Plagiarism, Policing, and Profit!

Turnitin

https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/library-babel-fish/plagiarism-policing-and-profit

 

I have a problem with Turnitin. It is business model that makes money on my research and I have no control over it.

 

Would you say this is the same with SafeAssign?

 

It does not. It only checks to see if submissions are plagiarized.

 

Exactly, and that is it business model and a very profitable one. Turnitin acquired my research for $0.

 

Did they not profit from their service and a need in the market? What did they do with your research once acquired?

 

My guess it becomes a part of their database. That is judging from the feedback I received on my own papers as some similarity to other students from other universities.

 

I think so too. I understand what you are saying that they are both obtaining and using your material for their database, with no personal benefit except it being deemed worthy if not found to be plagiarized, and are making considerable profits from doing so. I am trying to think of a similar business model for comparison. I usually think of their business model not based on the information submitted or used within the database but for the program/service they provide.

 

They scan everything that is publicly accessible, including books, web site postings, including even things like pastebin, and all other student submissions. There is nothing limited to just research.
How are they supposed to license everything on the Internet? I am sorry, but that is out of touch with what they do to think that is even possible or necessary.

There is no legal need for them to make a comparison either. They provide a brief, legally acceptable quotation from the suspected plagiarism along with a link that can be clicked on to see more, if available. That link takes you to the actual site. They do not share the contents of student submissions where there is suspected plagiarism, only that it was submitted previously by a student.

 

I did a bit more reflection. My position may be petty and pedantic. Maybe, I am upset in handing over my work to a corporate entity.

 

I don't think it is petty. It is definitely a big ask to turn over our intellectual property to someone that is going to use it, though not as a primary purpose, for financial gain. In the bigger picture though I do have concerns over plagiarism and even more so for essay writing services, though I am not up-to-date on what counters are in place to remedy that.

 

This is one of the problems I have with Turnitin - similarities to other unknown students. I see this as something great, that other unknown students are developing similar ideas to me. However, this is actually a problem because it messes with the submitted paper similarity’s score. The solution is for me to change my original thought processing. Now I am writing for Turnitin purposes instead of writing what I truly want to write.

 

Proctorio- plagiarism detection tools

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/proctorio-launches-plagiarism-detection-tools-110000868.html