On May 7, 2009 Animal New York wrote:
The New York Post published a graffiti story in today’s paper that New York Shitty posted earlier in the week, simply confirming the Greenpoint-based blog’s observations and comments with an expert, then declaring the mysterious tags to be “Nazi cult graffiti.â€
When this was brought to my attention yesterday (thanks Animal New York and Gothamist) I was literally speechless. When I noticed that Mr. Doyle and Mr. Sanderson had the temerity to call this sensationalist schlock an “exclusive” I got angry. Very. Angry. And thus I feel compelled to give these gentleman a refresher course in Journalism 101:
Culling previously published material from a web site— material, I will add, that was linked to by Gothamist and Brownstoner, among others— and trotting out an expert to verify “your” findings does not constitute an “exclusive”. It is plagiarism, plain and simple.
Those of you reading this who feel the same way and wish to remind Mr. Doyle of this fact can contact him via email at: john (dot) doyle (at) nypost (dot) com
Tell him New York Shitty sent you.
Miss Heather
UPDATE, 5/8/09: Mr. Doyle responds to a New York Shitty reader! Not only does he deny any plagiarism on his part, but it would appear he cannot spell the word for that matter. Whoops.
Very Angry! Ms. Heather Smash!
ha ha i so wrote in. the nerve.
You know, I thought about writing him because I have one question I would very much like to ask him. It goes as follows:
When you decided to plagiarize my material was it due to laziness or a sense of entitlement?
I’m guessing the answer is “both”.
you should ask. i want to know.
wow, what an assrag. isn’t it someone’s responsibility while researching a news item to google it? can’t you sue him or something? just to fuck with his smarmy plagiarizing ass. notice he doesn’t say where on the web he saw ‘references to it’. oh, i saw something mentioned! instead of clicking through to the original post, i’m going to go research it on foot! exclusivity!
is that response really from a journalist? aside from the many typos, he writes like a defensive and entitled 12-year-old. even if he didn’t plagiarize, if he somehow came across the story on his own, the similarity is so close it warrants a thoughtful response.
Yes, Jeremiah, this is indeed a response from a journalist.
Here’s the thing: they didn’t copy any actual text from your post, they only took the idea. As such, you’d have a hard time proving that any plagiarism took place. The timing is highly suspicious, especially considering it’s happened before, but that’s ultimately only circumstantial evidence, and I doubt it would hold up in court. So they can get away with it, and they know it.
Besides, most of their readers don’t know of this site and would suspect nothing. And the story sells papers.
So it’s not about laziness, and it’s not about entitlement – it’s about making money.
Getting ahead in the business world is all about lying and cheating like that. People who play by the rules get outcompeted by people who don’t. Sad reality.
Duke87 said “they didn’t copy any actual text from your post, they only took the idea. As such, you’d have a hard time proving that any plagiarism took place.”
As such, in fact, no plagiarism did take place. It would certainly have been appropriate to reveal this site as the source if in fact it was, but there’s no legal requirement to do so. And it may not have been. Perhaps, for example, a Post reader saw them and notified them… or even saw it here online and notified the Post, without even mentioning the source.
The bottom line is that writing about a topic that someone else has already written about isn’t plagiarism.
OK, there are two bottom lines, the second being that his email makes him appear to be an idiot.