Duplication vs Plagiarism
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Duplication and Plagiarism
There seems to be some confusion, especially in the community here at HubPages, as to what duplication really is.
And to be quite honest, when you look at all the facts it can become quite confusing.All plagiarism is duplication.But what about something that is not published online and plagiarised?All duplication is plagiarism.But what about information that authors want distributed on the net? They have given permission for people to republish. Or PLR (Private Label Rights) articles that are sold? It therefore is not plagarized, but it will turn up as duplicate not just by the HubPage filters but Search Engines.So there is a difference.While it can overlap, lets look at them individually.What is Duplication?
The republishing of information that is already present online, is what we are referring to in this discussion.
Search Engines don't like duplication. Think about it, they only need one copy of the exact same content. They will typically index the first instance of the information and rank it higher than those that come after it.If it happens a lot, then they may have less "trust" in the site that is serving up all this duplicate material. And end up ignoring the content that is on the site.Generally, although plagiarism is often loosely referred to as theft or stealing, it has not been set as a criminal matter in the courts. Likewise, plagiarism has no standing as a criminal offense in the common law. Instead, claims of plagiarism are a civil law matter, which an aggrieved person can resolve by launching a lawsuit. Acts that may constitute plagiarism are in some instances treated as copyright infringement, unfair competition, or a violation of the doctrine of moral rights. The increased availability of intellectual property due to a rise in technology has furthered the debate as to whether copyright offences are criminal. Source
What is Plagiarism?
Plagiarism is the practice of claiming or implying original authorship of (or incorporating material from) someone else's written or creative work, in whole or in part, into one's own without adequate acknowledgement.
While plagiarism in scholarship and journalism has a centuries-old history, the development of the Internet, where articles appear as electronic text, has made the physical act of copying the work of others much easier, simply by copying and pasting text from one web page to another.Plagiarism is different from copyright infringement. While both terms may apply to a particular act, they emphasize different aspects of the transgression. Copyright infringement is a violation of the rights of the copyright holder, when material is used without the copyright holder's consent. On the other hand, plagiarism is concerned with the unearned increment to the plagiarizing author's reputation that is achieved through false claims of authorship.SourceOnline plagiarismSince it is very easy to steal content from the web by simply copying and pasting, the problem of online plagiarism is growing. This phenomenon, also known as content scraping, is affecting both established sites and blogs. The motivation is often to attract away part or all of the original site's search engine-generated web traffic and to convert these stolen visitors into revenue through the use of online ads.Source
HubPages Stance on Duplication
Or better titled: My Observation Of HubPages Stance on Duplication
Hubpages penalises for duplication, not for plagiarism. While it's against the law to plagiarise (according to copyright laws) Hubpages can only act on it if the author of the work submits a DCMA.
You may very well trip the filter, but what do you do then?
It is not the end of the world. If you're happy with what you've got, submit it for review.
If you have borrowed heavily from other sites (assuming you've done the right thing and given source links to those sites) then maybe you need an injection of more original content.
HubPages can and will enforce their policy on Duplication. They do it so the cream will rise to the to and HubPages will establish itself as an authority site. It does this by encouraging and rewarding its authors who publish quality content.
As HubPages reputation grows the authors have a wider audience to show their work.
HubPages Stance on Plagiarism
Or better titled: My Observation Of HubPages Stance on Plagiarism
While HubPages will incur a Hubscore penalty for duplicate content (see HubScore hub for more info) they do not police copyright infringements or plagiarism?Why?It is up to the orignal author of the work (copyright owner) to make a claim.It would be an onerous task (and even an impossible one) for a team even five times the size of HubPages Inc to vet every page.They do however take allegations of copyright infringement seriously. But there is procedure to follow. More on that later.
My Personal Opinion
If a hub was made and it contained snippets from other sites AND had source links, then it would not be plagiarism. Add to that some personal opinion, commentary or indepth analysis and it could turn into quite an interesting hub.
It may trip the duplicate filter.
Which has happened to me.
I've been experimenting with different ways of approaching hub making, and on occasion I have tripped various filters. Sometimes it's what they call a "false positive". It shouldn't have happened, but it did. If you feel that you fall into that category, request a review. All you have to do is click the button.
Other times I added fresh relevant content, and it passed muster.
I wouldn't suggest publishing PLR articles because even though you own them and you're allowed to republish as you see fit, there will be plenty of copies of the same content on the world wide web. You could consider rejigging it. But that's a whole other hub of discussion.
If you do get caught up in the duplicate filter and you submit it for review and get an exemption, this is the message that you will receive...
