Not sure why people absolutely need to continue to keep this discussion alive. The definition of plagiarism does not change in other cultures or other forums. Its punishment does. Its definition doesn't.

Some of you are acting as if this plagiarism discussion is like a wine-tasting event. In reality, you're all drinking plain tap water.

Posting something and pretending it's yours, is plagiarism. The rest is not. End of discussion.

I'm not going to write a new post every few months, so here's quoting myself:

Quote from: friends1980 on July 28, 2021, 11:00:37 PM

(...) Posting something and pretending it's yours, is plagiarism. The rest is not. (Which doesn't mean that the rest might not be violating some other rule.)

There is however no difference between countries. Plagiarism is plagiarism and the definition of plagiarism does not change if you're in an other country.

Surely some countries have laws or no laws or flexible laws or unenforceable laws or whatever terminology fits you to try to act as if you didn't know you were breaking the rules. But even if your country doesn't punish plagiarism, the definition of plagiarism is VERY clear.

Because if you don't know the definition of plagiarism, then how can you tell your country is flexible towards plagiarism? Roll Eyes

So I'd suggest everyone to quit the useless pseudo intellectual discussions about countries, cultures and definitions, and to get to the point:

1. you copy-paste something that's clearly not yours: a photo of Brad Pitt or Britney Spears? An article from the New York Times or Yahoo Finance? A Youtube clip of Michael Jackson's Billie Jean? If it's clearly not yours, it is common policy to post a source, and if you don't, it's generally frowned upon. You should do this especially for written posts and articles, because in general it's less evident that the post is a copypaste.
(for instance, in the case of images, virtually 99% of all photos posted on this forum are considered non-plagiarizing copypasting, and most of the time quoting a source is not necessary, simply because it is so obvious that you are not the original author of that content)
>> this is not plagiarism, but this doesn't mean your post doesn't violate any other forum rules like zero value, burstposting, spamming etc.

2. you copy-paste someone else's work and pretend it to be yours: this is plagiarism. By definition it's intentional. "Unintentional plagiarism" does not exist and is a contradictio in terminis. Your intent has to be proven and this explains why mods are very careful before (temp-)banning someone for plagiarism.

Sure, there may be differences between individual countries' legal approach, flexibility and punishment of plagiarism, but there is no difference in the definition of plagiarism. Therefore, your culture, country or origin never counts as an excuse or a justification for plagiarism.