I came across a comic strip in the local newspaper the other day, in which a a school girl had copied bits and pieces from various web pages, which she compiled into one paper for one of her classes. Her mother was annoyed about this, because the kid copied the material, and when she was asked about the content, she replied that the she would have to learn about what she "wrote" at a later time.
I'm not sure to whom the following quote should be attributed, but it goes something like this: "Copying one person's work is plagiarism, copy from many is research".
Now copying someone else's ideas may be considered a high form of flattery, but I never consudered theft of ideas a particularly complimentary action, especially when credit hasn't been given to the source from which the idea was taken (which is nice to do, but may not obviate the taking). Hey, I'm not saying that the wheel has to be reinvented, but, come on, if an individual or group is too lazy to even attempt to change things from the original, that's pretty bad.
Copying pages from a book to use as your own, copying concept and format to use as your own, seems to be symptomatic of what's going on today. Apparently, people just don't care about anything or anybody, and it will more than likely take legal action to get the idea across that using someone or some organization's ideas as your own can be a lot more expensive than anticipated.
Have a good day!
Joe Chernicoff