After this year’s RWA national conference, a new Code of Ethics was posted on the RWA Web site.

Of the nine numbered items included in the code, numbers 2 through 5  and 8 (more than half) list offenses involving plagiarism, copyright infringement, and/or theft of intellectual property.

It’s clear that this is a major issue in the publishing world, and yet the majority of readers and writers don’t seem to understand (or, more to the point, to care) what proper behavior is, how to avoid these offenses, or why it’s such a big deal.

::sigh::

What goes around . . .

It’s one of those glorious moments when someone gets their just desserts: Cassie Edwards has been dumped by her publisher. They’re citing “editorial differences” that cannot be reconciled.

Plagiarism is serious business with serious consequences. It’s about time publishers started doing the right thing instead of covering up for these authors.

Useful Article

In the wake of the Cassie Edwards plagiarism scandal, the good people at Dear Author have posted this article called “The Proper Application of Fair Use.”

It’s easy to read, not overly laden with legal jargon, and I found it quit interesting and useful.

Cast Iron, I tell you

It would seem Cassie Edwards ripped off The Song of Hiawatha.

HIAWATHA, people.

In the comments at Dear Author regarding Cassie Edwards, Jane posts this, which someone apparently e-mailed to her:

SAVAGE OBSESSION
Page 284 (pg 434 in Large Type edition)
The odors of the forest, the dew and damp meadow, and the curling smoke from the wigwams were left behind as Lorinda […]

HIAWATHA by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow:
Lines 3-5 of the Introduction
With the odors of the forest,
With the dew and damp of meadows,
With the curling smoke of wigwams

From Nikki the Super Badass Researcher

This is just mind-boggling if it’s true (and from what I saw when I Googled Savage Obsession, it is true). Also, she apparently plagiarized the author’s note that appears in this book. The frickin’ author’s note!

A hilarious write-up of the whole thing appears here.

Weekend

Joy, for it is Saturday. Fingers crossed that my boys play well tomorrow :-)

First the way cool news: Book three in a series I’ve been editing has just been released, and it’s on the NY Times bestsellers list! How cool is that?

Second: Reporting of the Cassie Edwards plagiarism “incident” is gaining steam; there’s an article about it in The New York Times.

I would like to see this turn into the catalyst for discussion among readers of what plagiarism is and why it’s wrong. Unfortunately, from what I’ve seen, many readers are choosing instead to attack Nora Roberts for speaking out, saying that since she’s not involved in this she should have kept her mouth shut.

Sidebar: Quite frankly this astonishes me, because Nora Roberts has herself been a victim of plagiarism (Google Nora Roberts Janet Dailey plagiarism if you’re not familiar with this). Cassie Edwards’s publisher had initially issued a statement brushing off the plagiarism claims; it was not until Nora Roberts went public that the publisher backed off and announced it was going to review all books by Edwards. Why is this important? Because Edwards and Roberts have the same publisher, and you can’t have it both ways: it can’t be plagiarism when someone steals from your author, but fair use when your author steals from someone else.

But yes, I think it would be wonderful if more readers were aware of what plagiarism is and why it’s wrong. So many readers seem to think it’s perfectly okay to quote nonfiction sources verbatim without attribution because “it’s just saying a fact.” The irony here is that while most of these people seem to think that using an academic source without attribution in a work of fiction is fine, academia is the setting where plagiarism is perhaps the worst possible sin.