Author: Al Uszynski August 14, 2024
EdisonReport Plagiarized Content From 28 Different Media Sites
Above: The logos of EdisonReport and Designing Lighting
Repeated plagiarism incidents point to serious flaws in company's publishing practices
For media publishers, avoiding plagiarism is simple — yet when plagiarism happens, it’s often a self-inflicted wound that stems from carelessness, indifference or dishonesty. A rare instance might be brushed off as an honest mistake, but repeated offenses usually signal a troubling lack of effective processes or ethics.
Readers deserve original content that reflects genuine effort. By avoiding plagiarism, publishers show respect for their audience and uphold copyright laws while respecting the creative works of others. By engaging in repeated plagiarism, they do the exact opposite.
Recent events have revealed that EdisonReport, a 25-year-old lighting industry trade media outlet, has repeatedly published plagiarized content from various sources without proper attribution. This situation follows a history of plagiarism by EdisonReport and has more recently affected a long list of trade publications and business websites including Inside Lighting.
Inside Lighting & LEDs Magazine plagiarized by EdisonReport
Since June 2020, Inside Lighting has regularly sent cease-and-desist notices to Randy Reid, Publisher of EdisonReport, regarding repeated instances of copyright infringement. To his credit, he usually swiftly removes the infringing content, while often stating that he "takes these matters seriously." Interestingly though, Reid has never once apologized for any of the infractions, either privately or publicly. Many times, he simply doesn’t reply at all.
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| Above: The June 2024 issue of Designing Lighting copied four paragraphs directly from an Inside Lighting article. |
Last week, Reid took a positive step by issuing its first-ever apology to Inside Lighting for what has become a recurring pattern of copyright infringement. This came after our discovery that four paragraphs, totaling 279 words, were plagiarized verbatim in the June 2024 edition of Designing Lighting magazine — which is published by EdisonReport.
Only after Inside Lighting brought it to his attention, Reid also admitted a plagiarism infraction from 2021 involving copied content from LEDs Magazine, an indication that plagiarism has gone unchecked at Designing Lighting for years.
Reid's Misleading Public Acknowledgment
Above: Reid's Designing Lighting apology falsely states that "specialized software" discovered the plagiarism
When Reid published last week's public acknowledgment of plagiarism, he misleadingly suggested a proactive effort by his publication, when in fact it was a direct response to Inside Lighting's cease and desist notice, which informed Reid of "a rampant plagiarism problem with past Designing Lighting editions." The apology not only dodges meaningful accountability — failing to address Reid's or EdisonReport's responsibility — but also falsely claims that "specialized software" discovered the issue.
Reid’s software claim begs the question: How did his “specialized software” go 0-for-28 in detecting plagiarism before publication, only to flag some of it months later after Inside Lighting issued a cease and desist notice?
By citing only two affected publications by name, Reid drastically understated the extent of the copyright infringements, ignoring that this has been a persistent issue for years. We’ll explore this in more detail shortly.
Questions arise about EdisonReport's processes
Reid states that Designing Lighting has published articles from 79 contributors but didn’t explain what steps, if any, are taken to verify that the content is original before it's published. In one instance, 29 out of 29 paragraphs of a Designing Lighting article were mostly or completely plagiarized from other sources, yet this somehow went undetected and was published. Numerous trusted and affordable software tools would have identified this easily detectable plagiarism.
Another article from Designing Lighting in August 2023 had plagiarism in all 14 of 14 paragraphs, which somehow slipped through unnoticed.
This ongoing pattern of plagiarism is occurring frequently on both Designing Lighting and EdisonReport.com, with the copyrighted work of numerous content creators being copied verbatim across multiple EdisonReport publications. Any attempt to portray this as an isolated incident would be misleading, untrue, and dishonest.
26 other publications plagiarized by EdisonReport
Reid downplayed the vast extent of recent copyright infractions in his public acknowledgment, blaming a single, nameless individual and mentioning only two affected publications, without indicating the rampant nature of the plagiarism. Reid neglected to mention a long list of other copyright owners whose rights have been infringed across multiple issues of Designing Lighting.
In recent months, several different issues of Designing Lighting magazine also published substantial verbatim content, usually multiple paragraphs — seemingly plagiarized, without attribution from:
- Bizop Media
- Built In
- Business of Home
- Discover Magazine
- EE News Europe
- Electro Optics
- ExtremeTech
- Flynn Product Design
- Futurism
- Institute of Lighting Professionals
- Light & Lighting
- Live Science
- McKinsey & Company
- Medium (DS Media)
- Phys.org
- Polytechnique
- Skoltech
- Startup Challenges
- U.S. Lighting Trends
- WSP Blog
- YouTube (@Kugelblitz_Science)
These findings came from a partial, spot-checked review of recent Designing Lighting content, and we imagine a deeper dive into the publication's four-year history could reveal many, many more.
