Jan 19 2006

CFDJ and Plagarism: I am offended.

Posted by Joe Rinehart at 1:10 PM
12 comments - Categories: ColdFusion MX | Model-Glue | Causing Trouble

A few months ago, one of Raymond Camden's blog entries was reprinted under the Sys-Con/CFDJ banner, with Sys-Con's copyright appearing at the bottom. He blogs about it with his entry "Should I Be Honored Or Offended?." I guess it's now my turn, as my October 31 entry "Introducing Arf!" has been reprinted, in its entirety, on Sys-Con's site as part of the January 2006 CFDJ "Digital Edition."

Update: Sys-Con has removed the article. Simon Horwith, editor of CFDJ, has posted a very good comment regarding his (lack of) involvement in the matter:

"I don't have anything to do with what shows up on the Sys-Con website, nor was I aware that they took a blog entry and turned it into an article...I never saw a copy of this 'article' nor was made aware of it's existence."

So, not Simon's fault at all! Please don't blame him.

I was never contacted for my permission to reprint my contact. While my blog's content is implicity protected by copyright law, I do state an explicity copyright.

Now, my words are being reprinted on a revenue-generating page that contains Sys-Con's copyright information. This is simply plagarism, and plagarism with financial impliciations.

I've contacted Sys-Con and asked for it to be removed. This is a repetitive behavior on their part, and needs to cease.

Comments

Jason

Jason wrote on 01/19/06 2:10 PM

Joe, that is truly mind-blowing. For a professional publishing company to ignore issues of copyright is not only UNprofessional, it's downright illegal. Certainly, if their pay-to-view content were redistributed, *especially* by some other for-profit site, CFDJ would be outraged, and rightfully so. They have no business doing the same to others, especially those in their own community, which I like to think we CFer's are.

Best of luck to you, and I hope they straighten up.

J
Joe

Joe wrote on 01/19/06 2:17 PM

Update: The article has been removed.
Simon Horwith

Simon Horwith wrote on 01/19/06 2:47 PM

Just for the record, I don't have anything to do with what shows up on the Sys-Con website, nor was I aware that they took a blog entry and turned it into an article (the article in question is not just in the digital edition - it's in the printed magazine for that month as well). I solicit and guide authors, give the magazine direction, etc. I do see all the articles that are going into each issue, as I work with the authors on tech edits, etc. In this case, there was no actual article submission per se; I never saw a copy of this 'article' nor was made aware of it's existence.
Brian Rinaldi

Brian Rinaldi wrote on 01/19/06 3:14 PM

I seem to remember it being in the most recent print edition too. I don't have it here in front of me, but (if my memory serves me correctly) I do remember it being there.
Engin Sezici

Engin Sezici wrote on 01/19/06 3:25 PM

SYS-CON has the utmost respect for intellectual property and copyright issues for more than a decade.

Today, we have more than 600 active "Industry Bloggers" for whom we publish and syndicate their content to a number of news sites with their permission and appreciation as these authors utilize and benefit from the exposure that we are able to provide to them. We have no reason to publish anyone's content without their request, thus this accidental incidence was taken very seriously by our editorial team and the above mentioned article was immediately removed from our website.

We will continue to promote our author and our industry blogs and bloggers proudly and as we always have done and will make sure to go through a more careful automated process not to repeat mistakes such as this one in the future.

To request a syndication of your blog at SYS-CON.com, please contact us at editorial@sys-con.com.
Joe

Joe wrote on 01/19/06 3:44 PM

Engin,

Thanks for giving this immediate attention.

I've received a number of e-mails in the past few hours that informed me that my content appeared in the print November 2005 edition of CFDJ.

Please contact me privately at joe.rinehart@gmail.com about this.

