I remember my teachers in high school making such a big deal about how bad plagiarism was. If you plagiarized, you were committing the equivalent of a mortal sin. Their emphasis on this deeply ingrained in my head the message “Never, ever, ever copy anyone else’s material.”
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I thought that this same emphatic message would have resonated with every single human being on the planet. But…apparently not.
This week, we have found some pathetic examples of plagiarism and copyright infringement. One of them was a training provider in Malaysia who dedicated its entire blog to reposting our PurchTips articles so that they would appear as if they wrote them. Another was an ISM affiliate whose president, in his “President’s Pen” section of that affiliate’s newsletter, inserted an entire PurchTips article after his introductory blurb and signed his name to it!
Are people stupid?
Do they not realize that using someone else’s work is not only morally wrong but illegal and subject to extremely high penalties? As an example, the case Lowry’s Reports, Inc. v. Legg Mason Inc., 271 F. Supp. 2d 737 (D. Md. 2003) involved a company found guilty of reproducing the content of a newsletter that it subscribed to and, as a result, having to pay $20 million in damages!
Are you willing to risk being penalized $20 million?
If not, then do not republish anyone’s content without permission.
If you think that giving the author credit will give you a free pass to reproduce their work, you’re wrong. According to plagiarismchecker.com, “It is illegal to copy large sections of someone else’s copyrighted work without permission, even if you give the original author credit.”
In very limited cases, we do grant permission to reproduce our PurchTips articles in other organization’s newsletters. But we must give our express written consent in writing to the specific organization that wants to publish it. Absent this approval given specifically to you, any reproduction of PurchTips is copyright infringement.
If you would like us to consider giving you permission to republish PurchTips, contact us with your request. But if we find you stealing our content, we have 20 million reasons to come after you.
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