Omniverse One

I'm not in charge here, and for that exact reason I'm not turning this into a ban poll. But I've seen a slightly disturbing trend in Kamin's work. Mostly in the fact that we can't actually call it his work. Aside from the great unoriginality in his ideas (Roman survival has been done to death a bakijillimillion times over), he seems to take the next step and actually actively steals from other peoples' work. This plagiarism does vary from point to point, ranging from a full copy/paste of someone else's storyline to the more subtle.

We have the Lekad, which are essentially the Daleks and Imperium of Man slightly merged. We have the far more blatant SB.com Scars of Mustafar incident. We have his ripping off of minor ideas and other such from other posters here including some of Shroom's ideas (even referring to some by name; can't find the old thread, however) and also a direct ripoff of Heretic's character. Not that he hasn't done such a thing before, naturally.

Coupled with the fact that his poem, Liberty and Reason, in the poetry thread bears a great similarity to the structure and tone of a far more famous Latin poem.

I'm not going to advocate all-out banning just yet (wouldn't be out of the question, though), but I think it needs to be brought to everyone's attention that a primary poster's work isn't actually necessarily his work.

Plagiarism on Spacebattles

The Scars of Mustafar

Wikipedia's thoughts on Kamin

While some of you may not want to eject a member who has, technically, not done anything in our forums... I think we should be wary of anyone with a history of plagiarism on other boards.

So what if he lurks in SDN and rips off an SDN story in SB?

Well, so what if he posts in OZ and O1 and... ???

At least, this means we should start giving Kamin some of the attention he longs for.

Fuck Starklandia.

Just to make it clear, I would not have brought this up had the pattern ended some time ago. As it stands, the pattern still continues, and thus I think it deserves some attention.

Wow.

That said, I don't think he should be banned here until he actually does something. I wouldn't be against titling him so people know to watch out for this activity.

He has actually done two things here on this very board which I pointed out, the Heretic thing and the O Fortuna thing. And I'm a staunch believer that a pattern is a pattern and what we have here on this creative writing forum (effectively what it is) is a pattern of plagiarism.

Plagiarism is what we like to call a Cardinal Sin.

My objection there is neither example goes beyond reasonable doubt on its own: the character might have been a subliminal thing (he read the one post, then quickly forgot about it and wrote it down thinking it was original), and the poem is similar, but not close enough that I'm sure it was intentionally plagiarized (which he definitely has done in his past).

Enough to warrant a title, but nothing beyond that, yet.

The fact also remains that his plagiarism of Heretic is too similar to be subconscious, using the exact same terminology. And he's still got a record for this sort of thing. There is the other primarily troubling thing. This is written in a distinctly different style to his poetry, sharing none of the same sorts of hallmarks.

Kamin doesn't actually seem to have much of a distinct and consistent 'author's voice', as such.

Which means, basically, that he's very probably ripping off someone else. It's sort of the way you can tell Iain Banks wrote something. Just from the 'voice' alone. Of course, going in depth into author's voice, even though it is fascinating, just isn't doable. Not at the minute. It'd take a very large essay discussing the way narrative voice works, and would likely involve lots of quotes from novels, quotes from critics and quotes from poetry as I construct this very large picture of why certain writers sound like they do.

Rather than just chime in another "burn the xenos scum" (which is, for the record, my opinion), I think I should offer a bit of advice for Kamin. If he follows it or gets butthurt over my tone is entirely his decision to make.

There is a big, big difference between "taking inspiration" from something and "ripping off"/"plagiarism". When you have "lekads" and a "god-emperor of lekadkind", it's unimaginative at best and ripping off while making a charicature of the source material at worst. Taking inspiration from something requires you to take an idea (the cornerstone of all writing) and give it a new twist; thematic, atmosphere, setting, and characterization. The latter being most important. And that goes beyond twisting a few words around. "Lekad" is only slightly more imaginative than Sarevok infamously calling himself "Koveras". ~liek omg no one will know!!1!~ <_<

You also have to realize that plagiarism is the literary equivalant of performing NEDM on someone's beloved cat. It's the worst and most grievously wrong thing you can do; it hurts. How do you think Darth Fanboy felt? Many authors, myself included, devote much time and thought to what we write; it's a passion of ours, it's something we love. And to see it ripped off, twisted, and charicatured is worse than a bad breakup.

DO NOT WRITE FOR THE SAKE OF POSTING SOMETHING. [/cruisecontrolforcool] Let that sink in. You ain't hired by no publisher and have to produce something by a certain time. This is writing for recreation. God knows even I forget that sometimes. You don't have to post something to look like you're "contributing". Hell, if OZ/O1 worked by that, I'd have been kicked out on my ass long ago. It takes time to put thought into what you're doing, address plot holes, and produce a quality product. It also takes practice. If you have trouble thinking up things to write about, fucking read. That's what libraries are for, with helpful and (sometimes) cute librarians who are there to assist you in finding something to read. History; read moar.

