A Prophylactic for Plagiarism

If you are like me, you believe the Paul McCartney plagiarized the melody for “Yesterday.” According to lore, he woke up with the melody in his head. C’mon he probably heard it somewhere else. Or misheard something and put it back together in his head— which is another way to describe writing. Language is so limiting that we are constantly aping or parroting each other. The people who try to speak in unusual constructions or write with vigorous disregard for convention are often labeled messy for resisting the urge to cliché that’s natural when you are writing— oddly enough especially when I am journaling/blogging!

LexisNexus seeks to counter both intentional and unintentional acts of plagiarism with a new software program CopyGuard.

Check out this well-written article on LexisNexus’ efforts in Baltimore’s CityPaperOnline.