Debate:Is there a problem with simply copying content from other sites?

From Conservapedia
This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Jinkas (Talk | contribs) at 21:53, July 11, 2007. It may differ significantly from current revision.

(diff) ← Older revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)
Jump to: navigation, search
This is a debate page, not an article.
Opinions are welcome. Please remember to sign your comments on this page, and refrain from editing other user's contributions.


Obviously copyrighted material should not be plagiarized/stolen, and this debate focuses more on a quote from Aschlafly has been thrown around a lot lately:

Joaquin, one good type of resource that I want you to be aware of is this: United States government websites. Because we funded those websites as taxpayers, there is no copyright protection and we can almost always copy information from them without attribution or restriction. If the information is unbiased, as in scientific terms or information about countries or numerous other topics, then copying from those websites is fine. The same is not true for state websites (e.g., California or Florida), because they often do assert a copyright. Also, there may be prohibitions on copying certain US government images, such as the emblem for a division of government like the CIA.

Is there a problem with this method of adding content to Conservapedia?

No

Yes

As far as I understand, Conservapedia exists to provide a conservative viewpoint. However, many of the articles being created during this Team Contest are simple glossary information that really can't be spun one way or the other (take Crocoite's copying of volcano terminology, for example). It seems like with the limited editors that Conservapedia has, it would be a better use of editors' time to develop their own articles about topics that can be spun by liberals rather than just copy neutral information. Additionally, copying information just adds one more place where it has to be kept up to date. Now it's doubtful that volcano terminology is going to radically change any time soon, but there are many topics that do change often, and all that users will find on Conservapedia about those topics will be outdated information from the original copy instead of the updated information at the source. This is especially true if people copy over pages that no editor here is qualified to maintain. Finally, as more and more information is copied over, this problem just gets more and more complicated since there is more information that can potentially change more and more often.

Since Conservapedia is an encyclopedia, I feel that articles on Conservapedia should be original work based on facts rather than straight copy and pasting. Jinkas 17:53, 11 July 2007 (EDT)

Retrieved from "https://conservapedia.com/index.php?title=Debate:Is_there_a_problem_with_simply_copying_content_from_other_sites%3F&oldid=227233"