St. Maarten Private Eye

This is terrible. This guy is just making money off of the recent rise in environmental discussions here on the island. Isn't this sort of stuff punishable under Antillian law? Maybe someone should tell this Adam guy what EnviroNews is doing with his work.

B.t.w have you seen the full page adds in this magazine? I'm sure he makes good money off of those

You a right. I recall a couple of years ago several of our Enviornmental Groups formed an NGO called Enviro 1, he was invited to attend and the first words that came out of his mouth were "How much money would he make for being part of our group ". It turned the rest of us off, and we told him that NGO meant Non Governmental Organization and that we all volunteered, needless to say he hadn't been to a meeting one after that.

NO this is not correct, his question was how are much we going to pay to Mr Richardson as president. He made a big mistake. I was here at BBW office

Your post made me pull out the the lastest issue and have a look through it myself. There arn't that many fullpage ads, but the back page is for Sol, which is a tad conflicting with environment. I think Sol may be the one selling GEBE that lovely Heavy Oil for our polluting generators.
I looked at some of the other articles in there too, it seems they also forgot to accredit US House Leader Nancy Pelosi, Sen. Jim Jeffords, John Passacantando - Executive Director of Greenpeace USA, David Orr, authors Scott Sanders and Peter Matthiessen, Christina Wong and Alison Deming - Page 11 Environews.

See Grist.org

You should always acknowledge the source of a copied work, but this changing of words, such as Bush Administration for DP Administration and St. Maartener's instead of Americans looks like a deliberate attempt to make the articles appear locally written. The articles are good, but they should have been properly credited.

one

SXM News Network

Philipsburg:- The Island Vision Foundation in a press release admits that they were wrong for taking material off the internet and printing it in the Enviro-News Magazine, without giving the writers of the article credit for their work.

President of the Foundation Stephane Dje Robert in the release quoted Maya Angelou “I can be changed by what happens to me, but I refuse to be reduced by it”….
“I personally, have learnt from experience that when people have it out for you every time you choose to respond they will find other things to say, they will usually find one word or sentence in what you write to continue trying to portray you in a negative light” Dje Robert said.
Despite all of this “I must apologize to the readers and sponsors, but above all the authors that I have offended by using their material without proper acknowledgement”
All I can say is that I am sorry! I didn’t know I was doing wrong. The enthusiasm mixed with little knowledge of the fine details regarding plagiarism got the best of me. “I am not a journalist but I started the magazine to inform people and to initiate a change in the way we treat the environment.” That was, is and will always be my main intention. That enthusiasm made me overlook the rules of proper journalism practice. I have learnt my lesson and that it will never happen again!

The apology came one week after the St. Maarten Private Eye Published a blog post high lightening the plagiarism that is committed by the Dje Robert.

This media house also received an email which states that the author of the text that was stolen have filed a lawsuit against EnviroNews.

SMN News have been trying to solicit a comment from Dje Robert over the pass week, but his cellular phone was off, however, this media house was able to catch up with the publisher of the magazine who told this media house that he is not a writer and journalist, but instead he was paying two journalists who are working for the local newspapers to do his writings and editing.
However, in this incident of plagiarism he said he is the one who took the information off the internet because he is the one who writes for his column. However, the publisher did not say how many times he has committed the act and neither did he say if it’s the first time he was caught. "this incident have me and my entire fmaily totally embarrased he said and I just do not want to talk about it" Dje Robert said.
EnviroNews in its latest publication took a speech from well known American Enviromentalist Adam Werbach that is available on the worldwide net and published it in its bimonthly magazine as their work.

Stephane committed plagiarism. A little research reveals that plagiarism is considered the worst breach of journalistic ethics, and reporters caught plagiarizing typically face disciplinary measures ranging from suspension to dismissal from the company.

Stephane is the company. It is not very likely that he sacks himself and closes the doors to his environews. It is commonly known however that two (self proclaimed) journalists do his writing and editing one of which is Alita Singh, the reporter for hire. Has anyone heard if they distanced themselves from Environews as yet?

