Plagiarism and Copyright—What Are the Differences? (The Council Chronicle, Nov. 05)

If you don’t understand the distinctions between plagiarism and copyright, you’re not alone. John Logie, Chair of the CCCC Committee on Intellectual Property, says the terms have gotten intertwined in the popular discourse, but they are very distinct.

He offers the following key distinctions between plagiarism and copyright to help explain the concepts:

Plagiarism is using someone else’s idea (usually a written idea) without giving proper credit for the idea—a failure to cite adequately.
Copyright infringement is using someone else’s creative idea, which can include a song, a video, a movie clip, a piece of visual art, a photograph, and other creative works, without authorization or compensation, if compensation is appropriate. 

Schools enforce plagiarism.
The courts enforce copyright infringement.

Plagiarism is forbidden by institutional code. The penalties are failing grades or expulsion as a result of violating institutional codes. It’s not addressed by our legal system in any real way, except for some scientific circumstances. It is enforced by public censure and punishments by institutions.
Copyright infringement is against federal law, and penalties include fines and, more recently, imprisonment. For many years, copyright was a civil offense; now it’s a blend of civil and criminal offense. Powerful lobbies including software manufacturers and the recording and motion picture industries have taken an active role in enforcing copyright.  

There are instances where plagiarism also violates copyright, but Logie explains it isn’t often that these cases end up in court. He gives this example: “A student goes on the Internet and finds a key paragraph that explains Silas Marner. The student uses it and doesn’t give credit, making transitions to hide the plagiarism. The appropriation is verbatim so this is clearly plagiarism. It’s also potentially a violation of copyright, but since there’s no significant economic harm associated with its use, no court would touch it.”

However, Logie stresses, plagiarism causes plenty of harm in the academic sense, and for this reason schools take it seriously.

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