The truth of any statement is in question, perhaps even immaterial, if cited wrong.

Source 

miketodd07, thirdworldgirl-, and many others on Tumblr are liking and reblogging this quote attributed to John Steinbeck, but it isn't really a quote at all. It's Ronald Wright's paraphrase of something Steinbeck allegedly said or wrote. What's missing from the 'quote' is "John Steinbeck once said." That's important. Wright's being ignored and uncredited for his paraphrase; Steinbeck's being quoted in an improper way. 

I suppose I'm overdue for including a "cite Tumblr, fail the assignment" statement in my syllabi.

3 responses
This sounds not at all unlike this particular quote that has been attributed to Bob Marley on love:

"You may not be her first, her last, or her only. She loved before she may love again. But if she loves you now, what else matters? She's not perfect - you aren't either, and the two of you may never be perfect together but if she can make you laugh, cause you to think twice, and admit to being human and making mistakes, hold onto her and give her the most you can. She may not be thinking about you every second of the day, but she will give you a part of her that she knows you can break - her heart. So don't hurt her, don't change her, don't analyze and don't expect more than she can give. Smile when she makes you happy, let her know when she makes you mad, and miss her when she's not there."

It's an amazing quote and all, but I'm seriously skeptical on whether or not it's Marley's.

Another good example, Ben. How do we go about finding the actual source of that quote? The internet is incredibly unreliable here.
Agreed. This is one of the largest issues that authors who put their work up on the internet face. Take my blog, or any other blog for that matter. What is stopping people from copy and pasting what I have written, and claiming it as their own? Social media websites also face this problem all the time, where somebody submits something interesting and unique and a power user with a much larger network built on the website will take it from them, and rarely give the proper source credit.