Another fake (nonexistent) school: Antonius University

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by Dr. Schwen Gregor, Jan 3, 2010.

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  1. BillDayson

    BillDayson New Member

    I didn't find anything for 'university of antonius' either.

    For 'antonius university', there were many pages for people with the last name Antonius at the University of whatever.

    And there was this...

    http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2006/11/msg00192.html

    I Googled the telephone number from that crude 2006 discussion list advertisement and it seems to be associated with a whole collection of degree-mill ads from around the same time. The names of the "university" were different in each of them, but there's a definite theme.

    A few examples:

    Marianus Online College
    Eugenius Online College
    Theodosious School of Knowledge
    Palladius School of Experience
    Phillippicus University
    Demosthenes University
    Aemilianus Online University

    It's a if somebody was pulling names out of a classics textbook.
     
  2. Malajac

    Malajac Member



    Interesting. Maybe someone could "establish" a Hannibal & Hasdrubal University and then we could have degree-mill Punic Wars. I hope Carthage wins this time. :D
     
  3. Well this thread is entertaining. I wonder what he hoped to accomplish... the link provided leads nowhere and you can't even find the school via ANY major search engine. I wonder where he actually obtained his Mu.D (=Made-up Degree? :D).

    I'm kinda sore that you banned him... maybe we should quarantine people like this to a single thread (if such a thing were possible) and try to find as much information as possible. At least, for the lulz.

    BTW, @Kizmet

    Mill shill? I must say, I absolutely love the lingo on this site... that's the first time I've seen that one! :D
     
  4. cookderosa

    cookderosa Resident Chef


    I laughed to myself when I read this, because I LEARNED that here :)
     
  5. Kizmet

    Kizmet Moderator



    Stick around, there's plenty more where that came from. ;)
     

  6. I have seen the term "unwonderful" in regards to an illegitimate school. Is there a relatable history as to how that term came about? I've been thinking about starting a DegreeInfo thesaurus thread with such information. It's the type of thing that just may deserve the illusive sticky.
     
  7. Ted Heiks

    Ted Heiks Moderator and Distinguished Senior Member

    Technically speaking, one could get sued over calling a school a degree mill. "Unwonderful" is a subjective enough term that you can cover your behind (lawsuit-wise) if you cannot absolutely prove that a school is a degree mill. I believe it was Dr. John Bear who coined the term "unwonderful."
     
  8. Ted Heiks

    Ted Heiks Moderator and Distinguished Senior Member

    A shill is somebody who poses as a satisfied customer when he/she is really the owner. A degree mill is a "school" that offers "degrees" for little or no work. Hence, a mill shill is one who shills for his/her degree mill.
     
  9. How much shill will a mill-shill shill, if a mill-shill will shill mill?
     
  10. John Bear

    John Bear Senior Member

    Unwonderful, umschools

    Ted is right. You can't get sued for calling something 'unwonderful.' Well, you can, but the expressing of opinions is pretty well protected (although movie and restaurant reviewers still get sued occasionally).

    When the issue arose many years ago of what, on census forms, to call the person whom one lives with but is not married to, one of the charming suggestions was "umfriend," as in when you introduce this person to your parents: "This is my um, friend, Jeremy."

    So I suggested "umschool," which gets used occasionally here, but it usually requires explanation.

    Incidentally, that year, the census people actually used "POSSLQ" instead of "umfriend" for that situation: Person, Opposite Sex, Sharing Living Quarters," pronounced "POSS-ill-Q."
     
  11. japhy4529

    japhy4529 House Bassist

    "Mill Shill"! That's great. I love it.
     
  12. Chip

    Chip Administrator

    There's another term that goes along with this, associated with the apologia that mill shills generally offer up to defend their unwonderful institutions, and that's "Millspeak", as in "The school's page on their lack of accreditation is a great example of classic millspeak."

    John started using the term less-than-wonderful in Bears' Guide (and you'll see that used quite a bit on degreeinfo as well), but unwonderful (which he also coined) is shorter and just as clear :)
     

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