​

IGN has taken down a review of the game Dead Cells, after it was found the video was almost word for word when compared to a video by Boomstickgamer, uploaded to YouTube over a week earlier. Boomstickgamer uploaded a video comparing the two videos and contacted IGN for an explanation. IGN pulled the video almost immediately but has yet to comment on the event outside of stating that the review has been taken down and that they are investigating.

Source - Boomstickgamers video
Source - IGN's statement [mod edit] Original link removed from IGN, archive.org copy

 

[gameboy]

some butthurt noname screwtuber complains to ign for stealing their work (it's not actually work it's just TALKING) and a guy at ign gets fired that's HILARIOUS!!

things like this arent really funny to me, i don't think people realize that theyre cyber bullying this guy. whether or not he knowing or unknowing plagiarized a stupid game review should 'nt be enough to toss his ass under the bus before teaching him what he did wrong an giving him a second chance. we all love to hate ign but the level of attention and e results following are pretty extreme. Im sure the self elitist writers and journalist that properly cite sources are loving it tho

 

[FAST6191]

everybody copies others works when it comes to this kind of stupid stuff like reviewing games and game reporting. its not like he completely stole someones 300page book, its missing a source or not thinking a source was needed. The thing is that a verdict was made so damn soon before hearing anything out and a man was openly judged before even hearing him out. Was it worth a few dollars to destroy a man before he could issue an apology or retract a simple game review? its pretty messed up the world we live in. Lets teach this guy a lesson by completely destroying him instead of teaching him what he did wrong...

Are we not supposed to hold game media to a high standard, or indeed the same standard I was held to in high school French? To dismiss game media would rather serve to undo a lot of the work done over recent years to really take it to task and point out the nonsense within it. The extent of copying and protection of IP law is an interesting subject (the cases deciding things for music in the US being some of the best I have read) but I can not see even the vaguest path to it being either a happy coincidence, simple truth statements or below a threshold.

I am wary of hate mobs being formed and going off without proper evidence gathering and while I think they got kind of lucky in this instance
"teaching him what he did wrong"
I don't know what the hiring requirements are for IGN, though looking at http://uk.ign.com/articles/2018/06/04/ign-is-hiring-editors-you-could-be-one-of-them (a job listing dated less than a week ago at time of writing)

What is "relevant college experience?"

Our staff shares a variety of educational backgrounds. Perhaps the most relevant are Journalism, Creative Writing, Game Design, or Art; but we have plenty of majors in History, Japanese, Drama, and other degrees that develop creativity and critical thinking.

With the possible exception of Japanese, and that is an extremely slim one there, every single one of those will be extensively versed in the perils of plagiarism. This isn't then a teaching moment like maybe they screwed up an interpretation of a mechanic or something and the review suffered accordingly but a fundamental aspect of their job that would have been drilled into them for at least half a decade.

And why do you keep saying sjw?

I was wondering this as well. The conclusion I went with is they might have expected it to act like one of those rage words that the mere utterance of causes some people in various groups to stop thinking rationally and just rage.

 

[Windaga]

Yikes. This wasn't going to end well for Filip either way; even if he would've been "exonerated" by IGN, everyone would have seen the video comparison and held it against him for future reviews. It's just so....odd, I guess? He had a great, if not developing, personality, and this must have been a dream job for him. There's no way he didn't think this was risky at the very least. I mean, it's the internet afterall. Even if he didn't get discovered right away, someone would have eventually picked up on it and reported it. And as we've seen in the media recently, old works will still get you fired....

 

[gameboy]

Are we not supposed to hold game media to a high standard, or indeed the same standard I was held to in high school French? To dismiss game media would rather serve to undo a lot of the work done over recent years to really take it to task and point out the nonsense within it. The extent of copying and protection of IP law is an interesting subject (the cases deciding things for music in the US being some of the best I have read) but I can not see even the vaguest path to it being either a happy coincidence, simple truth statements or below a threshold.

I am wary of hate mobs being formed and going off without proper evidence gathering and while I think they got kind of lucky in this instance
"teaching him what he did wrong"
I don't know what the hiring requirements are for IGN, though looking at http://uk.ign.com/articles/2018/06/04/ign-is-hiring-editors-you-could-be-one-of-them (a job listing dated less than a week ago at time of writing)



With the possible exception of Japanese, and that is an extremely slim one there, every single one of those will be extensively versed in the perils of plagiarism. This isn't then a teaching moment like maybe they screwed up an interpretation of a mechanic or something and the review suffered accordingly but a fundamental aspect of their job that would have been drilled into them for at least half a decade.