But finally, since I'm getting tired of playing Mr. Nice Redneck, I'm going to get to the cold, cold, point. Re-evaluate yourself as a writer. Take time and heed my advice. Or not, your choice. If you still have issues with writing something good, perhaps you aren't cut out for it. One thing the Internets has made everyone think is that everyone can be the next Shakespeare or J.R.R. Tolkien. On the contrary, writing is a talent. Masterful writing is a rare gift. Try something else, like WoW or drawing a webcomic. God knows yours wouldn't be the worst.

Of course this could all be irrelevant and you're just doing it for the lulz. Problem with that is, unsuccessful troll is unsuccessful.

Again, I must chime in that I've been the victim of plagiarism personally, and thus my opinion is an unmitigated BURN THE BASTARD!!!

It's something one works very hard at creating, and then to see it ripped off like some common 'omg luk at meh, am so clevah!!1'... the emotions involved aren't quite describable except for pure unkempt rage and anger. And I must also put forth the fact that we also don't know if he hasn't already done it to us by posting our own work elsewhere.

Dude, let's be fair. I could be the next J.R.R. Tolkien.

They walked. "Behold," the Elven hawttie spoketh, "'tis a tree!"

"Nay, 'tis a sdfdsfds. There are many; this must be a sdsaerudfx."

"sdsaerudfx is the Gnomish word for forest!"

"Thank you, Captain Exposition."

"I am T. R. R. John, and I am not a Captain. I merely admire all the EXTREMELY DIFFICULT WORLDBUILDING done to write this book. I admire it so much that I feel I... errr... the author must write this book FAR LONGER THAN IT HAS TO BE just so he can SHOW IT OFF."

"Cut-eth out-eth the-eth all-caps. Eth."

"Chan-stop the eths please-tho."

"THIS ISN'T AT ALL LIKE THE BOOK! PROBABLY BECAUSE THE ASSHOLE SPAMMER WRITING THIS POST HAS NEVER READ IT!"

The characters walk some more. Oh look, a beautiful mountain beyond the forest.

"Much better."



We now return you to your regularly scheduled thread.

That's not even like the films, Destro.

You seriously need more exposure to fantasy.

and not just FF, amirite?

I'll be nice, Kamin. I'll pretend you didn't plagarize us, but instead, had fanboy obsessions for us so much that you wanted to be like us, but didn't know how to write such awesomeness, so you made fan fiction, which seems strangely similar. There, I don't see you as a plagarizer. I see you as a little teen fanboy. That should work, right? No one has to be hurt. Kamin is not a plagarizer and I'm not a victim.

But, my little friend, I would like to see you have something original. If you cannot seem to do that, please feel free to use Seventh Sanctum, where you will never see the same idea 8 times.

dude so i used to watch a show that had adventurer guys going on like... fantasy adventures

the party was a human badass, an elf wizard, and a human healer and ensign ricky

they would teleport around to different places and fight gods on a regular basis

and win. it was awesome

i've even seen HIGHLANDER and CONAN THE BARBARIAN

what more would you ask of me????

From the Board Policies, as posted by Siege Tank:



Also, this:



seem far too possible to ignore. I have no love for this particular members. I vote ban.

Well, I've mostly ignored Kamin's stuff before. But looking at the evidence posted, seeing how little Kamin actually has "contributed" both here and in old OZ, and hating plagiarism with a passion, I also vote:

I HAET him.

I really don't care that much, since I find him petty and amusing in this manner. But can I keep his COMIX stuff? I've had urges to Ultimize them, and basically rewrite them under the bare frameworks he provided.

Which reminds me, I need to catch up on Exterminatus Now.

Anyway, aside from abstaining votes such as myself, the concensus seems to be in and judgment passed already.

Unfortunately for the ban-happy folks 'round here I've already decided that there isn't sufficient cause for banning Kamin (yet). Whatever despicable stuff he (or anybody else for that matter) may have pulled on another site, that's still on another site, and I'm not going to punish him for it, particularly not when I'm not fully aware of what transpired there. The Lekad ordeal in my opinion isn't plagiarism but merely uninspired (and ancient history); if we censured poets for using other poets' rhyme structures there wouldn't be many poets left; and frankly I'm not going to pull triggers for the RPG-thing. While all of the previous combined does tend to lend credence to the theory of a rather frightening lack of creativity on Kamin's part, that's not in my opinion a bannable offense, although Kamin may hereby consider himself warned - if you're reading this: don't let me catch you in the act of too blatant a rip-off again.

Also and for the record Dakarne, I don't appreciate it when after you and I talk about this in private and I tell you of my final decision in the matter, I come back on here to find you kickstarted this public showtrial. I don't appreciate that at all. Let me make this perfectly clear to the whole lot of you, this is not a matter that will be decided by public vote. I consider myself a very lenient administrator, I don't like (and haven't got time for) immature powerplays and I'm always open to suggestions from you guys, but the final call in matters such as these is mine and - until such time as I find the time to instate additional senior staff - mine alone. The bottomline is, this isn't a democracy, and you're not going to get to vote on this.

Finally, to anyone, don't make public threads on whether something "should be done" about member such-and-such again, under any condition. If you've got a problem with me, with the board, or with another member, PM me or get in touch via IM. Don't make it a public matter, because I find threads like these distasteful and critically lacking in tact and subtlety. It's not going to do your point, or your good standing, any good.

That'll be all.