🚩 The World of Football Moderator Caught Plagiarising

in Mosquito Squishers3 years ago (edited)

It has become customary when joining a new community, to undergo a verification process. To sign up and say "here I am, I agree to the terms of this community".

World of Football is no different. There's a membership validation (which highlights "UNDERSTANDING CONTENT ABUSE/PLAGIARISM" as one of its main headings), a post on how to obtain royalty free images and also an announcement of what the disciplinary actions are.

The community is very clear on its plagiarism stance. And within the disciplinary actions, it's clearly stated:

Effective immediately, any user found guilty of plagiarism or content abuse will be banned from this community and place on the "muted" status, after which they can no longer share any content here.

So when @icymi highlighted this post as significant, @the-gorilla took a look with a view to supporting it.

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But something within the post was amiss. A title that appeared irrelevant to the article and the original source of the article was quickly identified.

Knowing "World of Football"'s intolerance to plagiarism, the administrators and moderators were to be notified and it then became clear why this post had not been checked...

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⚠️ World of Football moderator @edmund.nef had been caught plagiarising


@the-gorilla investigated further and found 4 additional posts which he highlighted as plagiarised:

  1. https://steemit.com/hive-121930/@edmund.nef/simeone-applauds-atletico-s-extraordinary-spirit-after-dramatic-win
  2. https://steemit.com/hive-130734/@edmund.nef/premier-league-s-best-defenders-ranked-find-out-if-your-defender-is-part
  3. https://steemit.com/hive-121930/@edmund.nef/pep-guardiola-reveals-two-teams-he-believes-are-superior-to-normal-manchester-city
  4. https://steemit.com/hive-130734/@edmund.nef/senegal-draws-0-0-with-egypt-aet-4-2-penalties-mane-shines-as-the-lions-of-teranga-win-their-first-afcon-title

I've no doubt that we'd find more acts of plagiarism and following the discovery, "World of Football" admin, @njaywan, replied with:

Thank you so much for drawings attention to this. It will certainly be dealt with.

Almost 24 hours later, we are still watching closely to see the action that is required.

any user found guilty of plagiarism or content abuse will be banned from this community and place on the "muted" status, after which they can no longer share any content here.

In the meantime, he's been muted from Steem Sports (because I'm a moderator).

It can be seen that @edmund.nef has received good support from steemcurator and booming accounts despite the content being plagiarised. In fact, Post 4 above received both steemcurator and booming support despite it being 92.7% identical to another source and easily found to be plagiarised.

Does this user deserve to be in a position in which they're more likely to be supported in this way?


Tough on plagiarism? It takes more than words to be tough on plagiarism.

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Thank you for finding this.

We rather assume that communities would not let their own Moderators plagiarize.

cc @njaywan @adeljose
@theatrorve @marcybetancourt @fuentesjo3006 @winstonq7

cc @oppongk @nattybongo

Hi @steemcurator01,

We don't tolerate any form of abuse in our community and are constantly checking and warning members concerning this subject matter.

This is quite a unique and strange case since the user was seen to have been quite forthcoming with good articles and contributed massively to the growth of the community with positive engagement.

That is why he was promoted to the rank of the moderator. It is rather unfortunate that he took advantage of the community's trust and betrayed my trust too.

As I told the-gorilla on discord, we don't tolerate any form of plagiarism in our community so he was going to be dealt with.

He has been relieved of his duty as a moderator now which would serve as a strong deterrent to any member who might think of committing such an offense.

I apologize for this slip up in carrying out my obligations as the leader of the community. I will be extra vigilant in the scrutiny of posts including that of our moderators.

Sorry for any inconvenience caused.

You're doing a great job and working hard across multiple communities. Thank you for taking decisive action.

Sadly, things escalated as the user decided to lie about their actions (indicating a lack of remorse or intention to change their behaviour) and continued to receive support from steemcurator accounts within another community. This sat very uncomfortably with me, knowing that there are many honest users not receiving support.

The decision to appoint this user as a moderator is understandable. He worked hard to earn this position and continued to be active and support other users within the World of Football community. I can only assume that the additional responsibility and reduced time to write his own content resulted in the "quick solution" of passing off the work of others as his own. But only he can tell us why he did it which is unlikely whilst he insists that the content he plagiarised is his own work.

