… “It’s really like saying `well yes I did steal from 16 people but I only took a dollar from each’,” [CK Stead] told Radio New Zealand.  [There were sixteen instances of plagiarism in New Zealand novelist and professor Witi Ihimaera‘s latest book.]

… Stead, who is a professor emeritus [at the University of Auckland,] the same university [where Ihimaera teaches], said he was disappointed at comments from Associate Prof Crosthwaite minimising the seriousness of the fault.

He said students had it hammered into them that they must acknowledge borrowed work and not pass work off as their own.

“You reject students’ essays for doing this and you fail them in exams for doing it.

“It makes you wonder what the title of a distinguished professor means in the University of Auckland if they then say what Witi Ihimaera has done doesn’t matter.”

Stead said the situation would reflect badly on the university until professors acknowledged the seriousness of what had happened…

A University of Florida professor seems to have some violence issues.

[Richard Conley] was arrested Thursday on a domestic battery charge, after which he was put on leave and UF’s political science department briefly closed.

[He] was arrested on a misdemeanor charge in connection with allegations that he grabbed his wife by the wrist during an argument. The political science office closed early Friday as a result of the incident, according to an e-mail department chairman Stephen Craig sent to the department later that day.

“Because this individual has threatened violence in the past, it was decided that the best thing would be for the political science office to close early – which it did, shortly after 2 p.m,” Craig wrote.

… In May 2006, Conley’s ex-wife received a restraining order against him. That came after an incident in which, according to the restraining order, Conley allegedly referred to the Alachua County Sheriff’s Office as the “Gestapo” and threatened to arm himself with shotguns and enough ammo to “blow these f—–s to hell.”

Conley said Tuesday he has never owned any guns and that the allegations were false. He said his ex-wife used the issue for leverage in a pending divorce.

“This was not something that I said. These are allegations. The matter was dropped,” he said.

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Dean Paul D’Anieri said Conley has been placed on leave while the most recent situation is assessed, but that Conley is free to come to campus. D’Anieri said he could not comment on a personnel matter, but that there was no “clear and present danger” in the decision to close the office.

“We’re in an environment that we almost have to overreact to these things,” he said.

… Conley’s attorney, Thomas Edwards, said it was a “huge disconnect” to close the office and attributed the decision in part to academic disagreements between Conley and Craig.

… According to an arrest report, Conley was involved in a domestic argument Thursday over financial issues and other matters in which he threw a wine rack in anger. [Wine rack. He might be violent, but he’s still a professor.]

… Edwards said he believes the case ultimately could be dismissed, attributing the situation to changes at UF and the economy.

“I think there are a lot of people who are under stress because of the economy and things that are going on,” Edwards said. [Tenured professors?]

In the 2006 incident, Conley’s ex-wife alleged that he threatened to purchase an “arsenal of weapons” and “go to the death defending the right to keep and bear arms on his property,” according to the restraining order. He told a deputy he had no weapons when he was served with the order, which was lifted later that month…

A scan of his personal website suggests Conley is a bit hot under the collar about the federal government… Big Brother Barack leads the Two-Minute Hate…

The ABC News reporter
interviewing UD tomorrow
might also interview Mr UD
on the subject of laptops in the
classroom. Unlike UD, Mr UD
allows them.

UD loves the image of

Les UDs as The Bickersons.

Coming down hard on university students who plagiarize, but letting plagiarizing professors get away with it is a well-established national scandal… International, really, as in the recent case of New Zealand novelist and professor Witi Ihimaera.

When I say well-established, I mean not only multiple individual cases at our best schools, like Harvard Law; I mean the department-wide, accepted practice of plagiarism throughout many American medical schools, where a combination of courtesy authorship and ghostwriting thoroughly undermines research integrity.

By December 8, a group of our best med schools must answer a questionnaire sent to them by Senator Charles Grassley, who wants to know why some of their faculty publish

medical journal articles in which an outside writer — sometimes paid by a drug or medical devices company whose product is being studied — has done extensive work on the article without being named on the publication. Instead, one or more academic researchers may receive author credit.

