't about to start.
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
Your reply suggests that you may not have approached the issue diplomatically. It's very easy to turn someone off accidentally. That just happened to me on Stack Overflow. As a result I will no longer visit that site. Maybe OP was so ashamed that he could not respond. "Loss of face" is a serious issue in most of the non English speaking world. By the way, I've never considered "rep points" as a reason to write for CP. Maybe OP didn't either. I believe that your judgment may have been too harsh.
Gus Gustafson
-
Nope: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/nought[^] Nice try though - I'm a noughty boy! :laugh:
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
Nope: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/naught Viz., http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/nought?s=t Sub "Can be confused." Go directly to gaol-jail: I will not be knotted by your naughty noughts! Reminds me of the Japanese tongue-twister we were taught (he thought): "Niwa ni wa ni wa uraniwa ni wa niwatori ga imasu!" "In the [front] yard [and] in the back yard there are two birds."
-
...it's difficult to decide what to vote for: "Accept" or "Needs help". But I've just met one that gave me the same problem, but in a different direction. 1) The article is rubbish. :thumbsdown: 2) The article is spam. :thumbsdown: 3) The article is plagiarised.:thumbsdown: So what should you vote when someone has taken a badly written advert and copy'n'pasted it as his own article? :laugh: Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear... Triple fail!
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
:| If it really can't be helped, then throwing (virtual) stones at it could be a good solution...
CEO at: - Rafaga Systems - Para Facturas - Modern Components for the moment...
-
Your reply suggests that you may not have approached the issue diplomatically. It's very easy to turn someone off accidentally. That just happened to me on Stack Overflow. As a result I will no longer visit that site. Maybe OP was so ashamed that he could not respond. "Loss of face" is a serious issue in most of the non English speaking world. By the way, I've never considered "rep points" as a reason to write for CP. Maybe OP didn't either. I believe that your judgment may have been too harsh.
Gus Gustafson
It's entirely possible - I make mistakes, just like everybody else - but I don't believe I would have handled it any differently if it had been yourself, or DD, or anyone else who published the original article. As it happens, I had to just check now to find out where the OP has claimed as his country of origin - and as you say it is a country where "face" is important. It is also a country renowned for a - shall we say - relaxed attitude to copyright generally. I think it is important to "stamp" on plagiarism, on spam, and (to an extent) on rubbish. Being "supportive" toward plagiarists and spammers does not discourage them from doing it again. Rubbish can be improved by mentoring, and I do help people to produce better articles. But I'll not support or help people steal others hard work!
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
-
Can't be yours mate, OG said he read it.
Reality is an illusion caused by a lack of alcohol "Nagy, you have won the internets." - Keith Barrow
-
It's entirely possible - I make mistakes, just like everybody else - but I don't believe I would have handled it any differently if it had been yourself, or DD, or anyone else who published the original article. As it happens, I had to just check now to find out where the OP has claimed as his country of origin - and as you say it is a country where "face" is important. It is also a country renowned for a - shall we say - relaxed attitude to copyright generally. I think it is important to "stamp" on plagiarism, on spam, and (to an extent) on rubbish. Being "supportive" toward plagiarists and spammers does not discourage them from doing it again. Rubbish can be improved by mentoring, and I do help people to produce better articles. But I'll not support or help people steal others hard work!
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
Sure, trying to take action against plagiarism is important. But so too is diplomacy. I believe that OP lost face and that is exactly the reason he didn't respond. It wasn't because he didn't care. It was something cultural. Again, I believe that your judgment may have been too harsh.
Gus Gustafson
-
I do all that.
gggustafson wrote:
So help the author out. At least he took the time to try to supply information.
No, he didn't. He copied some rubbish, pasted it into an article template and submitted it as his own work. At the very least, if it was information that would be plagiarism, or "stealing" someone elses work. You have articles here of your own, so you know how much work goes into producing one. Should we let people "get away" with taking that from you just so they can artificially inflate their reputation? And I did. I left him a message that it was rubbish, that it was spam, and that it was plagiarised, and that none of those are acceptable.
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
OriginalGriff wrote:
Should we let people "get away" with taking that from you just so they can artificially inflate their reputation?
Does it actually inflate someone's rep to post garbage? I admit to writing a throw-away article. I'd seen several articles published that didn't say anything to me. So, I thought maybe a simple coding example might help someone else, I wasn't trying to up my rep. My article was turned down as too simple. I accepted that. I knew it was simple, but I'd just read a spate of them that seemed like garbage to me. I know this site has an open-door policy and that is great. But maybe just turn the article down and warn the poster that additional articles like that one can have consequences. (Not sure what consequence you could apply since they could just come in with another ID.) PS Thank you for being a guardian at the article gateway. PPS If you water zeroes in your garden, won't they turn into black holes that will suck your garden and everything else away???
-
OriginalGriff wrote:
Should we let people "get away" with taking that from you just so they can artificially inflate their reputation?
Does it actually inflate someone's rep to post garbage? I admit to writing a throw-away article. I'd seen several articles published that didn't say anything to me. So, I thought maybe a simple coding example might help someone else, I wasn't trying to up my rep. My article was turned down as too simple. I accepted that. I knew it was simple, but I'd just read a spate of them that seemed like garbage to me. I know this site has an open-door policy and that is great. But maybe just turn the article down and warn the poster that additional articles like that one can have consequences. (Not sure what consequence you could apply since they could just come in with another ID.) PS Thank you for being a guardian at the article gateway. PPS If you water zeroes in your garden, won't they turn into black holes that will suck your garden and everything else away???
KP Lee wrote:
If you water zeroes in your garden, won't they turn into black holes that will suck your garden and everything else away???
Depends on the soil, apparently. They like a sunny, sandy spot apparently (I had to ask the wife about this - I have "black thumbs") and if you water them correctly they will bloom into perfect 8s.
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
-
KP Lee wrote:
If you water zeroes in your garden, won't they turn into black holes that will suck your garden and everything else away???
Depends on the soil, apparently. They like a sunny, sandy spot apparently (I had to ask the wife about this - I have "black thumbs") and if you water them correctly they will bloom into perfect 8s.
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
-
This is partly why I have "black thumbs" - plants are obstinate, and refuse to grow horizontally. :laugh:
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre. Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
