Comments on: World-Herald publisher suspected of plagiarism

By: neal

neal — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 01:38:36 +0000

The Reader had a short piece on it this week, although the one original paragraph contained two typos and the rest was copied and pasted from the Romenesko blog. As far as critiques on journalistic credibility go, it wasn't exactly a home run, but the mess at least got some attention.

By: j

Sun, 14 Dec 2008 23:53:09 +0000

So WHY haven’t I seen a single apology/retraction from the OWH about this?

Why haven’t I seen any other news organization report on it (or at least the LJS or DN)?

What’s the standard punishment if an actual journalist does something like this? and why hasn’t it been levied against Kroeger?

What does it say about the outdated mindset at the OWH that the publisher thought–in the age of the internet and higher accountability– that he could get away with outright plagiarism of another widely (heh) read paper’s content?

By: neal

neal — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 21:53:10 +0000

For those of you who haven't seen the full columns, you can finks to both within the original Romenesko post or you can click below: Kroeger's column Zieman's column You can already tell something's up when you read the ledes: Zieman: "When William Rockhill Nelson founded The Star in 1880, it was instantly mocked by larger, more profitable and well-established competitors." Kroeger: "When Gilbert M. Hitchcock started The Omaha Daily World in 1885, he found himself in a war with multiple newspapers, all advancing ideas supporting their particular causes."

By: Eric

Eric — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 21:43:27 +0000

Wow. If you read the two columns in question, you’ll see that this is not just the lifting of a few lines. The whole column is plagiarized right down to the overall structure. This plagiarism is blatant and extensive. Kroeger either needs to step down or be fired for this.