Mr. Grassley said ghostwriting had hurt patients and raised costs for taxpayers because it used prestigious academic names to promote medical products and treatments that might be expensive or less effective than viable alternatives.

It’s just like the prestigious names at law schools, except that there the articles and books are written not by drug companies and their agents at ghostwriting firms, but by teams of students who essentially write the book for the professor, who then puts his or her name on it. This practice has its own name — it’s not called ghostwriting or courtesy authorship, but rather the atelier method.

Mr. Grassley asked the universities to describe their policies on both ghostwriting and plagiarism and to enumerate complaints and describe investigations into both practices since 2004.

… Mr. Grassley’s letter highlighted the disparate treatment of students and professors who claimed authorship of a paper that was not their own.

“Students are disciplined for not acknowledging that a paper they turned in was written by somebody else,” Mr. Grassley wrote. “But what happens when researchers at the same university publish medical studies without acknowledging that they were written by somebody else?”

The story of the New Zealand novelist whose latest work is a cut and paste job gets weirder. Having been found out by a careful reader who stuck various phrases from the novel into Google Books and came up with the books from which he plagiarized, the author has decided, in the proud words of his publisher, Penguin Books New Zealand, “to purchase the remaining warehouse stock of the novel The Trowenna Sea from his publisher Penguin Group (NZ). … Witi Ihimaera has taken this extraordinary step to show that he is actively engaged in resolving the issues involved. We congratulate him on that.’

Yes, take a bow. Not only has Ihimaera done himself proud; he’s also introduced a new business model to Penguin. As detection technology reveals more and more plagiarism among a publisher’s authors, it can institute a Witi Clause, in which writers of plagiarized manuscripts buy up the entire plagiarized run. In this way, publishing houses are guaranteed to sell out the first edition.

The ABC News technology feature, Ahead of the Curve, wants to interview UD about her laptop ban. Word’s getting around.

… in the Cal State Fullerton newspaper.

… the visiting professor convicted of massive credit card and student loan fraud. He’s going to prison for a few years.

The Moscow Times:

A debate between philosophers at an international forum ended in a fistfight Monday that left two people slightly injured, Interfax reported.

A woman and man were injured in the fight at the International Philosophical Forum, held in the House of Scientists of the Russian Academy of Sciences on Ulitsa Prechistenka.

One suffered a bruise, while the other one was left with a scratched face, a police source told Interfax, without elaborating. It was not immediately clear what prompted the fight. Several squads of police officers were called to restore order.

Readers are welcome to offer their theories about what might have prompted the fight.

*******************

Update, from Russia Today:

[T]he fight had little to do with arguments over the meaning of life. The incident’s instigator turned out to be a former Moscow State University student, who was withdrawn from the Philosophy Department a couple of years ago.

A witness told Interfax that the man attacked the Philosophical Department dean, Vladimir Mironov, during a scientific conference.

He had earlier tried to break into the Philosophy Department office and “argue” with Mironov, the same source said. The source did not elaborate on the reason behind the man’s vitriol towards his former dean.

Future shock.

After former marketing professor George Zinkhan shot and killed three people on April 25, the marketing department had to scramble to cover his classes.

Red and Black, University of Georgia newspaper.

Mussolini an anti-Semite.

… has killed himself.

The Chicago Sun-Times seems so far to have the best coverage. A breaking story.

… Brooke Magnanti, a cancer specialist at a university in western England, unmasked herself in a British newspaper as the woman behind “Belle de Jour,” the salacious online diary of a high class call girl.

… The 34-year-old said she became a call girl in 2003 to support herself in London while completing her doctoral thesis after realizing she had no qualms about being paid for sex…

UD‘s limitless need for attention has been more than satisfied over the last few days.

She was interviewed by the George Washington University newspaper (the article featuring her and a colleague talking about laptop bans has already inspired a response); by a graduate student at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs (about blogging); and, last night, by the features editor of The Listener, a cool magazine from New Zealand.

The Listener wanted me to talk about professors who plagiarize.