Tired of "From the story:" submissions and improper quotes

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Tired of "From the story:" submissions and improper quotes

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Tired of "From the story:" submissions and im... - Apr.-3th-2008 17:31:18

pjeigh

Posts: 23
Joined: Jan.-18th-2008
Status: offline

I'm getting tired of submissions that start within "From the story:" and then go to simply quote the first paragraph of the article, review, news, post, whatever. Often the first paragrpah does not summarize the rest of the article. Sometimes, it is the last paragraph. Sometimes it is burried elsewhere.

Sure, there are exceptions when a section of the source material works so well as a summary that it can't be rewritten any better. Unfortunately, that does not seem to be the case with the majority of N4G submissions (and yet they get approved)

Also, some people are pulling sections of an article and rewriting it to fit N4G style. Even if it remains in quotes, that is not legal (as in the law). If anything from a source is being quoted and is edited it must be properly noted. Even then you cannot change the context or meaning. Otherwise, you are misrepresenting what they wrote or said.

Deleted material is represented by an ellipse ("...") and added or correct material is put in square brackets ("[ ]").

Over-Simplified Example:

ORIGINAL: "I really, really, really like cheese."
EDIT: "[Bob Smith] really, really, really like[ s] cheese."
DELETE: "I really... like cheese."
EDIT & DELETE: "[Bob Smith] really... like[ s] cheese."

(note the exta space in the brackets for "likes" b/c the site reads that as a strikethrough)

< Message edited by pjeigh -- Apr.-3th-2008 17:36:14 >

Post #: 1

RE: Tired of "From the story:" submissions an... - Apr.-16th-2008 22:03:32

pjeigh

Posts: 23
Joined: Jan.-18th-2008
Status: offline

Apparently I'm the only one who cares about this. Bummer.

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Post #: 2

RE: Tired of "From the story:" submissions an... - Apr.-17th-2008 5:41:05

Diselage

Posts: 1691
Joined: Mar.-22th-2007
From: South Dakota
Status: online

Don't worry there are more of us that don't particularly like them. Personally I would like to see more effort put into submissions as well but people are busy and have a tendency to take the shortest route.

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RE: Tired of "From the story:" submissions an... - Apr.-17th-2008 21:14:11

pjeigh

Posts: 23
Joined: Jan.-18th-2008
Status: offline

Ah, there is a light.

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Post #: 4

RE: Tired of "From the story:" submissions an... - Apr.-18th-2008 5:35:49

MrSwede

Posts: 2992
Joined: Jun.-25th-2007
From: Sweden?
Status: online

Just thought I'd stop by and give my opinion. As long as you can summarize what the article is about I'm fine with the whole "Via IGN:" and quote text but I agree in general: put some effort in the contribution and that also means uploading pics and embedding videos. I once saw a story with ONE new screen released for a game and you had to click 4 times to get to the screen. ONE screen?!?! It takes 5 seconds to upload it to N4G...

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RE: Tired of "From the story:" submissions an... - Apr.-18th-2008 8:52:54

TnS

Posts: 234
Joined: Apr.-13th-2007
From: Hungary
Status: offline

Maybe you should check the guidelines of N4G before reporting bad editing and leaving not good rating. :)

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RE: Tired of "From the story:" submissions an... - Apr.-18th-2008 18:22:15

Diselage

Posts: 1691
Joined: Mar.-22th-2007
From: South Dakota
Status: online

quote:

ORIGINAL: TnS

Maybe you should check the guidelines of N4G before reporting bad editing and leaving not good rating. :)

Now i don't agree with reporting anything when it follows the guidelines. They may not be the best submissions but they are not bad and should not be reported as such.

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RE: Tired of "From the story:" submissions an... - May-1th-2008 17:24:44

pjeigh

Posts: 23
Joined: Jan.-18th-2008
Status: offline

quote:

Maybe you should check the guidelines of N4G before reporting bad editing and leaving not good rating. :)

I do check the guidelines. On that link it says: "You must write an intro text which explains who you are quoting," which is not really the same as someone writing "From GameSite:" before a quoted section.

The rest of N4G's policy concerning quotes for source material is, however, legally questionable at best:

"However for most stories you don’t need to use quotes but you can instead copy a few paragraphs of the text and edit out any “We” , “I” or “us”. These can then be often be replaced by the websites [sic] name."

It is never OK to use someone else's words as your own. If someone else wrote it, put quotes around it and give them proper credit. A link to the source at the bottom of the post is not good enough (as any good lawyer and journalist will know). Even worse is rewriting someone else's words as if you wrote it. Ever hear of plagiarism?

As for ratings, even giving proper credit to a post that has been copied/pasted does not make it a "good" post.

(in reply to TnS)

Post #: 8