When it comes to the ethical issues that face writers, self-plagiarism is one of the most difficult and hotly-debated topics out there. Not only are there tremendous disagreements as to what self-plagiarism is, many don’t agree that it exists at all.

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Plagiarism Ruling Under Scrutiny

First off today, Natalie Stechyson of The Windsor Star is reporting on a Supreme Court case in Canada that is raising questions about when and if it is acceptable for a judge to plagiarize his or her rulings. The case centers around a family that filed suit against a hospital after a complication with a birth left their child severely brain damaged. The family sued the hospital and the trial court awarded them $4 million in damages. However, upon evaluation of the judge’s decision, it was found that the trial judge had lifted some 321 paragraphs (out of 368) near-verbatim and without attribution from submissions from the applicants (plaintiffs). Lawyers for the hospital appealed the ruling, claiming that the level of copying indicated that the judgment did not represent the judge’s analysis. The appeals court agreed with that and rejected the judgment, prompting the family’s lawyers to file a petition with the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court of Canada heard the matter on Tuesday, November 13, 2012 but the ruling is not expected immediately.

Kimberly Mitchell is the Journal Publications Director at Landes Bioscience, a rapidly-growing publishing company that currently publishes over 40 journals.

Earlier this week, Stephen Matthews, the chair of the physiology department at the University of Toronto’s medical school, had an article retracted from the journal Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Review.

With the Internet, anyone can create a website in a matter of minutes and, with that presence, reach people all over the world. This has made it easy for for individuals, who previously only had a limited voice, to get an international audience for almost every topic imaginable.

A recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences finds that the majority of retractions are caused not by error, but by fraud.

On October 3rd, the Philippines Cybercrime Prevention Act (RA 10175) took effect and, with it, the country instituted criminal penalties for a variety of online acts, including spamming, identity theft and, most controversially, libel.