The colourfull(ie non academic) non fiction market is gennerally a huge tarpit of little white lies(most autobiographies are ghost written) and plenty of borrowing research(or buying it) from everywhere it’s posibly, leaning on wikipedia is definitely in the mild end witch is wry we dont see the all out lawyer defence lineup.

Wikipedia itself contains enough plagerism that theyll never wholeheartedly stand out against it.

This is where open source(here the two definitions of the term actually meets), differs a lot from free, the goal is not the price tag but for it to be accesible everywhere to everyone, a price tag of zero is just a byproduct of that goal, with free stuff you can take it non free if noone know it was there(a lot of newspaper revenue came from this fact) the “open culture” folks wont let that happen to their projects.

HG: Many thanks for the catch, fixed. I encourage readers to report typos—whether by email (drNOSPAMteleread.org) or comments.

STEVE: I myself think you’re giving Anderson the benefit of the doubt. What about passage after passage of similar language? But this is very complicated. You could well be right–I’d need to know more facts.

Here’s one example of the complexities. Maureen Dowd, another person accused of plagiarism, apparently inserted language suggested by a friend in a letter–the equivalent of an editor suggesting a change. She got a bum rap.

Thanks,
David