MAY 31, 2005

WERE WE BAMBOOZLED?

I'm back from a week in Brazil judging a cartoon contest; I'll write more about that soon. This morning I'm going through my mailbox and I'm hearing from many readers who tell me that the plagiarizing Saudi Arabaian cartoonist, Ali al-Ghamdi, is not a student at all. Readers are telling me that I had it right the first time, and that Ali, or someone, was trying to fool me into taking down the plagiarism samples. Some reader comments are below.

Click here to see the thread with many samples of plagiarized cartoons by Saudi cartoonist, Ali al-Ghamdi.

At the right is a plagiarism example from another Saudi cartoonist, that was sent to us by a reader. See it here on the Almadina Newspaper site, by Saudi cartoonist Alaa Allaqeta on 11/5/2005.

Sent: Sunday, May 29, 2005 11:04 PM
Subject: about the saudi cartoonest

First I thank you for talking about that topic

Second : I see you posted that he was a student , I hate to tell you, but I think he fooled you and thinks because you do not read arabic you wouldn't catch him for example in alwatan newspaper this is dated 13-8-2004 , and in it the prize for cartoon art ( 50,000 saudi ryals ) was given to the cartoonist Ali Saed Alghamdi ( 50,000 riyals = 13,000 $ ) not only that , but in the pictures the bottom picture has thiscaption " Ali Alghamdi receving the artist prize." and as you see in the picture , he isn't as young as he tried to make you think with his old picture

Hello Daryl,

I'm Saudi and i know that Al Watan isn't THE largest newspaper in my country. The largest newspaper would be either "al riyadh" or "al jazeera" newpapers. By the way , "Al Watan" has a bad reputation around here for the fake\distorted news it shows ocassionally. Even our prince , Sultan, called them "liars". And now with al ghamdi's plagiarism , it's reputation is almost destroyed.

Everyone is talking about Al Ghamdi here, we even gave him the nick name "theif". He tried to justified what he did , but he made himself look even more pathetic and stupid.

also , if you want to see a recent picure of Al Ghamdi ; you can find it here, he's in the last picture , the guy on the left. Below the picture it says "the artist Ali Al Ghamdi recieving the caricature prize". If you guys spend more time , you'd find more "stolen" comics by Al Ghamdi. Some people searched for and found some after reading your blog entry.


Sincerely,
Mashhoor Al Dubayan

Hello,

The only reason i'm sending you this E-Mail is to tell you that, as a Saudi, I highly suspect that the person who sent you the picture of Ali al-Ghamdi is actually the accuser cartoonist himself. When I read that he's just a student working part-time with the newspaper getting only 30$/month, I was a little bit shocked. This cartoonist used to publish his cartoons in another newspaper since I can remember (1998) before he moved to AlWatan newspaper. The picture is obviously for a 16 years old boy, not someone who's been publishing his cartoons (under the same name & style) since 1998.

Dear Mr. Cagle,

My name is Hussam and I'm from Saudi Arabia. I've just read the update you posted after getting an e-mail from the Saudi cartoonist Ali Al-Ghamdi, and I would like to inform you that there is no way the things mentioned in his e-mail could be true. First, there's no job, NO JOB what so ever in this country that pays as low a sallary as 30$/month! I mean street sweepers are paid at least 100$/month, and there're not Saudis. They are from the poorest countries, like Bangladesh. Saudi workers and employers are much more expansive.

Second, Ali Al-Ghamdi has been around for at least five or six years. So he can't be as young as the kid in the photo, plus the haircut seems way out-of-date, don,t you think? So, I imagine, even the kid in the photo is not as young today as he is in the photo :)

Also the photo is clearly a scan from a newspaper. If you look carefully, you could see the texture. Ali uses image-editing software in his work, so I don't think he's the type that'd be short on digital photos of himself on the hard-drive. Even if he had to scan, he would scan an original recent photo, not a newspaper vintage one!

So there you are. All things in that e-mail are false. Now, I'm thinking it's either that the e-mail is not really from Ali, or that it is from him and he's lying his ass off for some reason!

Ali is a grown man, and he's the lead cartoonist in Alwatan Newspaper (the second or third most important newspaper in Saudi Arabia). His cartoons appear on the last page, and they vary in their topics, while the other cartoons in the same publication are specialized. So he,s the top man over their.

I really think that the situation is much worse than what you began to think it was after you received that e-mail. It is as ugly and shameful as you thought it was in the first place! The newspaper and the cartoonist should be exposed.

Thank you

Drayl !!!