I was wondering this as well. The conclusion I went with is they might have expected it to act like one of those rage words that the mere utterance of causes some people in various groups to stop thinking rationally and just rage.

Social Justice Warrior does accurately describe them though and thats why i use it. Almost every review i see on youtube are cookie cutter reviews. Almost every game trailer is stolen and then stamped and regurgitated. I cant say if that guy was brought on solely for "his glowing reviews", to say he has no talent for otherthings ign im sure he had them. Its not rage, its this internet culture that sometimes sickens me. i do say stupid shit but i look at this situation and everyones treating him like OJ Simpson

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

Yikes. This wasn't going to end well for Filip either way; even if he would've been "exonerated" by IGN, everyone would have seen the video comparison and held it against him for future reviews. It's just so....odd, I guess? He had a great, if not developing, personality, and this must have been a dream job for him. There's no way he didn't think this was risky at the very least. I mean, it's the internet afterall. Even if he didn't get discovered right away, someone would have eventually picked up on it and reported it. And as we've seen in the media recently, old works will still get you fired....

"get found out(lol)" as Edgarska would say

 

[DiJornios]

Does anyone have the original video archived somewhere?
For memes

 

[Edgarska]

Social Justice Warrior does accurately describe them though and thats why i use it. Almost every review i see on youtube are cookie cutter reviews. Almost every game trailer is stolen and then stamped and regurgitated. I cant say if that guy was brought on solely for "his glowing reviews", to say he has no talent for otherthings ign im sure he had them. Its not rage, its this internet culture that sometimes sickens me. i do say stupid shit but i look at this situation and everyones treating him like OJ Simpson

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------



"get found out(lol)" as Edgarska would say

I haven't seen anyone treating him like OJ Simpson, I see people treating him like they would treat someone who gets paid to do a job, and decides to copy from a lesser known person.

Now, you say you studied English, which I guess means a literature degree? If so, then you already understand why plagiarism usually gets someone fired.

 

[gameboy]

I haven't seen anyone treating him like OJ Simpson, I see people treating him like they would treat someone who gets paid to do a job, and decides to copy from a lesser known person.

Now, you say you studied English, which I guess means a literature degree? If so, then you already understand why plagiarism usually gets someone fired.

not a literature degree, i never understood why people who spoke only one language (i speak more than english) never really knew how to speak it to the specifics words of what they want to say. In other words they dont even try to really understand how to better communicate in their own language. And english, in terms of global language, is the most specific language there is and i like specific things

 

[FAST6191]

Social Justice Warrior does accurately describe them though and thats why i use it. Almost every review i see on youtube are cookie cutter reviews. Almost every game trailer is stolen and then stamped and regurgitated. I cant say if that guy was brought on solely for "his glowing reviews", to say he has no talent for otherthings ign im sure he had them. Its not rage, its this internet culture that sometimes sickens me. i do say stupid shit but i look at this situation and everyones treating him like OJ Simpson

We have rather different takes on the social justicar concept then. Other than the potentially troubling hate mob thing I am not seeing the similarities and see fundamental differences in world views between them.

So youtube is filled with low effort dross, what bearing does that have on the situation here? Was the person that was copied doing something so low effort that it was coincidence that when IGN was also doing low effort dross that they happened to match? I watched the original review and while it is not how I would put together a review I would say it more than meets a creative effort threshold.
OJ Simpson? Someone convicted of a crime in civil court and dubiously let go from the criminal proceedings for the same event? I don't follow.

 

[kuwanger]

Social Justice Warrior does accurately describe them though and thats why i use it. Almost every review i see on youtube are cookie cutter reviews. Almost every game trailer is stolen and then stamped and regurgitated. I cant say if that guy was brought on solely for "his glowing reviews", to say he has no talent for otherthings ign im sure he had them. Its not rage, its this internet culture that sometimes sickens me. i do say stupid shit but i look at this situation and everyones treating him like OJ Simpson

How about, you hold in contempt all those who steal, stamp, and regurgitate others work even if they reword it? How about you don't go so anti-mob that you support people who are wrong? Just criticizing someone who you feel didn't actually do their job properly isn't equivalent to raising a pitch fork and demanding blood. You don't think SJWs? Does that mean one should never point out when someone takes your work and plagiarizes it? If it's not outright plagiarizing but is a demonstration of bankrupt ethics, do you get to point that out? If you make videos to make money, just like IGN, then is expecting money when people clearly are recycling your review inappropriate?

