That’s cut and paste journalism, taken in large part from Wikipedia – the online encyclopedia to which any member of the public can contribute.

Here’s where freelance journalist Tom Winterbourn took the exact same words and sentences from Wikipedia. —Community Papers Anniversary Lift (ABCTV (Australia) MediaWatch)

An interesting article about a print journalist accused of plagiarizing Wikipedia. Since the article I’m linking to is a transcript of a TV item, it’s pretty much useless to read on the web. The title “Community Papers Anniversary Lift” is completely meaningless, perhaps because this story was introduced by an anchor who read a script that was not archived with this story, which is why I had to add my own explanation of what you were reading in order for this excerpt to make any sense.

There are highlighted screenshots and excerpts, but they’re not connected to links. Wouldn’t it make sense to link to the Wikipedia source and link to the journalist’s article, and let readers judge for themselves?

A great example of how not to do online journalism. (Link via Metafilter.)