Former Conference Board Author Explains How Lobbyists Influenced Plagiarized Reports

from the well,-there's-that... dept

Wow. If you thought that the whole saga with the deceptive and plagiarized reports about intellectual property in Canada was over, when The Conference Board of Canada recalled the reports and admitted that they were both plagiarized and not up to research standards, think again. One of the named authors of the report is now speaking out to reveal some of the behind the scenes details. Now, he's only giving one side, but if his version of the events is true, it's incredibly damning of the Conference Board. Basically, he says that he wrote a very, very different research report last year, and handed it over in late August. He had already quit to take another job, but had finished up his research. However, months later, he received phone calls from both The Conference Board and some of the IP lobbyists who funded the research to complain about what the research said (impartial? non-biased?). Since he was no longer employed, he figured it was none of his business, but he implies that in response to these calls, the Conference Board appears to have replaced much of what he wrote with the plagiarized snippets from the lobbyist's own reports... but left his name on the report as an author. He's not happy:

• I was a full-time employee with the Conference Board between September 2007 and July 2008. I resigned almost a year ago to take a fulfilling job with a non-profit in British Columbia.
• I submitted draft research to my former supervisor for the IP reports in mid-August 2008. I finished the research after I moved even though I was neither on salary nor on contract with the Board.
• The research I submitted did NOT include the controversial passages or plagiarized content.
• I worked with three contract researchers on this project between April 2008 and June 2008, including Jeremy deBeer, whose work I integrated into the draft. These researchers did not submit research that included the controversial/plagiarized content.
• I had no involvement in any content changes and did not see these papers after I submitted them in August.
• My new work was interrupted in mid-September by my former supervisor at the Conference Board to tell me there had been “push back” from one of the funding clients about the research and inclusion of Mr. deBeer’s contribution. I had quit almost two months earlier so this was of no concern to me.
• Around the same time, my new work was also interrupted by a call from one of the funding clients who expressed similar concerns. Again, I informed him that I no longer had anything to do with these reports.
• I received news of its publication on May 26, 2009, ten months after my resignation. I downloaded and read the research after I was informed of the controversy and was alarmed to see the direction it had taken.
• I sent my letter to Anne Golden the following day.
• The VP of Public Policy e-mailed me on May 29th to ask for my assistance in finding both researchers who could "fix" the reports, as well as external reviewers who would be impartial in reviewing the new work. His message stated that “I trust your judgment, experience and knowledge and would value your help.”

The Conference Board wants my help to fix reports that were published 10 months after my departure. It wants me to help fix publications that were re-written (and plagiarized) months after my departure and after they discarded the research I compiled and submitted. The Conference Board asks for my help but won't acknowledge that it was wrong to put my name on reports that bear little resemblance to the original research I submitted, were substantially reworked, and were published ten months after I resigned. After Anne Golden laid blame on contract researchers and supervisors late last week, I noticed two of the authors who still were listed on the organization's web site were no longer on the staff list.

If true, this is all pretty damning, and raises serious questions about how The Conference Board of Canada created this report, as well as its impartial nature as a research institute. It's no secret that many research firms are accused of producing reports that favor the funders of those reports -- but to specifically toss out contrary results and replace them with the funders' own text goes beyond even what many "pay for the research results you want" type firms normally do.

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The Conference Board Of Canada Recalls Three IP Reports; Admits Plagiarism

from the wow dept

Earlier this week, we noted the massive problems with a recent set of reports put out by The Conference Board of Canada about intellectual property in Canada. Based on highly questionable research with parts of it apparently copy/pasted from lobbyist reports, the whole thing was a mess, and a significant drain on The Conference Board of Canada's credibility as an impartial analyst on these sorts of issues. Michael Geist has been leading the charge in exposing these reports for what they are, and I recently agreed to team up with Geist (really: back him up by saying "yeah, what he said!" over and over again) in a debate with the Conference Board organized by the Mesh guys. Except... while waiting for The Conference Board to respond to the offer to debate, something quite surprising happened: the Conference Board of Canada has recalled all three IP reports and put out a statement reading:

The Conference Board of Canada has recalled three reports: Intellectual Property Rights in the Digital Economy; National Innovation Performance and Intellectual Property Rights: A Comparative Analysis; and Intellectual Property Rights--Creating Value and Stimulating Investment. An internal review has determined that these reports did not follow the high quality research standards of The Conference Board of Canada.

Separately, the CEO of The Conference Board of Canada has supposedly admitted the report was plagiarized. Kudos to Michael Geist for his relentless following of this story, and making sure it got the attention it deserved... and kudos to The Conference Board of Canada for actually backing down (despite first defending the credibility of the report) once it realized how problematic it was. However, it is disappointing that it took massive publicity to get the company to recognize and admit the mistake. It's troubling that it would have put out lobbyist talking points in cut-and-paste fashion in the first place... and it makes you wonder if it's happened with other reports from The Conference Board of Canada. In the meantime, I guess this means I'm not flying to Toronto any time soon...

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Canadian Report On IP Not Just Deceptive... But Plagiarized

from the oops dept

Once again, we're seeing a report or person pushing for stronger IP laws that seems to feel that it's fine if they cut some corners. Michael Geist has the story of a report from The Conference Board of Canada, which describes itself as "the foremost, independent, not-for-profit applied research organization in Canada. Objective and non-partisan. We do not lobby for specific interests." Except... when the money's good. It's latest report, backed by a bunch of copyright lobbyists and the gov't of Ontatio (taxpayer money!) isn't just deceptive but appears to plagiarize widely from other already debunked reports, without a hint of skepticism or independent thought. Instead, it appears to have simply cut & pasted certain sections. While plagiarism and copyright are two separate issues, they are related in some ways -- and it's rather stunning that a report complaining about mass piracy in Canada would plagiarize large sections. But, even worse, of course, is the claim that this is from an independent group with no lobbying interests, when the plagiarized sections were written by lobbyists. Whatever credibility The Conference Board of Canada had (and apparently it's a well-respected organization), it just lost a bunch of it. Meanwhile, The Conference Board insists that it's standing by the report and only made a minor mistake in how it cited the info used in its report. Of course, that's not quite true. It didn't clearly quote the sections it copied, nor did it do any work to confirm whether that information was correct or simply repeated what the lobbyists who hired the company had already written elsewhere.

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