Proper Attribution of content in the Puthiya Thalaimurai
Dear Editor, Good Day. I am Arunmozhi, a final year BE student from Erode
Sengunthar Engineering College. I sometime come across "Puthiya
Thalaimurai" in my hostel and know dedicated students who read them,
and I too frequently take it up in free time.I am very impressed with
the content you deliver to the students, and proving that Tamil too,
as a language, can keep up the pace with development. However I would
like to bring to your notice a key point regarding publication of
cover story like articles. Recently, I was asked to write a case study for a paper called
"Professional Ethics" and the recent article regarding "Escalating
Cancer in Punjab" and the cancer train seemed to be a good choice.
First I thought about translating the entire article, then I decided
to Google the term "CANCER TRAIN". As I visited the links in the search result, it became apparent that
the Professional Ethics was not only lost in Punjab due to Green
revolution, but also in Puthiya Thalaimurai in the name of Mass Media
Revolution. I found that all the photos were taken from website
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=103569390 . Those
photos have been clearly credited to the name of "Daniel
Zwerdling/NPR" . But no such credits were given in your article
published in the issue dated 17 Feb 2011. I am yet to ascertain the
site content from where the text was translated. But being text, it
might be a combination of a number of articles, hence will be
untraceable to a single source. I suppose this a form of plagiarism of
content. This is one such occasion for which I have taken notice, but there are
many occasions where your magazine have used photos from various
sources found on the internet without proper attribution to the person
whom credits should belong to. Keeping in mind that articles of international nature or national
nature as this one cannot be investigated by a publication as yours
individually, I am convinced that translation of available content is
acceptable, so as not to loose the quality. But I prefer to emphasize
that the images should be credited to the photographer and failure to
do so clear violation of rules of the media. I would also bring into your notice the availability of licenses for
content sharing such as the Creative Commons Licenses
(http://creativecommons.org). It would be great if you could go
through them and write a article in your magazine too. Disclaimer: I am not in anyway connected with NPR Media, and hence do
not know whether you have sought their permission, and I am in no idea
of accusing your publication of wrong doing. I just wanted to bring
into you notice of the things that I noticed. I hope you plug these holes and bring out a more fruitful and
informative magazine. Note: This letter is also published online at http://tecoholic.co.cc
and http://www.arunmozhi.in/blog Thank you,
by,
Arunmozhi
arunmozhi@ieee.org
http://www.arunmozhi.in
Sengunthar Engineering College. I sometime come across "Puthiya
Thalaimurai" in my hostel and know dedicated students who read them,
and I too frequently take it up in free time.I am very impressed with
the content you deliver to the students, and proving that Tamil too,
as a language, can keep up the pace with development. However I would
like to bring to your notice a key point regarding publication of
cover story like articles. Recently, I was asked to write a case study for a paper called
"Professional Ethics" and the recent article regarding "Escalating
Cancer in Punjab" and the cancer train seemed to be a good choice.
First I thought about translating the entire article, then I decided
to Google the term "CANCER TRAIN". As I visited the links in the search result, it became apparent that
the Professional Ethics was not only lost in Punjab due to Green
revolution, but also in Puthiya Thalaimurai in the name of Mass Media
Revolution. I found that all the photos were taken from website
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=103569390 . Those
photos have been clearly credited to the name of "Daniel
Zwerdling/NPR" . But no such credits were given in your article
published in the issue dated 17 Feb 2011. I am yet to ascertain the
site content from where the text was translated. But being text, it
might be a combination of a number of articles, hence will be
untraceable to a single source. I suppose this a form of plagiarism of
content. This is one such occasion for which I have taken notice, but there are
many occasions where your magazine have used photos from various
sources found on the internet without proper attribution to the person
whom credits should belong to. Keeping in mind that articles of international nature or national
nature as this one cannot be investigated by a publication as yours
individually, I am convinced that translation of available content is
acceptable, so as not to loose the quality. But I prefer to emphasize
that the images should be credited to the photographer and failure to
do so clear violation of rules of the media. I would also bring into your notice the availability of licenses for
content sharing such as the Creative Commons Licenses
(http://creativecommons.org). It would be great if you could go
through them and write a article in your magazine too. Disclaimer: I am not in anyway connected with NPR Media, and hence do
not know whether you have sought their permission, and I am in no idea
of accusing your publication of wrong doing. I just wanted to bring
into you notice of the things that I noticed. I hope you plug these holes and bring out a more fruitful and
informative magazine. Note: This letter is also published online at http://tecoholic.co.cc
and http://www.arunmozhi.in/blog Thank you,
by,
Arunmozhi
arunmozhi@ieee.org
http://www.arunmozhi.in
