How is Copyright Related to Plagiarism?
Copyright infringement and plagiarism can be related concepts but are distinctly different situations.
Plagiarism is the act of taking someone else's ideas or work and passing them off as their own without acknowledging the original source. One can plagiarize a work regardless of its copyright status; for instance, it is plagiarism to copy from a book or an article that is in the public domain. It may also be plagiarism to take a set of facts from an unacknowledged source, even though the facts themselves are not protected by copyright. Plagiarism can be avoided by citing and crediting the original source.
Copyright infringement occurs when a copyrighted work is reproduced, distributed, performed, publicly displayed, or made into a derivative work without the permission of the copyright owner. It is the unauthorized use of someone else's work. It is a legal issue that depends on whether the work is protected by copyright and whether the unauthorized use is protected by fair use.