How to read this site
This site is meant as both a reference and a fact checking site. The purpose of this site is for people who are perhaps looking for something that James has said that you've maybe internalized and now question whether it is true. It's meant for people who want to make sure all the plagiarism James did is caught and documented. And if you really want to, you can use it as an aid while watching James's videos.
If you'd like to help with anything, feel free to submit an issue with any new sources or submit a pull request with any code changes. You might also want to join the Former Fans discord server where we're discussing this stuff in #general-plagiarism.
The video transcript will be on the left in orange boxes. Any text that has been plagiarized will be marked like this, both on the left and the right. It does not have to be exact to be considered plagiarism, but the words that are copied verbatam[sic: verbatim] will be marked like this.
Sometimes plagiarism is just copying ideas, or an order of ideas, and those will sometimes be marked where found.
Any text that was plagiarized is copied over to the right side of the page and will be marked like this for your comparison convenience. It does not have to be word-for-word to be considered plagiarism, but the words that are copied verbatim will be marked as such.
Sometimes the plagiarism is more subtle, such as taking the ideas that someone is talking about, in the order they're talking about them, and that sort of plagiarism will also be marked where discovered. This kind is obviously harder to detect.
Sometimes things have been reworded or reordered, and yet the plagiarism is still obvious. This is done to hide and try to get away with it. The little number at the front of the highlighted sections will help you see how the sentence has been reworded.
You'll often find that sometimes the plagiarism is obvious, but that things have been reworded or reordered. James often does this to try and hide his plagiarism more. Note that each highlighted phrase has a little number at the front of it in superscript. This is to help you see exactly how the sentence has been reworded. I will be including at least the whole paragraph of a plagiarized text, but if it gets too long I will truncate it with a [...]
Sometimes correctsions[sic: corrections] for spelling or wording will be called out with superscript. Other times there may be correctionsword changes like this to indicate when the captions from the video don't line up with what's spoken. Both of these will usually only happen with certain videos which have had their scripts uploaded as captions.
The text in the right-side source boxes is here for comparison only. I will be sure to give page or paragraph where you can read the original. You can click the blue link in the top-right corner to jump to the APA-style citation for this text, and from there I will try to always include a link to where you can read it yourself. (You may have to sign up for archive.org to borrow a book, but usually James copied from easily accessible material that wasn't behind a paywall).
I don't want to deprive the authors any more than James did, but I do want to be able to include context to show how James usually ripped off and mutilated these authors' ideas. I believe this to be fair use and properly cited.
However, if you are one of the plagiarized authors and would like the text of your work to be taken down from this site, please submit an issue and I will gladly clear out the right side boxes.
[On screen]: I will call out when something relevant is shown on-screen.
Usually, James will show and read out quotes--
[Scrolling on screen]:
"In full screen, which I will try and match the formatting, style, and punctuation of, even if that means sometimes having to correct
a thingsomething James mispronounces."
Other times, words may appear on screen
floating next to James's head, which he will then read out loud anyway
as if to highlight the words.
Sometimes, there will be transcripts with stolen visuals from other documentaries or youtube creators.
Parts which have footage from another video will be marked with a highlight bar between the two columns. The numbers in the middle bar highlights are the start and end timestamps in the original video. The highlight is positioned to roughly match up in the left-side transcript with when in the video the stolen footage is shown. (You'll need Javascript turned on to see these highlights.)
This can even be separate from what is being said in the video, so textual plagiarism will still be called out on the right.
Man A: (to Man B) "Video clips James uses will be included here."
[With some description as to what's going on.]
[The two men kiss passionately.]
Sometimes James will just make up something which is perfectly true, honest! Go look it up!
In which case, there will be a comment, usually linking off to some source with the factual information to correct the misinformation.
Sometimes we just want to comment on something, or may be pointing something out that we're not sure is true but still find suspicious.
Other times, we want to point out some absolutely terrible take James had about things. And we'll provide commentary as to how exactly this is a "yikes" take.
Some commentary may be provided by a famous YouTube personality, like HBomberGuy or Todd in the Shadows. These boxes will have their take from their video transcribed verbatim here. The link in the top corner will link off to the time in the video where they said this thing.
Sometimes James does actually correct things from the sources he's plagiarizing from. It's rare, but it has been shown to happen.
Commentary in these boxes is copy-pasted from people making the comments, so their text is verbatim how they wrote it (plus or minus [some] minor grammar changes and punctuation). The link in the top corner will usually link off to the exact message where this text was copied from.
I (tustin2121) am the creator and maintainer of the site, so you'll often see my name on the box as I will give more meta commentary on things. I will point out if I'm summarizing something and make sure things are properly linked and cited.
If things get too long...
I may put very lengthy information in 'detail' paragraphs that you have to click to open. These are to allow me to give you full context about things without unnecessarily stretching the transcript page more than it already is.
May also contain lengthy quotes.
If something is purely visual. It will be presented in grey boxes like these.
Written by
James Somerton
& Nick Herrgott
Executive Producers
[Six Patron Names]
(Note: As in warnings that I'm giving, not warnings James is giving in his videos. James's warnings will be in a box on the left.)
Let me tell you about the sponsor of this video:
[Sponsor Read]
I will be cutting out any links to James's socials and patreon(s), as well as any sponsor spots he did. He doesn't need the publicity.
I will also be cutting any names of former patrons, because it's not our fault we were duped. (I'm a former patron, and this site is basically how I'm getting my feelings about it out.)
Some videos are podcast episodes, where James and Nick will banter back and forth about things.
They will be formatted like this, with their back and forth more visually shown.
And of course, fact checking will happen on the right here, as usual.
They may sometimes interrupt one another, and where it's possible to hear, I'll make sure to include what was said in the cross-talk.
They may--
Yeah, and, um-- I'm-- I'm gonna try and cut out, um... some... some of the ums and repetition that... that comes from unscripted content like this. Just to, you know, be easier on the eyes. No promises though.