Should Mahalo have a plagiarism checker installed on the website to catch all duplicated answers? Read more inside!
http://www.mahalo.com/answers/open-discussion-flock-3-has-been-released-it-is-based-on-google-chrome-would-u-ever-use-a-google-chrome-based-flock-for-social-networking-1
The best answer was copy pasted from another site yet still received a M$21.04 Tip.(Props to @buddawiggi for this find!) I even voted up the answer at it was informing, well articulated, and added direct analysis to the question. But I never even thought to second guess the answer as plagiarized as I know there are many intelligent people on this website.
I personally think there should be a plagiarism tool that automatically filters all answers and if some answer is duplicated over 70 percent it should be flagged and check by the Mahalo Community. I think it would be key for the website such as Mahalo to keep up the integrity of all answers provided. That is what makes Mahalo Answers a unique place for users to come and interact. Should Mahalo play this ethical role?
Would love to hear what the community thinks.
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M$6 Answers
When I read a journalistic quality Mahalo answer from a new user here (like the one you pointed out) I almost always run it through Dustball for a couple of reasons; one I want to insure the answer I'm about to vote for is actually written by that user, two I am always on the look out for new star quality writers here because one of the educational facets on Mahalo for me is improving my own writing. I learn how to improve my own writing from the great writers we have here, and three .. it is just not fair to those of us who use all of our own words when someone gets away with a big copypasta answer like that one.
I would love to see a an auto-detector of plagiarism. Maybe just an "Are these your own words" pop up every time we submit an answer with a notice if the words are plagiarized then it is an illegal answer and considered very bad form here in Mahalo Answers.
With all of the other new expansions and improvements Mahalo has been making in the past few months I would not imagine that a automatic plagiarism detector is on their list of things to do but it is on my dream Mahalo list of features.
Until then lets just keep our eyes open and Dustball bookmarked.
You can leave an optional "tip" with Mahalo's virtual currency, Mahalo Dollars. If you are asking a difficult question that might require some research, or if you'd like a wide variety of feedback, a higher tip often leads to more answers to your question.
M$
You can leave an optional "tip" with Mahalo's virtual currency, Mahalo Dollars. If you are asking a difficult question that might require some research, or if you'd like a wide variety of feedback, a higher tip often leads to more answers to your question.
M$
You can leave an optional "tip" with Mahalo's virtual currency, Mahalo Dollars. If you are asking a difficult question that might require some research, or if you'd like a wide variety of feedback, a higher tip often leads to more answers to your question.
M$
Does anyone know if @Javedkhan is aware of how looked down upon this is? Im thinking he might of thought it was OK because if you look at all his other answers this 20M$ BA sticks out like a sore thumb.
You can leave an optional "tip" with Mahalo's virtual currency, Mahalo Dollars. If you are asking a difficult question that might require some research, or if you'd like a wide variety of feedback, a higher tip often leads to more answers to your question.
M$
So, a good system I have seen is, other answerers checking to make sure a "too good to be true" answer is really originally from the answerer. I think it's part of the competition for best answer. And it feels good to expose cheaters, who might otherwise have stolen your chances of getting a best answer.
I think the site Buddawiggi shared with us is a very good tool, to use here at Mahalo. I have already bookmarked it. :)
My own opinion
You can leave an optional "tip" with Mahalo's virtual currency, Mahalo Dollars. If you are asking a difficult question that might require some research, or if you'd like a wide variety of feedback, a higher tip often leads to more answers to your question.
M$
You can leave an optional "tip" with Mahalo's virtual currency, Mahalo Dollars. If you are asking a difficult question that might require some research, or if you'd like a wide variety of feedback, a higher tip often leads to more answers to your question.
M$
Yeah I agree, I wonder what or if Mahalo should do anything. I know they have an ethical guideline and it would be interesting to see if this falls under it. But knowing Mahalo they will probably take little action as it isn't a priority issue. I feel this is a huge priority because I have been seeing this occurring at an alarming rate the past day I have been searching for plagiarism. Hopefully a Mahalo staff member comes along this post and can provide insight!
Even though I don't have a program to run an answer through to check for plagiarism, I've found instances of cut and paste answers by just putting a sentence from the answer in quotation marks and googling it. Sometimes they're very easy to spot, especially when a description of a product is requested. It's so important to prevent these plagiarized answers from being selected as BA. I think there should be an option that would flag the answer as plagiarism to prevent people for voting for it. Besides reporting the answer, I think if someone finds that an answer is plagiarized, it's his/her responsibility to comment on the answer pointing out that it is copied and add the link to the original site.
Yeah it was great to see that individuals from the Mahalo Community are running the check and I was equally disappointed that I voted up the answer. But you are definitely right of running a "journalistic quality Mahalo answer" for any new users. Even clicking on his profile you can see most of his other answers were in a different tone and syntax. Simply completely different writing styles. Haha he even ended his post with "thnk u........" I should have caught that red flag. Yet as a casual Mahalo member I rarely have the time to check answers. I feel it would cut out so much leg work and improve the quality with an installed plagiarism checker on Mahalo. But thanks for your insight and your finds!