"If it's not plagiarism, it's certainly sloppy and lazy journalism": Travel Writing at the Times

Denny Lee of the New York Times has been accused by the Argentine blogger Taos Turner of reusing significant portions of a Newsweek story for his own piece, saying that it rephrased a number of paragraphs from a January 2007 Newsweek article by Brian Byrnes.

Even more suspicious is the fact that of the 12 expats quoted in the Newsweek story, 8 re-appear in the Times, and at least one was never contacted for the new piece. Turner asks, "if 'nearly everywhere you turn these days' there is an expat planting his or her flag, as Lee wrote, then why did he not refer to more of them in his story?"

Turner sought comment from the vice chair of the ethics committee at the Society of Professional Journalists, Fred Brown, who says " . . . if it's not plagiarism, it's certainly sloppy and lazy journalism. This is not fair to the original writer." [Mediabistro]