Did Beyoncé steal dance moves for her new, and amazing, "Countdown" video? Is she the Urban Outfitters of choreography? Say it ain't so. According to ABC, she's been called out for being a copycat, and there's some pretty convincing video to go along with the accusations. Here's the side-by-side comparison of B's latest moves, and Belgian choreographer Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker's routine, which she created: more ›

The principal at the small Clinton School for Writers and Artists is in trouble for allegedly reciting David Foster Wallace's famous commencement speech during the school's graduation without attribution, the Daily News reports. In the music biz, that's considered "sampling," but in the stuffy academic community they call it "plagiarism." During Friday's commencement, Joseph Anderson quoted at length from the late great Wallace's address, which was originally given at Kenyon College in 2005 and made Time magazine's Top 10 Commencement Speeches list. But as every great writer will tell ya, if you're gonna steal, steal from the best! Unfortunately for Mr. Anderson, the DOE doesn't see it that way. more ›

A federal judge in New York has officially dismissed a lawsuit against author J.K. Rowling by Adrian Jacobs, who claims the fourth "Harry Potter" book is a ripoff of his series, "Willy the Wizard." Jacobs claims themes like Wizard tournaments, Wizard chess, and the central character of an empowered Wizard child were all his inventions in 1987, but the judge sided with Rowling, who said she had never heard of the series. Scholastic publishers said that they "will continue to vigorously defend any such frivolous claims challenging the originality of Harry Potter and the brilliant imagination of its author." Now, can we all please focus our litigatory rage at "Twilight" author Stephenie Meyer? Just because? more ›

If your dad is a Dead Sea Scrolls scholar and someone disputes his theory of the scrolls' origins, the logical thing to do is to impersonate one of his leading critics (and submit a confession of plagiarism under his name) and create dozens of fake email accounts to attack the other critics, right? Raphael Haim Golb, 50, on trial for identity theft, criminal impersonation and aggravated harassment, claims his actions were just what Voltaire would have done, "I used the methods of satire, irony, parody and any other form of verbal rhetoric that became the type of language used by philosophers during the Enlightenment to expose the irrational arguments of their opponents." more ›

The Times business reporter who resigned yesterday after the Wall Street Journal accused him of lifting copy from their articles has come clean about the situation. 31-year-old Zachery Kouwe tells the Observer that when his editors told him about the allegations, he "was in complete shock. Then I started worrying and started thinking, how the fuck did this happen?" Apparently, it happened because Kouwe, in his rush to crank out content, forgot that some of the information he was piecing together was other people's writing, not his own: more ›

"In a number of business articles in The Times over the past year, and in posts on the DealBook blog on NYTimes.com, a Times reporter appears to have improperly appropriated wording and passages published by other news organizations," reports the NY Times in an editor's note today. Although the Times doesn't drop the P-word, that's essentially what reporter Zachery Kouwe is accused of doing. His thieving was brought to the Times's attention by the Wall Street Journal, which noticed that Kouwe repeatedly recycled language just like we did above, but without the all-important quotation marks or attribution, which are really the easiest things in the world to use. For instance, the Paper of Record also reports: more ›

Well, fancy that: A TPM Cafe blogger noticed how a passage in Maureen Dowd's Sunday op-ed column was very similar to a Talking Points Memo column, posted on Thursday, by TPM editor Josh Marshall. Dowd's passage read, "More and more the timeline is raising the question of why, if the torture was to prevent terrorist attacks, it seemed to happen mainly during the period when the Bush crowd was looking for what was essentially political information to justify the invasion of Iraq." Marshall's was exactly the same, except he used "we were" instead of "the Bush crowd was." Dowd later admitted to the Huffington Post that it was a mistake—she was discussing the column with a friend "who suggested I make this point, expressing it in a cogent -- and I assumed spontaneous -- way and I wanted to weave the idea into my column. but, clearly, my friend must have read josh marshall without mentioning that to me." Gawker calls it BS and Politico's Michael Calderone has emailed Dowd, asking "if it's common practice to take an entire passage from a friend and weave it into her column." In the meantime, Dowd's column is updated, acknowledging Marshall. more ›

