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When you actually read what's written in the Help Center, it strongly implies that only answers need to give attribution (see added emphasis):

Plagiarism - posting the work of others with no indication that it is not your own - is frowned on by our community, and may result in your answer being down-voted or deleted.

When you find a useful resource that can help answer a question (from another site or in an answer on Stack Overflow) make sure you do all of the following

Can this be changed to be more inclusive of questions (and perhaps tag wikis)?


My best suggestion:

Plagiarism - posting the work of others with no indication that it is not your own - is frowned on by our community, and may result in your post being down-voted or deleted.

When you use a resource in your post (e.g. from another site or in an answer on Stack Overflow) make sure you do all of the following

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    I see no reason not to do this, and I upvoted, That said, I would guess that answers are far more likely than questions (and maybe somewhat more likely than wikis and other posts) to be copied from elsewhere. Sounds kinda like someone was reacting to a specific real situation and then didn't think about generalizing the language.
    – SOLO
    Commented Nov 8, 2018 at 17:45
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    +1 Plagiarism is bad no matter where it happens, whether it be a question, an answer, or a comment. Commented Nov 8, 2018 at 18:22
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    On Puzzling we have problems with non-attributed content in questions far more often than answers; there's an entire close reason for it!
    – bobble
    Commented Jul 28, 2021 at 16:01

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I can't imagine any possible reason for disallowing plagiarism in answers but not in questions. Whatever the reasons are for not allowing it in the one should apply equally to the other. It doesn't matter where you post something—if it's obvious it's from somebody else, but you haven't provided attribution, then that's not right.

The Help Center article "How to reference material written by others" does indeed refer to answers specifically. I'll note that it seems to located in a section of the Help Center for answers (if I go by the navigation breadcrumb of Meta Stack Exchange > Help center > Answering at the top of the page), which might explain the specific focus. However, I find it odd that anybody would be interpreting it so strictly that they would only consider it valid policy for answers. The intent behind the policy is the same, regardless of where unattributed material is found. However it's handled in answers, it should be handled in the same way in questions.

I know that in the specific sites I follow, people who post quotations in questions—especially those that are obviously from another author—are very frequently asked to provide proper attribution, if not actual links, so that the validity and context of the quotations can be determined. Frequently, at least on those sites, context is quite important, and the simple text itself isn't necessarily sufficient to provide an answer. (Let alone the other issues surrounding plagiarism in general.)

In my opinion, the text should be changed from its reference to answers specifically to a reference to posts in general. Then, it should be linked to from the Asking section in addition to the Answering section—assuming that the Help Center navigation works that way.

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This was finally changed, though the help page still lives under the "answering" category. To quote (emphasis added):

Plagiarism - posting the work of others with no indication that it is not your own - is frowned on by our community, and may result in your content being down-voted or deleted.

If you copy (or closely rephrase/reword) content that you did not create into something you post on Meta Stack Exchange (e.g. from another site or elsewhere on Meta Stack Exchange) make sure you do all of the following

And since I must reference the author, shoutout to Catija.

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