Re: Help, a plateful of plagiarism

[Heinrich Mallison <heinrich.mallison@googlemail.com>]

Mike,
if it is on wikipedia, and if that source is cited, then you can't do anything.

wikipedia ALLOWS commercial use - tough luck.Here, the stolen text is
apparently highly similar to wikipedia (because WP was copied from
it), so that bringing proof it was not taken from wikipedia and
altered will be very hard.

If you open a book you will see a copyright notice on one of the first
few pages. If you copy it, you break the law.
:)
H

On Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 7:50 PM, Mike Taylor <mike@indexdata.com> wrote:
> Heinrich, that can't be true.  I can't just copy and paste the text of
> a Greg Paul book, call it a new Mike Taylor book, and mention in the
> acknowledgements that this is what I've done.  If I were in Trevor's
> position, my first action would be to contact the publisher.  Or, if I
> had a lot of money lying around, maybe to talk to a lawyer.
>
>
> On 1 December 2010 18:37, Heinrich Mallison
> <heinrich.mallison@googlemail.com> wrote:
>> If they give the source you can't really do anything, I'm afraid.
>> If not - talk to your lawyer.
>>
>> On Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 7:35 PM, Andreas Johansson <andreasj@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> Selling (unattributed) WP articles in book format is a business model
>>> that, depressingly enough, seems to have some success. I don't know
>>> what you can do about it in legal terms, but writing an Amazon review
>>> condemning the thing shouldn't hurt.
>>>
>>> On Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 7:29 PM, K and T Dykes <ktdykes@arcor.de> wrote:
>>>> I've just been looking at Amazon Books for Xmas present ideas (for me), and
>>>> this led me to come across something called Cynodonts... published by Books
>>>> Llc (
>>>> http://www.amazon.de/Cynodonts-Eucynodontia-Oligokyphus-Tritylodontidae-Probelesodon/dp/1155343786/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1291226159&sr=8-1
>>>> ) .  You even get an excerpt to whet your appetite for me.  The writing
>>>> style is pleasingly informal.
>>>>
>>>> "Among the first and most basal of the eucynodonts was Cynognathus. This
>>>> wolf-sized predator had a nearly worldwide distribution. About 90% of its
>>>> lower jaw was accounted for by a single tooth-bearing bone called the
>>>> dentary. Its teeth were differentiated, which enabled them to perform
>>>> several functions, including tearing and chewing. A crocodile tears at its
>>>> prey, but it can't chew. It's an effective hunter, but a wasteful and messy
>>>> eater. The ear of Cynognathus contained a solitary small bone for hearing,
>>>> (the stapes)."
>>>>
>>>> It's also remarkably similar to my webpage content, and even more similar 
>>>> to
>>>> the Wikipedia page which states it's largely derived from my page.  They're
>>>> even flinging in my jokes!
>>>>
>>>> I don't know what kind of help I might be asking for, seeing as I'm
>>>> presently too flabbergasted by what I've just seen.
>>>> Trevor
>>>>
>>>> Mesozoic eucynodonts, an internet directory
>>>> http://home.arcor.de/ktdykes/meseucaz.htm
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Andreas Johansson
>>>
>>> Why can't you be a non-conformist just like everybody else?
>>>
>>
>>
>