The Dark Recesses of My Mind
I have a habit of stealing other people's material. It's not necessarily conscious, but I'll remember a clever phrase that someone once used around and then pull in a different context and then neglect to mention where I got it from. My early writing coaches used to tell me "Bad writers borrow, good writers steal," and therefore I tend to feel no real remorse when doing this in casual conversation.
I expect that talking to me is like talking to an amalgam of the people I see as sources. These are not things I print, although my fear is that I'm passing myself off as quick-witted and funny, when all I'm really doing is using a phrase that someone else once said that seems to fit the moment. The repetoire is unique to me because I'm combining phrases other people use, but very few individual phrases are mine (Massages and Hot Chocolate, is one that I believe I actually made up.) I worry now that this is really a form of intellectual dishonesty. I am currently thinking about this because the Harvard Crimson just busted someone for copying passages from somewhere else into their novel.
Homeboy the Annoying Intern told me once that when he covered his college football team, he refused to read any recaps until he had written his own. This was so he wouldn't be tempted to lift anything. I've never gone that far. After Columbia games, I used to peruse the Times to see what they had to say and then try to go in a different direction. I like to think that I defend against plagiarism using writing style, in that even if I'm saying the same thing as another writer (as happens often in pack journalism) I communicate it differently. In my business, the key to avoiding plagiarism is original reporting. If you have something that no one else has, then you can't have stolen it from anywhere
But I fear that one day in a pack situation, by accident, I'm going to write something too closely resembles something else. Homeboy, according to the list provided in the above link, is entirely likely to commit plagiarism. He has contempt for others and often bit off more than he could chew. With the proliferation of blogs to fact-check things, this is probably my biggest fear. And this actually, this keeps me up nights.
I expect that talking to me is like talking to an amalgam of the people I see as sources. These are not things I print, although my fear is that I'm passing myself off as quick-witted and funny, when all I'm really doing is using a phrase that someone else once said that seems to fit the moment. The repetoire is unique to me because I'm combining phrases other people use, but very few individual phrases are mine (Massages and Hot Chocolate, is one that I believe I actually made up.) I worry now that this is really a form of intellectual dishonesty. I am currently thinking about this because the Harvard Crimson just busted someone for copying passages from somewhere else into their novel.
Homeboy the Annoying Intern told me once that when he covered his college football team, he refused to read any recaps until he had written his own. This was so he wouldn't be tempted to lift anything. I've never gone that far. After Columbia games, I used to peruse the Times to see what they had to say and then try to go in a different direction. I like to think that I defend against plagiarism using writing style, in that even if I'm saying the same thing as another writer (as happens often in pack journalism) I communicate it differently. In my business, the key to avoiding plagiarism is original reporting. If you have something that no one else has, then you can't have stolen it from anywhere
But I fear that one day in a pack situation, by accident, I'm going to write something too closely resembles something else. Homeboy, according to the list provided in the above link, is entirely likely to commit plagiarism. He has contempt for others and often bit off more than he could chew. With the proliferation of blogs to fact-check things, this is probably my biggest fear. And this actually, this keeps me up nights.
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