We probably all know about essay writing services like the one described in the material below, where Leigh Blackall interviews Andrew Schwartz from Custom Writing.
I've reproduced Leigh's post to TALO here for your potential delectation because I found some parts interesting, so from Leigh Blackall on the TALO mailing list, I present:
TALO :: It’s not plagiarism, it’s an easy essay
It's not plagiarism, it's an easy essayTuesday, July 10th in deschooling, teachingisdead, assessment, change, copyright, sustainability | No comments ( Edit) A week ago I was contacted by Andrew Schwatz from Custom Writing. He was offering me $25 per month to put a link on my website to his. Naturally I was flattered to think that someone out there thought that my blog would be a good vehicle to promote another webservice, and I was curious to know what that service was. Boy! was I surprised and riveted by the audacity! Custom Writing is a service that will write you an essay that is guaranteed to be free from plagiarism and to not get picked up by plagiarism checkers like turn it in.
So I'll add a link alright, and I'll do it for free! This is thoroughly interesting stuff and right down my alley, in terms of pressuring education and academia to rethink its role and practices. So I replied to Andrew and asked for an interview. Within a few hours he replied with a, "yes, send the questions through.." I buzzed my office with the disturbing news of a service that will write essays for you, and the questions came flying. I noted them down and sent Andrew the list. He had the answers for me next day. Here they are:
Is this a kind of plagiarism? Does your service get around the plagiarism checkers like 'Turn it in'? Yes, the papers we provide are plagiarism free - neither TurnItIn, nor any other plagiarism detecting software cannot find any plagiarism. Papers are 100% custom written, so the only way to find out that the paper was not written by a student is to compare the regular writing style of a student with the writing style in the paper. Still, at our writing service, a student can upload samples of own work for writer to review - so, the possibility for a teacher to find out is really minimal and for a teacher to prove - virtually impossible. How do you see your role in the field of education? No person can be equally good at everything - if he/she is, then this is the wrong path, a student talent is lost. There are people who are good at Math and IT - let them develop their skills in this field instead of torturing them with writing assignments. What is really the point of this, if students must waste hours developing skills they will never be professional in instead of concentrating on the field their future career will depend upon? I really see the role of custom writing services in education as a relief for those who have already chosen their career, who know their path, and have already somewhat succeeded in it - since services are somewhat costly and in order to buy a custom written paper, a student must have a job (the most part of our customers). Furthermore, academic writing services spare time for students to develop in the field they chose to, so, to some extent, this is a plus for their education too. The very existence of custom writing services shows that educational system is imperfect: assessment tools are not objective. Writing services simply indicate that a problem in assessment techniques exists and push educational system forward to development and innovation by making them analyze the appropriateness of writing assignments as an assessment tool. How much do you think your service potentially subverts assessment in education? Do you really know any widely recognized tests that assess writing skills, aside from assessment of students majoring in writing? Student knowledge simply cannot be assessed by off-class writing assignments. I do not think that assessment in education is subverted by the work of writing companies. Instead, it points out the possible failure of academic assessment techniques and, by doing so, makes a favor. Essay writing is not an effective assessment tool with or without existence of custom writing companies. Does you your service subvert academia? - good bad, doesn't matter, other... To some extent, yes, but not without help of educational system itself. Since essays are used as an assessment tool, which is a wrong method for testing student knowledge, students are seeking the way out. This is not bad in itself, since, as previously stated, they receive an opportunity to devote themselves to the path chosen - whether Math, IT, or Dance, but this, perhaps, shapes a wrong worldview, as students have to deal with ethical dilemmas imposed by society, which should not have happened if academic institutions were to develop better assessment techniques and a more personalized, individual interests based educational program. Does your company object to standardised assessments like essays? Yes, definitely, yes. Take-home essays are simply pointless for objective assessment of student knowledge, especially if it is for classes like Economics or Math - where exact, subject specific knowledge is what does count. Does your service undermine the quality of education and hence the work that people take on through their educational credentials? Nope, do not think so. Once again - the question and the problem itself lies in effective assessment techniques, which definitely should not be in essay format. When it comes to applying for a job - experience and testing conducted by a hiring company - is what does count, not educational credentials. From this perspective, companies like ours only help - we spare the time for students to develop in the field they chose to, which will then be their career path. Do you have alternative visions for knowledge creation and sharing? With the advent of online social networks, I think that one could definitely come up with an alternative to regular writing assignments. Why not let students communicate and develop their own interest based social networks where they could stand up for their views in academic related subjects that do interest them? For students majoring and/or interested in IT or Math - let them discuss in a written form questions that interest them - both professional knowledge and writing skills would develop. Math and IT students need writing for communicating own ideas in a written form in a professional manner, perhaps, using specialized IT/Math vocabulary. What would develop their writing skills better than an open discussion on an education related topic of own choice? Academic institutions perceive Internet as a threat instead of enjoying all the benefits and opportunities