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The section presents comments from journalists regarding the dismissal of William K. Marinow as editor of the Baltimore Sun newspaper. Publisher Denise Palmer announced in an e-mail to Sun staff on January 6, 2004 that she was replacing editor William K. Marinow as editor of Baltimore Sun newspaper. Two weeks after Marimow's firing, his colleagues were still perplexed by Palmer's seemingly simplistic explanation for firing an editor regarded as among the industry's best. Michael Waller, publisher of the Sun before Palmer, calls Marinow the most responsive editor he is ever worked with, even when it came to cutting costs and the more distasteful aspects of the business. The surprise dismissal shocked and disturbed journalists, not only at the Sun. Jim Keat, a longtime Sun newsman said that the way it happened has to be the most disheartening part of the whole thing. Colleagues of Marinow say there was no open hostility between the editor and the publisher. In public Marinow aligned himself with management during the contract talks that teetered on the verge of a strike. Those familiar with the work of Marinow describe a tough minded and ambitious journalist, one who relishes the type of reporting that wins prizes.

Since the plagiarism scandals, iThenticate has sent offers to 200 newspapers in the U.S. It says it has added a number of them to its roster of clients, the papers wish to remain unidentified. Rates vary, but most newspapers can expect to pay a flat fee and an additional fee for every 500 words submitted for scrutiny. The program scours gargantuan databases of academic papers, Web pages and published work and in seconds produces a color-coded list of possible plagiarism instances. "The Courant" is using the software on many of its opinion-editorials to guard against shortcuts by contributors who may not know the guidelines for attribution, but not in other sections of the paper. Another plagiarism-detection service, MyDropBox, which launched in fall 2003, says it too has newspaper and magazine clients. But like iThenticate, it is keeping mum about who they are. For drive-by plagiarism detection, editors can turn to WCopy-find, a free downloadable program.