1 00:00:14,157 --> 00:00:18,791 Welcome to the Department of Plagiarism Investigation. 2 00:00:18,791 --> 00:00:21,653 The D.P.I. has dealt with numerous complex cases 3 00:00:21,653 --> 00:00:24,010 in their effort to bring plagiarists to justice 4 00:00:24,010 --> 00:00:26,348 and to rescue purloined texts. 5 00:00:26,348 --> 00:00:27,942 The first form of plagiarism 6 00:00:27,942 --> 00:00:30,187 that the D.P.I. regularly encounters 7 00:00:30,187 --> 00:00:32,314 is known as brain child snatching, 8 00:00:32,314 --> 00:00:34,399 in honor of the Latin word, plagiarius, 9 00:00:34,399 --> 00:00:36,400 from which plagiarism originates. 10 00:00:36,400 --> 00:00:39,082 Brain child snatchers sneak up on innocent papers 11 00:00:39,082 --> 00:00:40,237 and copy and paste them 12 00:00:40,237 --> 00:00:41,989 without citing any sources, 13 00:00:41,989 --> 00:00:44,176 putting quotation marks around direct quotes 14 00:00:44,176 --> 00:00:45,867 or changing a word. 15 00:00:45,867 --> 00:00:47,787 They've also been known to steal and hold 16 00:00:47,787 --> 00:00:51,025 particularly eloquent essays for ransom. 17 00:00:51,025 --> 00:00:53,208 When brain child snatchers get together, 18 00:00:53,208 --> 00:00:54,957 they form a kidnapping ring, 19 00:00:54,957 --> 00:00:56,461 which involves brain child snatching 20 00:00:56,461 --> 00:00:58,296 from multiple sources. 21 00:00:58,296 --> 00:01:00,215 Some perpetrators have even been known 22 00:01:00,215 --> 00:01:01,967 to commit self-plagiarism, 23 00:01:01,967 --> 00:01:05,388 one of the laziest crimes in the annals of the D.P.I. 24 00:01:05,388 --> 00:01:07,704 Also known as one-sided collaborators, 25 00:01:07,704 --> 00:01:09,809 these odd balls snatch up entire texts 26 00:01:09,809 --> 00:01:12,306 or small passages that they've written before 27 00:01:12,306 --> 00:01:14,854 and present them as brand-new material. 28 00:01:14,854 --> 00:01:16,674 Brain child snatchers and kidnapping rings 29 00:01:16,674 --> 00:01:18,718 are easy for the D.P.I. to catch. 30 00:01:18,734 --> 00:01:21,157 Just paste a few passages into a search engine, 31 00:01:21,157 --> 00:01:21,825 and BAM! 32 00:01:21,825 --> 00:01:23,633 They're caught red-handed. 33 00:01:23,633 --> 00:01:25,269 The more covert forms of plagiarism 34 00:01:25,269 --> 00:01:27,640 include the wild goose chase technique, 35 00:01:27,640 --> 00:01:29,971 in which plagiarists create fake authors, 36 00:01:29,971 --> 00:01:30,757 book titles, 37 00:01:30,757 --> 00:01:31,566 page numbers, 38 00:01:31,566 --> 00:01:32,736 or other information 39 00:01:32,736 --> 00:01:34,674 in order to cover up plagiarism. 40 00:01:34,674 --> 00:01:36,668 And the old synonym switcheroo 41 00:01:36,668 --> 00:01:38,602 in which plagiarists utilize a thesaurus 42 00:01:38,602 --> 00:01:39,874 as their main weapon. 43 00:01:39,874 --> 00:01:41,143 By substituting a synonym 44 00:01:41,143 --> 00:01:42,913 for nearly every word in the document 45 00:01:42,913 --> 00:01:44,331 and leaving the sentence structure 46 00:01:44,331 --> 00:01:46,495 and order of the ideas the same, 47 00:01:46,495 --> 00:01:48,211 plagiarists give legitimate paraphrasing 48 00:01:48,211 --> 00:01:49,666 a very bad name. 49 00:01:49,666 --> 00:01:51,668 Shoddy paraphrasing is also a key part 50 00:01:51,668 --> 00:01:53,796 of variations on a smokescreen, 51 00:01:53,796 --> 00:01:55,504 a technique in which multiple passages 52 00:01:55,504 --> 00:01:56,512 are paraphrased, 53 00:01:56,512 --> 00:02:00,266 then pasted together into one. 54 00:02:00,266 --> 00:02:02,588 The thorniest issue that the D.P.I. deals with 55 00:02:02,588 --> 00:02:03,850 is the misconception 56 00:02:03,850 --> 00:02:05,842 that you can never be accused of plagiarism 57 00:02:05,842 --> 00:02:08,229 if you use quotes and cite your sources. 58 00:02:08,229 --> 00:02:10,552 This is most certainly not the case 59 00:02:10,552 --> 00:02:11,942 because a paper that is made up 60 00:02:11,942 --> 00:02:14,707 of passage upon passage of other people's ideas 61 00:02:14,707 --> 00:02:16,998 is known as a wholly quotable document. 62 00:02:16,998 --> 00:02:18,164 This is considered plagiarism 63 00:02:18,164 --> 00:02:21,398 since there are no original thoughts in the work. 64 00:02:21,398 --> 00:02:23,294 Similarly, passage after passage 65 00:02:23,294 --> 00:02:26,623 of too closely paraphrased text from multiple cited sources 66 00:02:26,623 --> 00:02:30,078 is also plagiarism of the pervasively paraphrased kind 67 00:02:30,078 --> 00:02:33,545 because the ideas still aren't one's own. 68 00:02:33,545 --> 00:02:36,818 And lastly, the technique of revealing while concealing 69 00:02:36,818 --> 00:02:39,499 is plagiarism because it involves selective amnesia 70 00:02:39,499 --> 00:02:40,962 regarding one's sources 71 00:02:40,962 --> 00:02:43,104 in an attempt to cover up wholly quotable 72 00:02:43,104 --> 00:02:46,067 and pervasively paraphrased issues in a text. 73 00:02:46,067 --> 00:02:48,485 Some passages are meticulously documented, 74 00:02:48,485 --> 00:02:49,109 quoted, 75 00:02:49,109 --> 00:02:50,129 or paraphrased, 76 00:02:50,129 --> 00:02:53,862 while others are presented entirely as one's own. 77 00:02:53,862 --> 00:02:56,495 As you can see, the D.P.I. has its hands full, 78 00:02:56,495 --> 00:02:59,372 tackling all sorts of academic mischief and mayhem, 79 00:02:59,372 --> 00:03:02,375 ranging from the petty to the outrageous. 80 00:03:02,375 --> 00:03:04,515 Given the gravity of these transgressions, 81 00:03:04,515 --> 00:03:06,431 you might be wondering why you've never heard 82 00:03:06,431 --> 00:03:09,610 of the Department of Plagiarism Investigation's victories. 83 00:03:09,610 --> 00:03:12,132 That's because it doesn't technically exist. 84 00:03:12,132 --> 00:03:15,467 But people, like you and me, can be our own D.P.I. agents 85 00:03:15,467 --> 00:03:16,629 to fight plagiarism 86 00:03:16,629 --> 00:03:19,306 and uphold the values of original thinking. 87 00:03:19,306 --> 00:03:21,951 We know that the best defense against plagiarism 88 00:03:21,951 --> 00:03:23,774 consists of writers who save themselves 89 00:03:23,774 --> 00:03:25,381 time, worry, and effort 90 00:03:25,381 --> 00:03:27,020 by taking the far easier road 91 00:03:27,020 --> 00:03:29,524 of just doing the work themselves.