Re: Portfolio Samples -- Yours, Mine and Ours

["Eric J. Ray" <ejray -at- RAYCOMM -dot- COM>]

>      Several months passed and, lo and behold, Bubba's book was published
>      (by a major publisher). What was really interesting to the tech
>      writers was that the book contained verbatim paragraphs from the
>      manuals and articles they had written and shared with Bubba. Upon
>      closer examination, it appeared that the entire book was a
compilation

Was Bubba's book a "personal" project, or sponsored and underwritten
by the company you both work for? That is, do the royalty checks
and advance go to Bubba, or through some other arrangement is your
company compensated? If the former, I'd make darn sure that Bubba's
boss (and on up the food chain) is aware of what happened. Additionally,
assuming that's the case, Bubba almost certainly signed a contract
with the publisher in which he stated that he owned or had full
permission (documented) to use everything in the book, and he'll
be in a world of trouble with the publisher as well.

On the other hand, if the company helped land the book contract
to promote the CardX project, and for whatever reason told Bubba
to work with the publisher and write the book, Bubba's behavior
is likely legally, if not necessarily morally, defensible.

>      Does the concept of "plagiarism" still exist? In my past experience,
>      plagiarism was considered very bad form. However, in our current,
>      hurry-up-just-get-it-done work climate, is it now OK to just lift
>      entire sentences, paragraphs, sections from another writer's work and
>      put your name on it -- because you, the writer, don't own the work,
the
>      company does, and we all work for the same company, so it can't be
>      plagiarism, it's called leveraging?

Depends on what you're using it for. If you're using it for another
_manual_ (or document, or whatever) within the company or
for distribution by the company, it's only working smart. That said,
in that case it wouldn't have an individual's name on it anyway.

>      Let's say that it is OK to leverage. Then, to carry this out to its
>      logical conclusion, couldn't a writer could take any other company
>      manual, put it into her/his portfolio, and represent it as hers/his?

That's not the logical conclusion of leveraging. As soon as you hit
the "put into portfolio" moment, you went from working for the company's
interest to working for personal interest, and went from working smart
to deceit and lying.

>      Let's also throw in a little Big Bubba (a la Bill Clinton) logic and
>      ask what is meant by "my" writing (I am the company and the company
is
>      me).

"My writing" when at work? "My writing" when interviewing for another job?
"My writing" when your group is up for annual evaluations? I dunno--it
certainly depends, doesn't it.

>      Now, I'm an old fogie who's admitting that the rules seem to have
>      changed. I genuinely want to know if the (old) ethics of writing have
>      changed. Do we have a new ethic when it comes to the ownership of
>      writing? Also, what is the politically correct way to acknowledge
>      Bubba's authorship? And should the rest of us "lock up the silver"
the
>      next time Bubba comes a calling?

In my opinion, the answers to the questions all come back to who benefits
from the book, who sponsored/encouraged/whatever the book, and if Bubba
is acting on the company's behalf with their blessing, or in his own
enlightened self-interest.

Eric

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