Here's a quote from your blog :

"... Had I known that Ali was a student and not a top Saudi cartoonist, I would have written an email to him and to the Alwatan newspaper, scolding them for plagiarizing cartoons, but I don't think I would have posted anything in the blog. There is no point bashing a student for plagiarism. I think the Alwatan newspaper should have done some more due diligence on what they were printing, but I can see where they might not have put much thought into student cartoons appearing in their paper.... "

HOW IN EARTH DO YOU BELIEVE THAT? Ali Alghamdi is trying to fool everyone with that e-mail he sent. He wants to make you think he's a small teenager trying to make money (to avodi being sued) , but in fact he's an older guy and actually looks MUCH older than he do in that picture.

besides , he's NOT recieving $30 per month. God !! even the worst janitor here makes more !!!

he FOOLED you. And i think he's happy about showing false information about him so Saudis won't know he really looks like or\and to make himself look like a small rookie (so no one would blame him cuz he's young)

Al Watan showed alghamdi in a pic recently taking a price for his comics, he looks much older , but i couldn't find a link to the pic.

Also , when alghamdi tried to justify his theft in al watan , he mentioned that the newspaper warned him about the way he "adapt" ideas of other cartoonists. So they already KNOW about it.

thank you

WERE WE BAMBOOZLED?

I'm back from a week in Brazil judging a cartoon contest; I'll write more about that soon. This morning I'm going through my mailbox and I'm hearing from many readers who tell me that the plagiarizing Saudi Arabaian cartoonist, Ali al-Ghamdi, is not a student at all. Readers are telling me that I had it right the first time, and that Ali, or someone, was trying to fool me into taking down the plagiarism samples. Some reader comments are below.

THE CARTOON PLAGIARISM STUFF ...

I took the Saudi Cartoon Plagiarism stuff off of the blog. It was all getting too weird.

First, I got emails from a reader in Saudi Arabia telling me about the matching cartoons, and directing me to the Alwatan newspaper site which displayed the cartoons. Then I emailed a couple of Saudi cartoonists for comments, both said they knew and respected the cartoonist and were shocked by the plagiarism samples. They said his work was known as innovative and the newspaper is the largest in Saudi Arabia. I e-mailed the newspaper and didn't get a response. I also heard from readers in Saudi Arabia who said they saw the cartoons in the newspaper. Good enough for me to put the blast into the blog.

Readers started sending in lots of examples of traced cartoons from the Alwatan newspaper site. Then the accused cartoonist, Ali Alghamdi started emailing me. Ali tells me he is a student who works part time for the newspaper and is paid $30/month. He's also quite excited to have his cartoons featured on our "famous site" and he sent us his photoograph to post. Yes, it seems that is young Ali's smiling face, on the right.

Then I had a classic "Newsweek moment". My original source for the story seemed to backpedal a bit on the "top, respected cartoonist." part of the story, and had nothing to say about Ali being a student.

Had I known that Ali was a student and not a top Saudi cartoonist, I would have written an email to him and to the Alwatan newspaper, scolding them for plagiarizing cartoons, but I don't think I would have posted anything in the blog. There is no point bashing a student for plagiarism. I think the Alwatan newspaper should have done some more due diligence on what they were printing, but I can see where they might not have put much thought into student cartoons appearing in their paper.

So, there you have my Newsweek style, half apology for this. Congratulations to young Ali for getting his photo and cartoons onto our "famous web site," he seems rather happy about that. He's smiling, I'm blushing.

PLAGIARISM SCAVENGER HUNT WINNERS!

We have some winners in the first round of our Saudi Arabian Cartoon Plagiarism Scavenger Hunt! Congratulations to cartoonist Josh Ferrin, who sent in the example below with the comment, "I can hear him now, 'If I just flip the image over, no one will ever notice!" Brilliant.'"

And if you want to send some comments to the Alwatan Newspaper about cartoon plagiarism, you can email them at: webmaster@alwatan.com.sa



Josh also found the rip-offs below.


Congratulations to Tom Kneiper for finding the cartoon below with a plagiarized detail:



An anonymous reader sent us the matches below.


Here are some more, sent in by readers who didn't want us to post their names. It's a plagiarism festival!




And here are some comments from our readers:

Sent: Thursday, May 19, 2005 8:14 PM
Subject: plagiarism in Arabia

Chuckling at your recent encounter with Arabic plagiarism.

I see this kind of stuff here all the time, but I've never bothered you with it because:

1. I suspect you're too busy to spend much time with fan mail
2. I thought you already knew about it
3. I didn't think you cared that much.

Oh, yeah. This stuff goes on all the time. You wouldn't believe. I can say this with authority, because I live and teach in Saudi Arabia. I'm a kind of general teacher at an upper-class prep school here. I teach a couple of classes that you may find interesting: research paper and Western culture (!).

