Sturgeon's Law

well, if the wiki entry is correct, it seems several of the similarities are pretty convincing plagiarism. many of the others seem as though they could have been written simply with mccafferty's books in mind. either way, there was some conscious and extensive borrowing here—from a work/works not in public domain.

i think the dissenting voices are seeing this as a question of artistry and nuances of literary authorship, when it should be considered more a question of legality with a big pile of money involved.

i mean, she received a substantial advance. sure, it's tragic that it was for sappy lit, but the absurdity of the writing doesn't excuse any legal gravity.
 

I think that sums it up pretty well for me: they're incorrectly conflating two issues. Viswanathan's plagiarism is not equivalent to, say, a poet taking another poet's line and riffing on it for a number of reasons, the two most obvious being the profit motivator and the lack of an artistic motivator. There's plenty of debate about the gray areas and around the edges, but there's little question this case satisifies the two criteria for plagiarism: she used another writer's material and she failed to credit it.
 

well looking at the examples on Wik, i would say it's obvious that she plagiarized. the real question for me, and I mean that in a personal way, is: What's worse, plagiarism or the idea of personal property, intellectual property, private property? My inner zen monk tells me that the invention of private property has caused a lot more strife and heartache in this world than plagiarism ever will. And the problem isn't plagiarism but ownership. I mean who really owns anything when we all just die? Ownership is an illusion.

depressing, yes. but that is how I feel about it.
 

By golly, as soon as we can do away with the concepts of money and moochers, we'll be okay! Seriously, though, humans are territorial animals, which leads naturally to the concept of property. A movement against property is going to be about as successful as a movement for celibacy.
 

jenni, i think if i bought that kaavya for a second thought as you do, i might be there with you.

however, the sage-mind probably wouldn't accept a half-million advance to produce this kind of commercial work—so, isn't it kind of moot?

as much as it's cool to stick it to the man, you can't be the man and stick it to yourself . . . or maybe you can, but it's at least slightly hypocritical.
 

well yes, you both make good points.

honestly, i don't understand plagiarism enough to really discuss it as an issue--because i don't, as a writer, understand the point of it--my own process is so dependent upon the pleasure it gives me to create (and yes even sometimes for the pain in the ass it gives me to destroy, which is also a twisted sort of pleasure). so from the experience of my own method, why on earth would anyone ever want to copy a few little actions, descriptions, transitions like she did? especially when in most cases, she made the writing worse--not better.

i don't get it. and maybe that is why i have to look at it in a completely different way in order to process it so that it makes sense to me. if that makes sense to you.
 

makes sense to me, jenni.
 

YES!

A story of three Indian born Americans.

Its organized practice to promote children not worth what they are promoted to! If you have two Indian born nerds having MD to practice and earn enough to promote an average child to work with promoters who manage one to success, what do you expect? BTW, everybody coming from India with 4 year college degrees, 2 years masters degree, 12 years of pre-college education and 4 years of non-academic work experience are still 24! I just want to add. It's not 1+1=2. Its creativity we are talking about here. I hope I have been.