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| Above: An EdisonReport article from June on a New Orleans bridge lighting project featured an illustration of NYC's Brooklyn Bridge and failed to credit the TV station that originally reported the story. |
Meanwhile, at the EdisonReport website, they continue to republish original reporting from other sources as their own. Recently, they covered a New Orleans bridge lighting project and a school fire caused by under-cabinet lighting without crediting the original sources. Only after Inside Lighting asked Reid about this apparent plagiarism did they quietly add the source's names, never acknowledging their previous lack of attribution.
Reid's after-the-fact edits still don't exemplify proper attribution which would involve explicitly stating within the body of the article that the stories' details or quotes from Winnetka School District Superintendent, Kelly Tess, are from the source, such as by saying "According to WVUE..." or "As reported by Patch...".
Additionally, in April, when the American Institute of Architects (AIA) inadvertently delayed publishing its monthly press release on architecture billings numbers, EdisonReport accessed AIA's copyrighted research section. EdisonReport proceeded to copy and paste the entire 1600+ word report — complete with proprietary images — without obtaining permission or providing proper attribution. Only after Inside Lighting asked Reid if this was original reporting did EdisonReport remove the entire article. Per usual, no retraction or public acknowledgment of this copyright violation was published by EdisonReport.
Above: EdisonReport copied a Boston.com article verbatim, but deleted the "By Ross Cristantiello" byline
Inside Lighting invested 6+ hours researching and writing an article on the same topic, emailing the school newspaper’s faculty advisor and trying to track down Shephard Engineering's project specs.
In 2023, Reid appeared on the Get A Grip on Lighting podcast, where he was questioned about copying, pasting and publishing entire articles verbatim from Boston.com (owned by the New York Times) and Law360. The plagiarized Law360 article was attributed to "Randy Reid." Those infringing articles were quietly removed weeks after they were published by EdisonReport and promoted on social media, but Reid has yet to issue a written retraction for those acts of plagiarism or many other similar incidents.
Despite the vast availability of easy-to-use tools to detect plagiarism, Reid has consistently ignored our numerous inquiries about whether his business ever intends to take any meaningful action to deter or detect plagiarism.
Reid's consistent evasion of this question, coupled with EdisonReport's track record, might itself be the answer.
Related Infractions: Admitted False Advertising by EdisonReport
Last year, in response to yet another Inside Lighting cease and desist notice, Reid publicly acknowledged that EdisonReport had falsely inflated its web traffic statistics used to attract advertising revenue. The figures were not just padded by 5-10%; EdisonReport's web traffic statistics were exaggerated to three times their actual size over 3½ years.
EdisonReport.com estimated web traffic (in prorated annual page views), based on Media Kits, by Media Kit year
Concurrently, Inside Lighting held the position as the most visited media site in North America for lighting industry news and information but was unable to claim this status to potential advertisers due to Reid's egregiously inflated reporting.
Reid has yet to offer an apology to Inside Lighting regarding the potential harm caused by his false advertising tactics that likely diverted customers and significant ad revenue away from Inside Lighting.
On a personal note:
While it's necessary to mention Randy Reid by name due to his role as publisher and the person who replied to our numerous cease and desist notices, the intent of this article is to address important lighting industry media issues in a detailed, fact-based way without making it a personal attack on him.
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| Randy Reid in 2021 File photo from an Inside Lighting / EdisonReport collaboration regarding the National Lighting Bureau |
I once liked and respected Randy, but over time, in order to protect my business, I was compelled to respond to EdisonReport's repeated careless or possibly dishonest actions, which strained our formerly friendly relationship. My first cease and desist to Randy in June 2020 was amicable, but our communication has since evolved to the tone of lawyers exchanging demand letters.
To be clear, I never sought conflict with EdisonReport. If these easily avoidable infractions had never occurred, I would not have had to send my first demand notice — or my twentieth.
I wish Randy well and hope he recognizes the need to adopt processes that consistently respect copyright laws, honor others' creative works, and avoid false advertising, much like the other 20-plus global lighting-related publications I follow that have never infringed upon my business's rights.
For years, Randy has repeatedly made the statement, "We take these matters seriously." However, these words ring hollow without decisive corrective action.
My repeated, behind-the-scenes communications with Randy have yet to spur positive change. Regrettably, other than a lawsuit, public accountability appears to be the only recourse left to stop this behavior once and for all — but, sadly, I am not optimistic that it will.
Inside Lighting remains dedicated to providing the lighting community with trustworthy and original reporting, while respecting others' creative works, abiding by copyright law and upholding the standards of fair competition.