- CERTIFIED ORIGINAL: This Hub has been granted an exception to the HubPages duplicate content penalty.
Below is a screenshot of where that message will display. Only you can see it. Visitors and other HubPage authors can't see it.
The hub won't automatically jump to a higher HubScore, but it will slowly climb out of it.
To date I don't know what you get if you fail to receive the exemption. I'd say "fingers crossed" but it's in my nature to be curious and inclined to experience the process and see what happens ;-)
HubPages HQ
I've collected snippets of statements made by various HubPage staff members and have collated them here for your convenience...
A duplicate penalty is applied when our automated duplicate content checker detects copies of the same verbiage on the Web.
Flagging something as duplicate only makes the duplicate content checker run the exact same automated process that it would do, just a bit sooner. (It moves it up the queue)
If something is completely unique content, and someone flags it as duplicate, the automatic checker will run, it will find out there are zero duplicates, and there will not be a penalty applied. Someone flagging something as duplicate will not give it a penalty.
There is the occasional false-positive, but we've only seen that on Hubs published outside the U.S. There are some forms of punctuation that mess up our duplicate content checker. We happily put in overrides in these cases when we manually check the content and see that it is original.
I'm pleased to announce a new factor that goes into assigning Hubscores. Hubs which largely contain content that can be found elsewhere on the web are now penalized slightly. This should help make the Hubscores better reflect our desire for quality original content.
Some authors who have republished the same content on a bunch of sites will likely see a drop in their Hubscores. But our best authors should enjoy slight lift in their scores as a result of this change.
The number of duplicates must reach above a certain threshold before the duplicate penalty kicks in.
If your Hub's content continues to be copied and the dupe checker does assign a penalty (you'll know because it will say so in the top notification pane), then let HubPages know and they can issue an override, since they are 100% certain you are the owner.
However, it is in your best interest to make sure that copies don't start stealing your search traffic, so contact the site owner and request them to remove the copy since it was copied without your permission.
We would prefer that people did not copy text and pass it off as their own... (but) it is not something that we can practically enforce. What we can do is to lower the HubScore for content that appears to be duplicated, and respond to DMCA Complaints.
We pass every hub that has sufficient text through a duplication measurement system. It isn't a perfect system, but it works pretty well. We've also enabled a flagging mechanism so that you all can let us know about suspected duplicate content. We will give hubs that are flagged as duplicates additional scrutiny. Hopefully this will ensure that most copied content is sufficiently penalized.
You should let the copyright owner know so that they can file a DMCA take down notice if they so choose. It's neither practical nor possible for us to make a determination on every single piece of content that flows through HubPages. If we even tried, we would immediately become liable for all infringements that we didn't catch. That's just the way the law works.
Copyright infringement is another matter and we will remove content that is in violation, as long as the copyright holder follows the proper reporting procedure.
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Duplication vs Plagiarism. Do you believe there's a difference?
Excellent explanation!
Perfectly explained! Thanks Darkside.
regards Zsuzsy
Thank you,thank you for putting it all together and laying it out so effectively. yeah darkside. Your "hubericity" is awesome.
Some much needed knowledge
Have occasionally wondered why excrutingly boring hubs get high scores.
I believed the hub was there for knowledge and entertainment.
Not so you are able tell us with your great HUb
Not much entertainment in boredom, even if original
Thank you
Very details and useful explanation . Nice work .
A discussion that goes beyond definitions by examining the question "what are my chances to get away with theft (copyright, intellectual property, internet traffic -- take your pick)?" certainly belongs on the "Dark" side.
Fortunately, the blogging system is set to intrinsically reward honest and original work that acknowledges its sources. I suppose another attribute of the system is that it eventually separates the wheat from the chaff.
Great hub, there is an awful lot of both terms happening online but without issuing lawsuits there is not a lot we can do, I have written lots of articles of my own and found them a few weeks later on someone elses site almost word for word, but with so many desperate for content (it seems) it is going to happen.
nice article, I am dealing with copyright infringement at the moment, infigement will really tick you off
LaZinnia Manley
I linked to your page from my own take on plagiarism.
Thanks, good hub. Surely though, it tripped the duplicate content penalty with all those quotes. Or am I missing something?
Carolina, it may end up doing so, but if it does I'll put it up for review and we'll see what the HubPages Honchos will do with it.
At the end of the day a lesser Hubscore isn't going to stop the effectiveness of this hub.If it goes below 50 it may be detrimental to my overall Author Score but other than that it's not going to dampen my hub enthusiasm.
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Misha says:
5 months ago
Much needed hub! Hope it will help our poor peers.