This is the second time this user has committed plagiarism . So welcome @endingplagiarism to make the right decision about this ID @bidyut01.
https://steemit.com/hive-129948/@bidyut01/3e9uma-diy
Cc: @ac-cheetah @milakz

Greetings friend @steemcurator01.

I have left aside my functions in this community, since it was only a support that you asked me for the newly created community at the time, however, I will be aware of these cases of plagiarism, regardless of whether they are moderator, administrator or Country Representative.

Hello @steemcurator01,

Thanks for the cc, as edmund.nef also happens to be a member of steem-ghana it is only prudent that we also keep an eye out for his work to curb any form of plagiarism in our community as soon as possible.

He would be put on the radar and watched accordingly, however I believe this community would have to deal with him their own way and so I would leave that to this community’s leadership to do their work whiles I focus on steem-ghana.

Thank you

The abuse appears to be solely related to posts about football so I would not expect any issues within steem-ghana 👍🏼

Ok please thank you

This is the second time this user has committed plagiarism . So welcome @endingplagiarism to make the right decision about this ID @bidyut01.
https://steemit.com/hive-129948/@bidyut01/3e9uma-diy
Cc: @ac-cheetah @milakz

Greetings friend, I would like to have you in Colombia-Original again, your tag is intact.

Es una vergüenza... Y los que trabajamos duro y ordenadamente a veces ni somos vistos ... Qué está mal aquí?

There are quite a lot of initiatives designed to highlight users that comment on others' work and power up now so I'm optimistic that things will improve and those most deserving of getting noticed will.

With regards to abuse, It does feel like we're at a low point and hopefully things will improve again (it was almost exactly 1 year ago that plagiarism appeared to be at its worse).

Nos mantenemos optimistas 🤗
Que todo sea para mejorar. Gracias por tu ánimo 😌

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Dear team. @endingplagiarism

On behalf of our community we give you a warm welcome, well that you have resumed your good offices "against plagiarism in steemit".

We want to ask you if you accept that we grant you the role of moderator again in our community, which has grown quite a bit, and now there is more that we must verify in order to support our users.

Answer us here and we will be happy to work as a team with you.

A big hug, and welcome aboard!

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I would be happy to be added as moderator again. I am not as active as I was previously but still see a lot of abuse and so being able to take action within Recreative Steem (if necessary) would be helpful.

Listo. Enseguida te asignó el rol. Es un honor trabajar contigo. 🤗

Rol asignado :)

You know I have already seen some communities where the moderators after being initially good and correct, later on started posting plagiarism. So no wonder, temptation of easy cash out after their status is verified and they have good reputation.

It is too bad some people do this after we instill our trust in them and end up tarnishing the good image we have worked so hard to build.

Yes, it is a shame. We have seen it many times in various forms across the platform - The temptation to abuse their power often becomes too strong for some people.

Thank you @steemcurator01, the issue of plagiarism is really growing in Steem and discard this. Members involving in such acts are sometimes warned privately in order not to feel so exposed publicly which would turn to dump their spirit and reputation of writing. Muting the individual is very simple for us as Moderators to do, but we first want reforms and change in the individual behavior. However, if these if these issue of Plagiarism become rampant in our communities it becomes like we the Reps and Mods aren't working as expected.

Going forward, we are on the lookout to ban and mute all Plagiarism in our Communities no the affiliation we have with the person. Just hold on and expect the Mods and Admins working. We are therefore sorry on these issues trending since @stef1 revealed this on about two occasions from @steem-ghana. I would be also checking @steemfarm-market and would team up my colleagues Mods to check other Communities too.

Our pleasure 😃 working with you!

Unfortunately in this instance, the author was quietly informed and the opportunity to be honest quickly passed him by, instead choosing to argue and lie when the evidence was clear (i.e. no sign of remorse or indication of a future change of behaviour). I would have far preferred not to have felt that this course of action was necessary but to have him continue in his role and receive steemcurator support when there are many honest users meant that attention had to be drawn to this user ☹️

Hopefully I won't feel the need to write a post like this again.

From what I have seen here plagiarism is a sin in steemit.
Why do people steal content when there's so much in the world to write about and make it meaningful to fellow steemians?