Sincerely,

Joe
Patrick Correia

Patrick Correia wrote on 01/19/06 5:44 PM

This just goes to show what a rinky-dink operation the CFDJ really is. They charge the astronomical rate of $90 per year (which is still a savings from the $9.99 cover price) for a publication that seems thinner every month -- when it actually comes out, that is. Currently they're three months behind their publication schedule, which is why your article which just showed up on the website is in the "November 2005" issue (we just got that issue in the mail this week). Despite all that, they still have to steal content to fill the few pages that don't have ads. And the editor-in-chief goes on record disclaiming responsibility for the articles in the pages of his magazine. Who's running the show, and what are they smoking?
Simon Horwith

Simon Horwith wrote on 01/19/06 6:02 PM

Boy Patrick, tell me how you really feel. Seriously though, if you had any idea what goes into putting the magazine together each month you'd probably be a little more sympathetic (to me, at least). I just wanted to address 2 things you said in this comment. Regarding who's running the show - I solicit authors and articles, tech edit (along with Ray Camden) the articles, offer ideas about format, topics, etc. Joe's "article" was never submitted to me as an actual article, it was an internal Sys-Con thing, which they've apologized for. Why did they do it? Well, there's no real justification but I can tell you that at one point yes, we were really lacking content. I've publicly gone on record explaining the reasons for this. I can only assume that's the reason it was done, though I don't really know to be honest. The second thing I want to address is the fact that the November issue just came out. This is again a result of us having a lull in article submissions (again, I did already publicly address the reasons for this). You'll be happy to know that although the Nov issue just went out, the Dec. issue content and the January issue content are all complete and in Sys-Con's hands, and I'm getting close to wrapping-up Feb. as we speak. We're not caught-up because we can't just release 3 issues at once so they're trickling out. I'm not happy about getting off schedule but I can tell you that one of the major reasons for it is my desire to turn CFDJ into a better magazine. I've been learning the hard way that it's very difficult to give more on-topic focus to the articles each month while still meeting deadlines. Perhaps if more people volunteered to write, or provided articles after promising to, it'd be easier. I'll tell you one thing - it would definitely make my life easier, that's for sure!
Peter J. Farrell

Peter J. Farrell wrote on 01/20/06 2:10 PM

Perhaps Simon, CFDJ shouldn't be a monthly journal if there is not enought content. Maybe a bi-monthly affair would be easier to sustain in which it gives you time to increase the quality of the magazine (better is word you used). Secondly, I can fully understand that producting high quality content (or likewise...documentation) is extremely difficult. In general, the more time you have...the better it is.

As to the "internal Sys-Con thing" with taking content without permission, it demonstrates that the internal workflow process that Sys-Con uses to get a piece from conception to print needs to be revised/revisited. Maybe having a one page, per article media release would mitigate any future situations. You can count 'em up one day - 12 releases with signatures to 12 articles.

I shall hope that CFDJ prints an public apology regarding this. At least for me, it probably does not help that this happended shortly after the BlogCFC "scandal" this week. I understand that everybody makes mistakes, however in situations like this -- it is important that internal business processes catch them before mistakes become problems.
Sam

Sam wrote on 01/24/06 9:26 AM

This might be the only thing in CFDJ, but there is more just like it in MXDJ. Who knows if the others are carrying copyrighted material this month as well. IMHO, if the "Journals" actually paid their authors, they may have no content issues and likely, the content would be of higher quality. As it stands though, they are creating a "for profit" magazine using anything they can find for free. Obviously, that includes nabbing what they feel they need from other places. Sad. If they keep it up, they will fall apart. Or maybe they already are.
Ron Pasch

Ron Pasch wrote on 02/02/06 10:56 AM

Joe,

What is your view on the following:

1. Your time spent to create Modelglue is by far more than writing the "Introducing Arf!" article. Correct?
2. People who will be using Modelglue are most likely also using it lots for revenue-generating purposes. Correct?
3. I guess you already see my point with 1 and 2. Correct? ;-)

I'm not trying to be a smart*ss or anything, I'm just curious why one thing that people use to generate revenue is fine and the other is not.
Jared Rypka-Hauer

Jared Rypka-Hauer wrote on 08/01/06 12:05 PM

Ron,

The difference is Model-Glue comes with a license... permission from the author to use the product for a particular set of purposes. Those purposes can be commercial so long as the license is upheld. The software, in that case, gives blanket permission to use, reuse, etc., as befits your purposes.

There is no blanket permission given to copy/paste and republish a copyrighted work, for commercial or any other purpose. They used Joe's words without his permission, where in the case of MG they use his software WITH his permission... it's a very fundamental difference.

If you were to change a couple tags in MG and then start putting it out there as "Ron's Nifty MVC Framework" you can bet your ass that there would be hell to pay... it's the same deal with Sys-Con republishing Joe's blog posting without permission.

Litigable to the nth degree, no doubt...

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