And english, in terms of global language, is the most specific language there is and i like specific things

That's funny. Should I use the term "fanny pack" or "bum pack"? If I say bollocks or spaz, am I being super offensive? A comedy of errors is often based precisely on how unspecific English can be or how unintelligible two people can be to each other which able to argue they're using "correct" English. I find it funny how you refuse to acknowledge what was done as plagiarism but you seem to lump near all of youtube into plagiarism without considering fair use and criticism of a work.

Not that my opinion matters. Any sort of criticism, mine or yours, is its own sort of SJW if enough people mob behind it.

 

[Lazyt]

But..who cares?

 

[Skelletonike]

snip

I just concluded my university degree this month and plagiarism and one thing I learned in my Applied Languages course (which focused in English and Japanese), is that what is considered Plagiarism is different nowadays. When writing reports, thesis, reviews, etc, we more likely than not need to cite something, even if it's only an idea or a view, we need to cite said idea or view. A lot of people were kicked out of my university because they rewrote phrases that were originally not theirs. Rewriting used to be good enough in the past, nowadays it is not.

The biggest problem here is that he did not cite his source. Firing him over this is well deserved imho.

 

[Ev1l0rd]

Good that he's fired. Plagiarism = Bad.

Just looking at the video shows that it's waaaay to similar to not match up.

Don't steal other people's work, or if you use them as a reference, learn to properly cite. It isn't hard.

Cut, clear and dry. And a cut, clear and dry resolution to this case.

Now on another note: Dead Cells is a damn good game. Pick it up when you have the chance.

 

[Deleted User]

copy is a strong word. Most people do the same with reviews HEAVILY INSPIRED by someone else's review. Again this is not a ''not enough creativity'' thing, its a plagiarism accusation which going ''word for word'' outside the game verbiage it is not... LOL i laugh because it was very heavily inspired from but NOT plagiarism.

I think the guy should have been reprimanded but firing him over one act of misconduct is pretty harsh. We don't know if he was busy at the pub drinking or busy helping his wife look after their sick children. Though, it's also true that we don't know if he has a history of misconduct or not. I don't like seeing the fuck your shit up hammer getting dropped on someone.

 

[Catsinabucket]

When are people going to stop claiming everything under the sun is a "SJW" issue

 

[sarkwalvein]

When are people going to stop claiming everything under the sun is a "SJW" issue

Well, it is a problem of the these times.
People are not using the term "SJW" as "Social Justice Warrior" anymore, but more as "mob mentality".
It happened because, TBH, SJWs on the internet were the prime mob mentality representation.
Mob mentality nowadays doesn't have much to do with "social justice" (as in distribution of wealth and equity), but people still say SJW for anonymous people on the internet with mob mentality.

 

[Krazyeye]

only thing he'll be "editing" is updating his resume..hehehe

 

[Catsinabucket]

Well, it is a problem of the these times.
People are not using the term "SJW" as "Social Justice Warrior" anymore, but more as "mob mentality".
It happened because, TBH, SJWs on the internet were the prime mob mentality representation.
Mob mentality nowadays doesn't have much to do with "social justice" (as in distribution of wealth and equity), but people still say SJW for anonymous people on the internet with mob mentality.

Huh, I had no idea people were using it to refer to mob mentality - thanks for that

 

[sarkwalvein]

Huh, I had no idea people were using it to refer to mob mentality - thanks for that

It still is a wrong usage of the term, but I see people all around using it like that.

 

[mancasoko]

And now this guy is little more popular and gets attention on him because he screw IGN a little. I guess many times bad things happens to us in life and sometimes that can backfire with one good thing.

 

[sarkwalvein]

And now this guy is little more popular and gets attention on him because he screw IGN a little. I guess many times bad things happens to us in life and sometimes that can backfire with one good thing.

He should make a YouTube channel under the handle "The Review Plagiarist", sure he will get a good number of subscribers.
Hell, perhaps he should play it straight and make the channel all about "plagiarized" reviews based on small reviewers, reinterpreted by him and tuned to his style a little here and there. Yeah, that might be a hit.

But this time around perhaps he should cite the reference and state it is some kind of parody under fair use to avoid legal problems.