Plagiarism in the real world

I recently asked about content and sourcing from Reuters on the sitepoint forum. I couldn’t believe my eyes at one response. I posted my thoughts here as my sitepoint account could be at risk.

My question was: "is it ok to edit content from Reuters?"

Although some users agreed and made the important point that it needs to be changed (they said 70%, I think 100%) I was slightly perturbed when a highly exalted ignoramus made her attempt at vindication through the use of much plastic talk and poor epistemology.

In reply to my question above this is the response I got from "Shyflower":

"Oh good grief! You "edit" someone else's content and that makes it yours? Ridiculous. Changing 98% of something is still plagiarism if you don't have anything of your own to add to it that makes it unique. In fact, it's near impossible to make a unique article out of anything if you're only "researching" it with one source. "

“If you want to be a good writer, then do it right. Don't hack someone else's content. Chances are, they said it better than you ever could."-- Shyflower

Why this is completre rubbish
Let me explain why this is utter bull. Apologies if this is a bit rich, but its logic; canned and bottled for your rational viewing pleasure.
There are only so many arguments (views) in the world about a topic. If you are stupid you will think that someone with the same opinion as someone else (who has also written a similar article) is guilty of plagiarism, even though it is changed 100%. If this is the case however, 75% or more of internet content is plagiarised.
Does that sound remotely realistic? Fancy trying to sue someone for thinking the same thing. Also, how do you copyright an event? You can't. Thirdly, what some people write in 1000 words, some can shorten to 500. Each time it becomes more untraceable.
Let’s say I look out the window tomorrow and see a pig flying through the air; and I’m so taken up that I don’t notice a Reuter’s court order being posted through my door. Well, when I do get round to opening it, then it would make an extremely poor attack of my defence, should the matter reach litigation.
If the proposal was that I had copied content, then the four details mentioned in their report could have quite easily have been discussed in a conversation with a friend. That's right. Those very same details could have been discussed with a friend who has a friend nearby the scene or whatever. It's a small world after all. Straight away the case flops. In the world of law, if you can't prove something happened, then it never happened. Shame really.

Total contradiction
Then she wrote this:
"Rewriting someone else's work is still plagiarism. Unique writing takes the thoughts and ideas of many and puts them into an author's own mind, allowing the author to form his/her own thoughts and present them through his/her writing."-- Shyflower.

If you edit someone else’s work 100%, then all you have done is taken their thoughts and ideas- You complete fool. By your own non-logic that would be multiple plagiarism. This is in fact a long winded paraphrase of what I said at first. So I can agree with her on one thing: "Chances are, they said it better than you ever could."

It gets better (worse):
"That doesn't mean that every hack can take their content, change a few words, put it on their website and call it their own. That is plagiarism in the real world."

The problem you have is that you are stupid. I mentioned changing 100% of the content. Not changing a few words. This means that you are day dreaming and not in the real world still. Please, stay with us

The best part is, she then copied and pasted copyright info that wasn't her own and didn’t even link back to the site!

Shyflower, if you are reading this you are a dumb ignoramus. You are not logical enough to win I’m afraid. Your epistemology is devastating. Good afternoon.

Ps: I thought the content on your site was so good I made it my own. Thankyou so much, darling.

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Youth

And they've always hated punishing him. It was always too much stress to discipline this 6.6ft killer. We didn’t want to correct him when he was young because we quite frankly couldn’t be bothered and I didn’t want to make a scene when we were shopping, we loved him too much to embarrass him. After all if he gets away with it when he's little who cares, let’s let him off in his teens too. And by then he's nearly an adult and he should have worked out how to behave, even though I never told him not to swear at me and hit me.


You see: I loved him, and I still do, I drive 100 miles every week to see him, and we share a visiting hour with his "mates". Some friends they are, but then again some even worse scum bag murder advocating parents we are. Forget about terrorism this is worse. There’s more of them. They don’t get to go to the paradise that doesn’t exist, they get immediate respect and notoriety from there mates.

Not a bad deal, and I learnt this in school for the one lesson I went, its scientific fact that we came from a blob and were just animals at the end of the day. And there’s nothing after you die, so do everything you want to do now, experiment and go wild, you probably won’t get caught. Just don’t tell anyone, ever. You won’t feel guilt cos it doesn’t exist and you didn’t know em. Quick. You could be dead tomorrow.

Your exact sleeping amount

I recently read Dr James B. Maas' book called Power Sleep. I had mixed feelings about its content as lots of it was made up of statistics with emotional twists on a few of them to push the general thrust of the book along a little. The general idea is that you can sleep and wake up easily by paying off your sleep debt and determining how much sleep you need, via the simple experimentation showed. One useful point was made that feeling tired and using an alarm clock signs of sleep disorder and defficiancy.
These are signs that we are not getting enough sleep and need to get more, explaines Dr Maas.

Although some of us may say we are getting plenty of sleep now we may already have a sleep debt from a few weeks or even months ago that we need to sleep off. Not doing so affects every part of your life in a negative way and causes stress and other illnesses. Serious stuff, eh?

Although the book has about 300 pages, only about half is content, the rest is facts, study observances and the like.
Apparentley sleeping for about 20 minutes a day after being awake 8 hours adds more energy to uss than an extra 20 mins nocturnal sleep. Some of this stuff is useful, the rest was interesting.

The cold

Here is a poem I made:

The cold wind was liberating: freedom in a breeze
was found when facilitating carelessness and ease.

The Pros and Cons of a Dedicated server

Above: What a typical hosting provider is like

When to buy a dedicated server
How many sites should you host before you consider going to a dedicated server? Although getting a dedicated server may sound like a bit of an extreme venture, hosting costs and loading times could bring dedicated servers into question when hosting more than 5 sites, as a higher uptime is guaranteed and better service is too.

The Pros
Getting a dedicated server will also mean that you don’t stand a chance of breaking the 9 second rule. For those not in the know, this is supposedly the time in which a potential visitor will decide whether to stay on your page. Loading time plays a big part in this, and as the tech world gets even faster, web users get even more impatient, web browsers more demanding.

The cons
Unless you have experience with server software and server maintenance you will need to opt for a managed dedicated server. This is more expensive again. Also you are responsible for various duties including: software updates, kernel compiles ,looking out for hackers and monitor a firewall...and that’s not exhaustive.

Cheaper Solution
If you dont want to buy a dedicated server for any reason, but need more than a normal hosting package, then maybe a virtual private server (vps) is right for you. Although you get control of server software and other apps, other pieces of software are only available in a normal dedicated server, and kernel tasks cannot always be performed without additional software plugins. The difference physically between a VPS and a normal dedicated server is that you dont get your own hard drive with a VPS, it is shared.


People who would most likely benefit from a dedicated server the soonest are those with video sites and large programs not supported by shared servers. If you are considering buying a dedicated server for the first time, then remember to get a managed one, otherwise you will have loads more technical work to do; typical duties include:

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