Well, the reason I'm writing this email is perhaps to give you some cultural insight about what is obviously disgraceful and laughable behavior. Not to excuse it, because you're right to be angry, but to let you know why it happens. I thought you might be curious. It goes back to the way they're educated.

To begin with, "plagiarism," although well-defined and shameful in the west, is so common and expected here in Arab culture that its discovery doesn't have anywhere near the sting it would in the West. From early childhood these people are taught not to question or think for themselves. An enormous amount of their learning is mere rote memorization. Of course, they memorize great chunks of the Koran. They're not encouraged to analyze or question the Koran, just memorize it.

This approach infects all the disciplines. In math, they memorize formulas without understanding them. And they're just supposed to regurgitate stuff unquestioningly. Same with history.

Anyhow, as I said, I teach a culture class here, to prepare them for dealing with Westerners or to ready them for life in the West. So you've got to talk about Christianity, pork, politics, bikinis, etc. to a lot of religious fundamentalists. It's pretty wild.

But the intersting thing is that that particular class goes down quite well.

The class that is the REAL culture class is the research paper class, because the content of that class most directly flies in the face of their cultural sensibilities. That's the course we all have trouble teaching.

Coming up with their own thesis? Unheard of! Taking large chunks from another author, especially the internet, is deemed as a sign of RESPECT towards "past masters." Being original? Awkward and unnecessary!

I don't know if I'm explaining myself very well here. It's a collectivistic society. They really don't think as individuals, like Westerners do. This is sharply discouraged. And so, by merely lifting or repeating what somebody else has done before, they show their obesiance, their unwillingness to upset the apple-cart, and the fact that they "honor" the elders, if you get what I mean.

Please don't take any of this as a justification. They're laughable. They're idiots. I have been out here for years and have yet to see any significant unplagiarized creative effort from any one of them. Even the Friday sermons delivered in the mosques calling for the downfall of the US and the extermination of Jews are all plagiarized! The graphics on their jihadist websites are all lifted from non-jihadist websites! The list goes on.

The only thing halfway original out here is the local indepedent filmmaking scene, if you get my drift: chop chop. That's definitely not copied from Western sources.

The copied cartoons you found are just another example of the culture clash we're in the middle of, whether we want it or not: around here that wouldn't be shocking--it would even be expected. Back home of course, people freak out.

Anyhow, it happens on almost a daily basis. And it's not just the political cartoons, either. Editorials, the basic setup of ads, you name it, they'll take it. Another egregious violator: http://www.arabnews.com/

One of the rip-offs that it so blatant (and incompetent) is called "Block 13," a stunningly incompetent Kuwaiti rip-off of South Park. But other thefts include Mickey Mouse, Laura Croft, Dragonball, etc. It goes on and on.

The cartoons are accessible from the main page. Anyhow, just thought I would share whatever insights I've gained over here, a bright spot in my day.

From Cartoonist, Graeme Mackay:

Hi Daryl,

Just going through your latest blog entry on the plagerizing Saudis. I remember there was an uncanny resemblance between a cartoon I had published in the Hamilton Spectator on March 8, 2003 :


And this one:



Published in Al-Riyadh (Saudi Arabia), July 24, 2003

An old cartoon cliche for sure but the U.S. flag on the fish scales smells of imitation... It's not from the same newspaper which you speak of on your blog, but it comes from the same country. I think we should now declare war on those Saudis.

Cheers,
Graeme

Cisse Bocar

A reader in Saudi Arabia sent us these interesting cartoons from Saudi Arabia's Alwatan Newspaper; I'm told this is the biggest newspaper in Saudi Arabia. It looks like at least one of the Saudi cartoonists regularly traces his cartoons from the cartoons that appear on our site.

I thought I would ask our readers to participate in a little contest. See if you can find more Saudi Arabian cartoons that match cartoons from our site. It's a plagiarism scavenger hunt! If you find a match, send the two files (from our site and from the Saudi newspaper site) to us at cari@cagle.com, we'll give you a nice credit on our site and a big, virtual, e-hug!

Here's how to see the Saudi cartoons, if you don't read Arabic ... go to this page on the Alwatan Newspaper site: http://www.alwatan.com.sa/daily/2005-05-01/caricature.htm

See the cartoon that is a tracing of my graduation cartoon in the archive? Now go to the URL and change the numbered date to go to other pages in the archive; there are a few cartoons on each page, when you find a cartoon that you recognize from our site, you're a WINNER! Please email the match to us!

And if you want to send some comments to the Alwatan Newspaper about cartoon plagiarism, you can email them at: webmaster@alwatan.com.sa