Plagiarism: A Way of Writing in Journalism

Holly Tod

ht827010@ohio.edu

Think of it this way; how easy is it for someone to use a search engine such as, Google, and immediately find what they are looking for? Also, how easy it to take the information from that source and call it theirs? 

Today, plagiarism, fabrication and obfuscation are frequently used and it’s only getting worse. Journalists are under a lot of pressure; they need the best information and write their publication it in a short period of time. Due to the amount of pressure, some feel that the best solution to this is to plagiarize. This solution is giving journalists a bad reputation and less credibility.

Journalism’s Summer of Sin marked by plagiarism, fabrication, obfuscation

In the article, “Journalism’s Summer of Sin Marked by Plagiarism, Fabrication and Obfuscation,” by Craig Silverman goes intro great detail about this issue. Silverman discusses how journalists do not admit to their actions. If they aren’t admitting to it, then why should others? They’re all doing it. This makes other journalist want to plagiarize because other journalists are not being held accountable for their actions.

Solution: Three Steps

According to Silverman, there are three steps to solving plagiarism, fabrication and obfuscation.

First, Silverman believes the best solution to plagiarism, fabrication and obfuscation is to inform and educate their newsroom employees of this problem. They need to know an alternate solution and they only way they will overcome this issue is to inform the current rules and outcomes of plagiarism, fabrication and obfuscation. They also need to be informed out the negative outcomes of these actions.

Second, newsroom leaders need to be there for the newsroom staff if they have any questions or concerns about their work. There needs to be someone who can help guide a newsroom staff whenever they need advice about their work and chances of plagiarism.

Finally, Silverman believes the third step is to have random plagiarism checks. There are many software companies that newsrooms can use to check newsroom staff’s work. For example, turnitin and Ithenitcate are valuable plagiarism checkers.

I do agree with Silverman on his three-step solution. Sometimes journalists get caught up with their work and forget to credit their sources. They need to be educated and reminded of the consequences of their actions because sometimes they forget. We’re all human and we need to be reminded of these things once in awhile. In addition, once newsroom employees are reminded of the consequences, I do believe their work should be checked at least once a week. This will help newsroom employees be reminded that plagiarism is not acceptable and practice and taking credibility for their own work. Even if the newsroom employees have access to these plagiarism checker websites just to make sure they didn’t copy someone else’s work. Finally, I hope that this problem calms down. There really isn’t any excuse for taking others work. Journalist work hard to research information and implement it. It isn’t fair to have someone else take it and call it their own.