Editing, Reviewing, and Anti-Plagiarism Policies for Virtual Environments

摘要

Both traditional and virtual environments face the plague of plagiarism and are confronted with decreasing attention to perfecting original research and study skills. Among all, e-sources seem most exposed and tempting for the ones who seek an easy way out by means of cheating. This danger is especially present at students' level, but not exclusively, as such people choose not to make the effort of constructing their own views, but rather import others' approaches and language. However, this is only a mask to wear briefly, leaving the person behind it empty-handed/empty-headed for a long interval of time. E-resources are readily available, thus speeding up knowledge and progress. It is the academic environment that should put this heritage to good use, facilitating networking and originality, and educating learners and researchers towards contributing to it, not stealing from it. Inasmuch as the reviewing of manuscripts is an essential step in the publication process, all scientists have an obligation to do a fair share of reviewing, as publication policies together with the screening procedures play a key role in combating intellectual theft and promoting real values.