RUSSELL KOROBKIN: We Need A More Nuanced Standard for Determining What Constitutes Plagiarism. “That is, the question should be, to what extent was the expression specific and unique, but people are much more apt to employ a bright line rule based on the number of identical words. My high school English teacher taught me that copying more than three consecutive words from a source without attribution constituted plagiarism. This strikes me as privileging form over function.”

This is absolutely right. Peter Morgan and I argued for just such a standard in The Appearance of Impropriety. You can read that chapter online for free here. There’s even a defense of Joe Biden.