Madonna Constantine, the former Teachers College professor whose office door had a noose hanging on it last year, is now suing Columbia University over her termination. Constantine had been dismissed over plagiarism charges after an 18-month long investigation and she claimed the school was conducting a witch hunt (though it should be noted two of her accusers were minorities--one black and one Asian). The Post notes that the lawsuit says the accusers are the real plagiarizers while the Daily News reports that lawsuit now says Constantine was the victim of "extreme bias," stating, "They took [Constantine's] guilt as a foregone conclusion and conducted no investigation beyond that required to buttress such conclusion." more ›

Madonna Constantine, the Columbia Teachers College professor who was fired over plagiarism charges, is appealing the school's decision. She claims that she was fired because she spoke out after finding a noose hanging on her office door (Constantine also previously accused the school of conducting a witch-hunt against her). The Village Voice recently looked at the issues surrounding Constantine, Teachers College, and the world of higher-education politics. more ›

Madonna Constantine, the Columbia Teachers College professor whose office door had a noose hanging on it, was suspended indefinitely for committing plagiarism. The NY Times characterizes the move as a firing, noting a letter from Teachers College says, "We are terminating Madonna Constantine’s employment with Teachers College for cause, subject to a hearing before a faculty committee. In the interim Professor Constantine is suspended, effective immediately.” more ›

Two chefs of popular seafood restaurants have settled a lawsuit out of court, denying foodies the chance to hear how restaurant plagiarism would be argued. The NY Times reports, "Both sides in the case agreed to keep the terms of the settlement confidential." more ›

Lawyers for Jerry Seinfeld insist the comic was just joking when he described "Sneaky Chef" author Missy Chase Lapine as a "wacko" for accusing his wife of plagiarism. Lapine is currently suing for trademark infringement because she says Jessica Seinfeld’s hit book about sneaking healthy food into kids’ snacks, called "Deceptively Simple," contains too many similarities to "Sneaky Chef" – and it was published by HarperCollins, who twice rejected Lapine’s pitch. more ›

The Columbia University community is currently divided over the controversy involving a professor's possible plagiarism, which has escalated to racial politics. more ›

The Columbia Teachers College professor who was in the news last year when a noose was found on her office door angrily denied she plagiarized others' work. Madonna Constantine, who the Teachers College sanctioned after a year-and-a-half investigation, will appeal the charges. more ›

After a year-plus long investigation, Columbia Teachers College has sanctioned a professor for plagiarism. And the professor happens to be Madonna Constantine, the professor who found a noose on her office door last fall. more ›

A juicy theatrical controversy is swirling around Eric Walton's "Esoterica", a solo tour-de-force of sleight-of-hand, card tricks and mentalism. As we duly noted in our review of the show, Walton's performance climaxes with a rendition of the "Knight's Tour", a trick that Ricky Jay brought back from obscurity to conclude his 2002 evening of illusions. (Some might recognize Jay as 'that guy' from the Mamet movies, but he is also widely respected as a walking encyclopedia of sleight-of-hand.) more ›

Bad news for Fernando Ferrer: He's trailing Mayor Bloomberg by a whopping 31 points according to a Quinnipiac poll. And this poll, unlike earlier ones where Bloomberg enjoyed a 27 point lead, is after fears about the subway terror threat on October 7, which might mean that New Yorkers, despite their grousing, might really love Mayor Bloomberg! The Mayor introduced a new health plan to insure children, which Ferrer's campaign says is the second instance of the Mayor copying Freddy's promises. "Plagiarism," the Ferrer campaign slinged as he campaign with John Kerry on the Lower East Side. More shockingly, it seems that some of the diners at the Harlem International House of Pancakes (where the Mayor previously served diners) when Mayor B got an endorsement from Reverend Calvin Butts were actually Bloomberg volunteers. It's Flapjackgate! more ›

In a story about the Jack Kelley possible-plagiarism-at-USA Today brouhaha (most elegantly summarized here, by Gawker), check out how the New York Times gets to spin the Jayson Blair incident as what is making other newspapers are relook their own reporters' work: more ›

According to the New York Times today, plagiarism is on the rise on college campuses. Specifically, students seem to think it's okay to "cut and paste" information off websites without attribution. Let's let the article speak for itself: more ›