I think it's an important topic for us, students, (i assume there are a lot of students here) to think about and be aware of it while writing your essays or whatever you ever write in your life.

What is Plagarism?
Why Plagarisize?
How can you tell if you are plagarizing or just stating a common knowledge?
What is common knowledge?

If you research in some of YOUR school's policy on plagarism and YOUR school's penalty for plagarizing, you'll have an idea that plagarism is a serious thing, and if someone plagarize, the penalty is pretty harsh. So..

What is at stake when plagarizing?
Why does people hate plagarizing and be so harsh about it?

Here's another point to think about. When you write a paper, (essay) and an idea came up, and to you it's completely valid to say it's YOUR idea because you came up with it without any reference to sources. Then in a library one day and you found out that someone else already had the idea used already.
So
are YOU plagarizing? or is He plagarizing? (it's pretty hard to answer this question)

Some other questions to think about:

Can, and Should people have the right to own ideas?
How can you go about owning ideas and what you say?

Lastly:

Is language important? and Why?

EDIT: I'm not saying this so encourage plagarism (i think you all smart enough to know). DON'T PLAGARIZE!!

Why, you ask? Probably because you're not skilled enough to achieve the results that the person you're stealing from has. Also, I like this quote:

"A good composers borrows, a great composer steals."

ah yes you brought up another point with the quote

Are there difference in the penalty served for plagarism differ in cultures?

so in another word from culture to culture, are the view of plagarism are different?

because here in canada, that quote just won't work in language art.

"A good composer borrows, a great composer steals."
Wow. I really like that quote. That's going in my signature!

I think that in educational institutes all around the world plagraism is considered really bad and can probably lead to either failing the course or even expulsion. Anyway if there's anything I learned from a friend of mines talk on plagarism there are 4 kinds: Complete Plagarism where an entire work is used, Near complete plagarism where the authors own words are used in some parts of the plagarised work, Patchwork(I think it may be a different term) where the authour plagarises small chunks and self plagarism where you use your own work that you have previously submitted. And if you're just using a line that would, if you use proper procedure, be a quotation. About the writing an essay and finding someone else has done a similar one before, I don't think it really matters since although the ideas would be similar the writing styles and such would be different. About owning ideas of course it should be allowed it's called intellectual property.

Why, you ask? Probably because you're not skilled enough to achieve the results that the person you're stealing from has. Also, I like this quote:

"A good composers borrows, a great composer steals."

Not skilled yet. You gotta learn from somewhere, right?

Plagiarism is the ultimate sin here at my uni. Even worse than being in posession of drugs, starting fights. etc. it appears at times. Even though there is a great desire to copy a more knowledgeable person you learn to explain your own idea's on your own terms. No one is expecting you to be as well informed as, say, a Harvard professor as of yet at such levels.

Why does people hate plagarizing and be so harsh about it?

You have to look back at yourself. How would you like it if someone ripped off your work and claimed it as your own?

I like the question; are YOU plagarizing? or is He plagarizing?

It feels that way, doesn't it? I get really annoyed when I bring forth an idea and find out a much more recognised authority had brought this forward years ago. Its my idea, dammit. It was devoloped totally on my own, I should be praised for thinking of it, even if I am a little late with the idea. Don't you think?

I know I'm bad at bringing a point across. But I'll only get better at it through experience, right?

Edit: Sorry, forgot to justify my quoting of Noir7. Its in poor nature and will probably contribute nothing to this thread, but I'm curious to the meaning of his quote.

"A good composers borrows, a great composer steals."

I don't understand. Can someone explain this to me please?

Edit 2: Thanks Noir, for answering.

"A good composers borrows, a great composer steals."

I don't understand. Can someone explain this to me please?

It has been known that even the best composers in time have material stolen from others. Ideas, musical passages and styles have been copied through the ages, and no one seems to care - as long as the outcome of the music is good. So the quote means that even the most brilliant composers have skelletons in their closets =]

"The secret to plagarism is becoming more well known than whom you copy." Not the exact words, but paraphrased nicely. I can't remember who said it... The easiest way to avoid plagarism is to simply cite a source, if you use it. If you don't want to quote directly, paraphrase and then cite it in a seperate section; unless it is common knowledge, then you don't need to cite it. For example: I got these rules from the Modern Language Association.

Most of my friends just copy/paste. Then they change up the vocabulary a bit, so technically they're not plagarizing.

it's patchwork. It's a type of plagarism.
Patchwork: you take a sentence or paragraph from some source, and you change the wording to make it your own.

it's patchwork. It's a type of plagarism.
Patchwork: you take a sentence or paragraph from some source, and you change the wording to make it your own.
Unless you cite it, then it's paraphrasing.
Plagarism is only an offense if you label the work as your own, original stuff.

I've only plagarized once and that was to prove a point- basically a few of us in my english group knew that there was someone who the teacher thought the sun shone from his arse- so i basically stole the teacher's folder of exceptional work and copied one of this guy's essays and got 17 where he got 25/25....point proven.

Other than that- plagiarism is WRONG....don't know why people risk their grades by copying other's work- i mean at my uni there have been people in their final year who have worked hard for 3/4 years then copied that one essay and been kicked out...what a sad waste