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<font face="sans-serif">Dear colleagues,<br>
<br>
I strongly agree with those like Ned Kock and Steven Alter who use
words like "nonsense" in reference to "self-plagiarism". Steven
Alter was particularly eloquent in this matter, so I will not
repeat his arguments. However, I would like to refer you to two
articles in the Communications of the ACM that treat this topic
(citations below) from the two different perspectives reflected in
the arguments on this list. First, Collberg and Kobourov (2005)
define self-plagiarism thus: "Self-plagiarism occurs when authors
reuse portions of their previous writings in subsequent research
papers. Occasionally, the derived paper is simply a retitled and
reformatted version of the original one, but more frequently it is
assembled from bits and pieces of previous work." This misleading
definition has been addressed by many others in this thread. The
fundamental problem is that their article fails to distinguish
plagiarism (a real problem), multiple submission (another real
problem) and reuse of one's own material (an ethical and valuable
scholarly activity, as others on this list have explicated). In
short, although I agree with their fundamental exposure and
criticism of multiple submission as a serious problem in computer
science, I disagree with their labelling of this as
"self-plagiarism".<br>
<br>
Another CACM article on the topic is a much earlier work by
Samuelson (1994). A scholar in technology law, she argues that
while some reuse of one's own work is problematic when the
previous work has been assigned to someone else's copyright, "fair
use" quantities and types of reuse are ethical, justifiable and
valuable. (Note that the American "fair use" legal concept is
different in some important ways from the "fair dealing" concept
in other legal jurisdictions.) Her arguments are very much in line
with the arguments on this thread that have advocated that we
scholars should be encouraged to reuse our own work, without any
deceit involved that could be interpreted as multiple submissions.
My own views, heavily influenced by Samuelson, are thus:<br>
<br>
* Copyright violation by reusing your own work for which you have
assigned copyright to a publisher is illegal in almost all
international jurisdictions. However, whether it is unethical to
do so is another matter; I think it is more unethical that the
publishers strong-arm us into handing over our copyright so that
we can get published in desirable outlets. But that's a whole
other topic.<br>
* Multiple submission by resubmitting work for publication in a
distinct outlet while presenting it as substantially original,
previously unpublished work is deceit; it is thus clearly
unethical.<br>
* Reuse of your own original work, with or without citation of the
previous work, is perfectly ethical and very valuable, as long as
there is no misrepresentation that it is completely new and
original. However, for reuse of previously co-authored work, I
would think we would at least owe our co-authors a citation of the
work they previously co-authored with us.<br>
<br>
I would like to directly address Roger Clarke's definition of
"self-plagiarism": "'the re-presentation of the documented words
or ideas of oneself, without appropriate attribution". While I
respect that the underlying issue for which he is concerned is the
real and serious issue of multiple submission, I strongly deny
that there is any ethical obligation to cite yourself when only
small portions are reused. (I consider up to several paragraphs to
be a "small portion".) The idea behind plagiarism is that someone
pretends that the words they write are their original words or
ideas, when in fact they are someone else's original thought. If I
present words that are originally mine in a publication whereas I
have repeated them in print many times before, they remain
originally mine no matter how many times I do this; there is no
deceit involved (unless I present them as entirely new and
original, which is then multiple submission, a legitimate ethical
concern). I can't fathom why that would be considered
"self-plagiarism", when there is another term that accurately
describes it. Such a term can serve no purpose but to demonize
innocent scholars, as Ned Kock alerted us to, and should certainly
not appear in our professional policies such as the AIS Code of
Ethics.<br>
<br>
References:<br>
C. Collberg and S. Kobourov. Self-plagiarism in computer science.
Commun. ACM, 48(4):88–94, 2005.<br>
Samuelson. P. Self-plagiarism or fair use. Commun. ACM 37, 8 (Aug.
1994), 21–25.<br>
<br>
<br>
Regards,<br>
<br>
Chitu Okoli<br>
Associate Professor in Management Information Systems<br>
John Molson School of Business<br>
Concordia University, Montréal<br>
<br>
Phone: +1 (514) 848-2424 x2985<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://chitu.okoli.org/pro">http://chitu.okoli.org/pro</a><br>
<br>
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