Let’s not be duped into delivering speeches with plagiarized material

[Joe Carillo]

I feel so sorry for PLDT Chairman Manuel V. Pangilinan for having been duped into delivering a graduation speech laced by his speechwriter with plagiarized material from graduation speeches by—of all people—fantasy writer J.K. Rowling and TV host Oprah Winfrey. The speech in question was his commencement address last March 27 to Ateneo University’s Sesquicentennial Batch of its School of Humanities & School of Social Sciences. It’s obvious that Mr. Pangilinan had either been betrayed by his speechwriter or victimized by the latter’s gross incompetence. Indeed, assuming pure laziness and good faith, that speechwriter could have spared Mr. Pangilinan from all the trouble by heavily paraphrasing those quotes beyond recognition or, if the temptation to quote verbatim was strong and justified, by properly attributing them to their authors.

How could such a despicable thing happen and how might it have been prevented?

In our digital communication age, a simple Google check could have saved Mr. Pangilinan from all that humiliation. Google has a standard search feature that can find any string of text in the World Wide Web that replicates or closely resembles the string of text someone has prepared or provided for you. An even more sophisticated plagiarism checker on the web is Copyscape. You can run a check on a manuscript to find out if its content is unique and original; conversely, you can also find out whether someone on the web has copied your content without permission. What makes this plagiarism fiasco so surprising, in fact, is that the PLDT-Smart combine under Mr. Pangilinan’s helm has at its command all the sophisticated web facilities to prevent it from happening.

When I posted my essay “Here’s hoping for better English in this year’s graduation rites” in the Forum last March 26, little did I know that something much worse than bad English would happen the following day at the Ateneo University’s commencement exercises. I had been too focused on fighting bad English to even think of plagiarism involving very high-profile graduation speakers. As they say, life happens while you’re still planning or writing forward about it—and it happens in the most unexpected ways! The most we can do is to be ever vigilant not only with our English grammar and usage but also with the provenance of our ideas.

[hill roberts]

Good morning Joe,
Greetings and a very Happy Easter Week to you and everyone!
Oh, dear, that was absolutely sad. How can some people, especially speechwriters think it is OK to paraphrase someone else's work and claim it to be his/her own? This is precisely the reason why I neve read other poets' work for the simple reason that it would echo in my mind and ended up being written by me. For Mr Pangilinan to take it hook, line and sinker without verifying the source of a good sauce was indeed folly and simplistic. Still, Miss J K Rowling has her own plagiarism problems, too. The original writer of a similar story written by Miss Rowling is now suing her for millions of British pounds. He wrote a 36-page children's book, sent it to Bloomsbury through an agent (who eventually became Miss Rowling's agent)--before he knew it, her book was published, after paying her the princely sum of £1,000.---and in those days, Bloomsbury was just a new publishing company, and was at the mercy of authors. Now, a lawsuit is facing this famous woman. Who knows, the day of reckoning would come anytime soon for this gentleman who sadly died three years ago? (I shall supply his name later since his name escapes me.)

[Joe Carillo]

Happy Easter, too, Hill!

You said you never read other poets' work for fear of unconsciously plagiarizing them. I think that's an extreme precaution that could forever prevent you from enjoying some of the most profound, lyric thoughts of humankind. I do hope you'll learn how to moderate that fear. Reading every week a poem or two by one of the great English-language poets should do no harm. The "Going Deeper into English" section of this Forum has a link to the Bartleby.com Anthology of English Verse, a treasure trove of great English poetry; dip into it anytime at your leisure. You can do so by simply clicking this link.

At any rate, do tell us more about J. K. Rowling's own scrape with plagiarism in your next posting.   

[hill roberts]

Yes, Joe, it sounds silly but in recent years, I've deprived myself of famous poets' works and I am foolish to have done so. Thank you for your advice and I will put it to good use and go back to reading poems again. I will try not to listen to the "echo" that may linger for a few days while penning a new poem or two.
The author Adrian Jacobs (now deceased) and his estate are suing Miss Rowling for having stolen his original ideas on his published book, 1987, Willy The Wizard, which was supposedly copied by Miss Rowling for her book, Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire. The full article can be found online, The Daily Mail, 19th February 2010, by Chris Brooke and Richard Shears.
An American Facebook friend of mine and I have now made a bet: US$1.00--with yours truly for Mr Jacobs winning half of Miss Rowling's estate and he is for the defense. Whichever way it goes, I'm quite certain that the relatives of Mr Jacobs have a valid point, win or lose. Miss Rowling would end up with egg on her face regardless of the outcome. My only hope is, the egg would be free-range and not battery.

[hill roberts]

If Mr Pangilinan were my social acquaintance, I'd look for  him and try to strangle his neck. My word, he also needs a good smack across the face! What was he thinking copying parts of the speeches of Miss Winfrey and Miss Rowling? Did he really think that just because the speeches were several years old, people would forget? For a distinguished man with  solid economic and academic backrground, what he did was downright stupid, not to mention genuinely embarrassing. I can imagine him walking up a posh hotel with the media and former admirers looking at him, not anymore in awe but in a state of  shock, wondering why he did it. I wish this gentleman well, despite his major lapse in having done something he wished he could put aside for good. But, the state of mind, wherever he now goes, would keep banging both sides of his brain, asking the same question: why? why? why? Can he redeem himself ? Mind you, the BBC has also picked up this story, describing him as a tycoon. How I wish he weren't a tycoon, let alone a person of very high standing in Philippine Society, condemned for his own self-inflicted shame. Mr Pangilinan, my message to you is, start walking or doing the rounds of the marginal districts/towns, up and down the capital, and redeem yourself by earmarking all those cashless, very intelligent young adults, give them scholarships, decent dorms where they can stay, and a monthly stipend for daily transport, "baon" and an hour's use of internet cafe.

[Meikah]

What happened to MVP was really really sad. It was the height of irresponsibility!Whoever his speech writer(s) was(were) ought to be shot!

I read the full speech and if not for those undocumented parts, it would have been a good speech. My golly! How difficult is it to acknowledge your sources?!... See More

Well, it's a lesson learned for all of us. Next time, careful careful! Better yet, let's have respect for other people's ideas, other people's accomplishments.

[renzphotography]

I wonder what became of the speech writer?    ..talk about command responsibility.