Plagiarism has profilerated; you can avoid it

Giving credit to others enhances credibility, trust

We are not born knowing common courtesy. Someone has to teach us, and then we have to practice it.

We also are not born knowing what plagiarism is, and those of us who haven't learned to avoid it could be in big trouble.

Plagiarizing the work of others will get you expelled from a university, fired from a news organization, or dismissed from public office

The issue of plagiarism is especially relevant at the moment in Spain, where high-ranking officials in two major political parties have had to respond to evidence of plagiarism — here and here — revealed in investigative reports by the web publication eldiario.es and the TV station La Sexta.

(See some other examples at the end of this post).

Today it is so easy to copy and paste material digitally that some are getting sloppy and careless in newsrooms and academia.

Here are some guidelines:

• On the most basic level, it's common courtesy. Don't take credit for someone else's work.
• Put direct quotes in quotation marks and name the source.
• If you have paraphrased a direct quote, be sure to name the source at the end of the paraphrase.
• If you make extensive use of a source, mention the name of the author in every paragraph.

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