How can Alita Singh distance herself from Stephane, he honored her best Enviro journalist.

The other one is yet to come out of the nut shell

then you have no choice but to accept responsibility.
Kudos to PE for making people aware of this, and shame on Stephane for trying to get away with this. I am disappointed in him.

Once more PE proves to be a useful tool. When I read the blog about Environews stealing Werbach's work I jumped on it. It is all true, obviously, and it has been going on, I guess, from day one. Today gave Dje Robert ample time for a reaction, but he did not budge until we published the story on Monday. But the kudos belong to PE for breaking the news. We have a follow up tomorrow.

O Psilos

Seems like you all are sitting in your office and going through PE to get stories. Thank them for the CBS story too.
Newspapers are supposed to be the ones breaking the News not only following other people leads.

Reporters are welcome to anything we have on here, if they choose to pursue a story then even better. Today is doing a great job and they mention SXM PE everytime they use something from it. We take stories fro the papers, they can take stories from us, no big deal.

Flipper

Herald is stealing from SMN News too, their yesterday headline with the Trust Company was SMN News the very day they were raided. I actually read it on this blog.

Joan Veerwoord even ask them how they could publish a story, using her name and she never spoke to a Herald reporter. Joan did that on purpose because she knew its only SMN News and Today covered her story.

I can only say that it seems that the last message came from the disgruntled Daily Herald and their incompetent reporters.
While the TODAY has been monitoring the PE site and FOLLOWING UP ON THE NEWS, you people are doing absolutely nothing.
A great example is the Enviro News story, not only did they monitor the story, they continued by doing their own investigation and calling the writer at his home in California. And why did the Herald not publish this story? Is it because a few of the reporters there write for Enviro News? The Herald reporters stick around their office waiting for press releases, waiting to be called to press conferences. But you know what? Maybe this new reporter O Psilos will have your editors putting you people back on your toes.
You reporters at the Herald have become slack, complacent and not interested in sniffing for news. With this said I am having high hopes that the Herald will start giving us the readers something to really look forward to every morning. I thank the TODAY newspaper, you are doing a great job.
And SMN news, even though you need to check your spelling and sentence structure, your breaking news stories every day is the way to go.

Stephane admitted he is not a writer and he pays 2 journalist to do his work. I honest opinion is that he is covering for these reporters

Oh oh, our friend Stephane CLAIMS he is not a writer, as if that would excuse his actions. He was not too shy to stick his own name above pieces he did not write. And he did not know that equals theft? Come on, everybody is supposed to know the law.

O Psilos

I guess the Former Director of the French Tourist Office should have known better too. Stephane admitted he made a mistake. Have you ever apoligized and accept repsonsibility? He did and most of all since he is taking all of this to Protect two Journalist is commendable. These journalist who are working for the local newspapers know themselves. You may not know them and you dont know Stephane either. We know he is crookish, it takes guts and balls for a crookish and selfish man to allow himself to be trampled upon because of two sleezy journalist. And by the pilos dont call the kettle black when you yourself is under the heat

Dear Writer,

At the lease Stephane had the courage to take the Texaco,Yadonee N.V. issue to the media.

Bruno Hodge the local entrepreneur is still fighting this big giant from September 2003 until now.

It's seems as if no other local newspaper,environmental actives or simple private eye would like to comment on this issue.

So you're saying, Stephane did something right years ago (with the mysteriously disappeared Green Voice Foundation, and that justifies stealing (because plagiarizing is exactly that) other people's work? I don't think so.
O Psilos

The texaco station and the leaking gas tanks was mentioned in this post. If you know Bruno Hodge, please invite him to come and tell us more about it.

My understanding is that Toochie owns the property, but the station part was rented/leased to Texaco themselves. I do not know who installed the tanks, who should of been checking them and who is responsible for cleaning up the toxic soils. Bruno is welcome to come here or email us with more details and info.

Remember, SXM PE is not a newspaper, we don't have reporters and we don't go around investigating and interviewing.

Flipper