I've decided to start this thread because of a trend I've noticed here and in the kinds of papers I receive from students. I don't know whether it's because students are doing this more, I'm noticing it more or whether search engines are making it easier to find but I've noticed more plagarism than before. What I think surprises me the most is that this seems to be an acceptable activity.

Perhaps I'm old school but when I came on the Internet you respected people who spent the time to create the HowTos, tutorials, pictures, websites, etc. If you wanted to use their work, you sent off an email and asked; or at the least, you referenced where you sourced it and openly admitted it wasn't yours. It was akin to what, IMHO, true hacking was about. You found the solution yourself, albeit it wasn't a pretty one, you were, however, the one who coded it.

When submitting a paper you'd reference sections with appropriate footnotes. When I ask students why they plagarized they look at me dumbfounded. They apparantly didn't know what plagarism is (and for those unaware):

Sourced: Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary
Pronunciation: 'plA-j&-"rIz also -jE-&-
Function: verb
Inflected Form(s): -rized; -riz·ing
Etymology: plagiary
Date: 1716
transitive senses : to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own : use (another's production) without crediting the source
intransitive senses : to commit literary theft : present as new and original an idea or product derived from an existing source
So perhaps someone could explain to me why it is acceptable to claim that someone else's work is your own? Perhaps because of the advent of massive downloading and trading of warez and because it is just that easy to cut'n'paste. I dunno. Perhaps I'm too idealistic.