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"As a college professor, I've heard many excuses for plagiarism over the years, but I don't believe that I've ever heard one quite that lame."

Language Log shows why you shouldn't believe Maureen Dowd. People just don't remember that sort of thing verbatim. Or is the non-lame response: Everyone these days understands that "talking to" includes emailing and IM'ing?

Certainly, in blogging, we say "X said" to mean "X wrote." And I see that I just said "we say" to mean "we write"... And I just said "I just said" to mean...

Oh, enough! Let me say instead that I didn't even bother to blog the Maureen Dowd "plagiarism" story (until now) because I don't consider that kind of thing serious plagiarism. It's sloppy and embarrassing, but it's completely unintentional and not a deliberate effort to pass off someone else's writing as one's own.

It was dull prose, not an eloquent phrasing or snappy quip. So this was was the sort of faux-plagiarism that constantly threatens all of us in these days of quick cutting and pasting. You think you know what is a quote when you're compiling your notes, but maybe later you see it and think it's yours.

Now, I like to believe I'll remember what blocks of text I dropped into my documents, and if I'm not too rushed or I think I might forget, I put quote marks or indentations to remind me what's not mine. Also, I think if I look back on something that I didn't write, I'll recognize that it's not my style.

But it's possible to slip up, and what Dowd did looks like exactly the sort of thing that can only be a slip.

The real fault is not making it a point always to write sharp, distinctive prose. Prose like the stuff Dowd lifted called out for rewriting. She might not have known to think I can't use that because I didn't write it. But should should at least have thought I can't use that because it's dull.

It's sad, because Dowd tends to err in the other direction ? rewriting things into the snappiest possible prose. That quirk should have saved her from this slip. It didn't this time. She's been embarrassed. That's all.

Full post as published by Althouse on May 21, 2009 (boomark / email).