it offers for improvement of education. Without giving away your competitive secrets, how does your company work? what is the process for your creations? Basically, we accept orders from customers through an online order form, where they fill out assignment details, provide a deadline. We then make the order available to our writers who work remotely for them to apply for the work. Once a number of applications is submitted, the best writer is chosen and the order is transferred to his/her personal work account. Students can upload files needed, communicate with writer directly to guide him/her. Once the work is completed, it is uploaded directly to our support team. We then check the work and send it to customer. That's it. Where do the people who write for you come from? What is their background? Are they paid well? What are their conditions (working from home?) We have a large database of writers working remotely, primarily from home. Most of our writers come from UK and US. A few years ago it was rather difficult to find a good writer. Now, we receive 5-10 applications daily. Are they paid well? I guess enough for them to work for us, not to drop the work, and receive overall positive customer feedbacks. Not long time ago, we gave a try to foreign writers and, let me tell you - we were really surprised by the quality of work produced. You can get a PhD writer from India , who is a lecturer in a University, where all classes are taught in English, to produce a neatly written document that will get an A+ for a native speaker. Even though we are not yet switching to writers with PhD degrees whose English is second language - believe me, IT is not going to be the only field outsourced to India in the nearest future. Check out optimization forums, where content for most of US based websites is written by teams of writers coming from the Third World . I imagine your service has to be fairly generic - how would you approach quite specific subject areas, where either specific knowledge or local dialect is needed? You are a bit mistaken here, for off-line writing agencies - you are right, but for online - we have hundreds of writers who can log in into their accounts and apply for the work they are most skilled at. Anything else you would like to add? what are the stats of people using your service? How many, where from? etc Unfortunately, I cannot provide you with the exact stats of people using our services and even if I do, it will not be representative in terms of students overall, since the market share of company can hardly be estimated with a certain level of accuracy. Overall, most students are either US residents or foreign students studying in the US (about 70%). UK - the next country on the list (15%), Australia , Canada - the next ones (5%). Some - coming from Japan , China , Russia , Poland (10%). Most students who use our services are overloaded with work, have family problems, or are too busy with all the different activities. They are not cheaters; they are simply seeking a compromise in difficult situations and imperfection of assessment techniques helps to find it in custom writing companies. I know you TALO-ites read more email than blogs, but if this stimulates your talking funny bone, please comment on the blog. |
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thanks for (re)posting this Mark - reminds me of Tony's post here on behalf of the AWESOME community when he describes how LaTeX can be used to standard effect
also reminds of George's suggestion as per his notes of conversation with Joe here that version control may not be required by users of the Emerge Project
suggest that a record of version control alongside any "custom writing" services we may be practicing together could contribute to this emerging field of (un)plagerism
particularly, as Ross comments under George's said post, in light of IPR issues further downstream
certainly remains an aporia green, if not at least a grey, area .....
No, you are right this is not plagiarism, it is plague-rism!!
Just a different way of undermining the purpose of education and making people believe that it is absolutely OK to buy knowledge.
And although I tend to agree that in our daily lives it is mainly experience that counts – I wouldn’t really like to see my doctor philosophising about my allergies, but instead provide me with the medicine I need - I still think that it doesn’t give people the right to consider such services as proper ones. It is the principle that is TOTALLY wrong. What we are witnessing here is the promotion of cheating and fraudulent behaviour that starts with the simple acquisition of essays and will probably will probably escalate to much more serious proportions. In school there was always a pair of smart guys that would try to sell some pre-made essays…everyone knew about it, but not many – at least that I know of – would adhere to such scheme.
Publicising this on the internet makes the scene much more serious, as it is accessible to a much wider group of people.
And what about respect for the people you are fooling with you immaculate paper? And where do your course colleagues, who can’t afford such luxury, stand in the middle of this? So I suppose that only the ones that can afford to buy essays will be able to get straight As? Where is one’s dignity and pride in this?
Although I don’t really expect my doctor to philosophise or write essays about my maladies, I would even expect less that he had had to cheat to be where he is, independently of the importance of the subject he was cheating on, simply because it shows how someone is not trustworthy.
It is incredible how people are able to do such things in the open and get away with it.
More than ever we are lacking the core values that are meant to conduct a healthy society. Is this the price of the global village?
But don’t mind me… I just get nasty when it comes to those in an educated society that scoff at the principles of hard work and excellence.
Christina displays most excellent values, I'd say.
Moving slightly to a differrent area, but still sticking to values, things become harder when people remix content a la Web 2.0, but there is a core set of values, to do with what are one doing something for, and why are one is doing it. And yes, values in modern society have declined, we suffer from a "why bother" maliase, if I can do something and do it easily then why should I go the hard route? Hey the rubbish bin is two paces to my left, but I'll just drop my rubbish here; I could write something from scratch but its easier to cut and paste, or pay someone to do it. :-(
Or even, and this particularly upsets me, why bother to do anything more than the minimum to get through this course?