I wasn't interested in this book before but I'm going to buy it now after reading so much about it. Its almost like a brilliant PR move. Perhaps there is some truth to "There's no such thing as bad publicity"
If I'd known that was acceptable it would have made writing The Geek Atlas a lot quicker!
Needless to say, value of something like this is very, very questionable.
All of the copied passages were concise descriptions of historical events. Obviously, quoting verbatim (like was done here) is plagiarism, but given that he wasn't there to witness the events, isn't the only option to take other accounts and rewrite them in his own words?
The passages he copied were short descriptions of events in history. Repeating them word-for-word, like he did, would be considered plagiarism, but since they are a source for events he wasn't there to see, shouldn't he just reword them?
There's no point in doing that. It's better to quote verbatim with citations, and to write when there's something new to say. Historians can compile primary sources into a new document that adds something to the existing information; they don't curate documents, they narrate events.