Academic & Professional Dishonesty

Spin THIS!

Your plagiarized writing may earn you a C on your term paper, or a few pennies on Medium, but respect, once lost, is nearly impossible to regain.

I read a student essay, a couple of years ago, that I would swear was written by someone for whom English was a second (or distant third) language. The conspicuous overuse of a thesaurus was one red flag. The more I thought about it, the more certain I was that it was written on Fiverr and spun through an article spinner so as to pass muster with Turnitin, which it did. Grammarly, too — although Grammarly had a number of other nits to pick with it, including its lack of full sentences. I had almost convinced myself that it was just a case of poor writing, despite my nagging sense that it sounded like something Ivan Mor Smirnoff would try to pass off as original content — until I read Jonathan Bailey’s article: “A Brief History of Article Spinning.” In it, Bailey notes:

The rise of plagiarism detection services such as Turnitin have caused many students to try and find ways to fool them. Some of them have turned to article spinning as a way to quickly “rewrite” a piece and escape detection.

Purveyors of article spinning technology have been all-too-happy to meed (sic) that demand. Often referring to the technology as “Automatic Paraphrasing” they offer up spinning tools to students for just this purpose.

Teachers may not be fooled, especially when it comes to quotations and works cited. But what about those store-bought essays from Fiverr? What if a C is good enough, so long as the work isn’t flagged for academic dishonesty?

If you’re not familiar with article spinning, I give you an example a hastily penned opinion piece on spinners, and a spun variant using a free tool that came up with a quick Google search. Italicized text is not included in the experiment:

Original

The following is my original “essay” on article spinning software, composed online in the text box of a “Free Article Spinner.” Without selecting any additional options, I “spun” the essay. The second section contains the result. Not only are these little programs the bane of writers, they provide additional challenges to teachers everywhere. What value is there in automated plagiarism checkers when they can be fairly easily defeated by such software? How can professors address the issue?

Article spinners are unethical and ought to be banned in all countries where copyright is valued.

Article spinners algorithmically change original, copyrighted, human-written text in order to pass automated plagiarism checks. This is not good enough. If anything, it creates a “derivative work” from the original text, without even citing the source. Generally, paraphrasing is not sufficient to escape an allegation of plagiarism. It is simply an effective way to escape automated detection algorithms.

Furthermore, article spinners encourage laziness and a reliance on the work of others while packaging that reliance as a sort of clever efficiency. Humans who use article spinners are well aware of their motives, which usually come down to increasing traffic or revenue while doing as little work as possible.

Finally, article spinners produce work that is likely to be “spun” again, or possibly paraphrased, or even cited by more ethical authors who do not recognize it for what it truly is. Eventually, language will be reduced to poor writing and nonsensical babble.

I have little respect for bloggers and others who use article spinners to steal the work of writers. Make no mistake: Writing is hard work. Those who use article spinners understand this, and they are seeking to circumvent the need to do any work at all, for themselves. It is tantamount to stealing, and they delude themselves to argue otherwise.

Spun Variant

I’ll confess to a bit of surprise: this “Free Article Spinner” did a better job of paraphrasing the original than some college students seem capable of doing. There are a few grammatical “glitches,” but the result is less jarring than expected. If anything, this strengthens my conviction that their use is unethical; not only can they be used by bloggers, but they may be a boon to students who are unconcerned with academic honesty. See below — I ran the previous section of text through the “Free Article Spinner” and this is the unedited result:

Text rewriters are dishonest and should be prohibited in all nations where copyright is esteemed.

Text rewriters algorithmically change unique, copyrighted, human-composed content so as to pass computerized counterfeiting checks. This isn’t sufficient. On the off chance that anything, it makes a “subsidiary work” from the first content, without refering to the source. By and large, summarizing isn’t adequate to get away from an affirmation of literary theft. It is basically a powerful method to escape computerized recognition calculations.

Moreover, text rewriters support sluggishness and a dependence on crafted by others while bundling that dependence as a kind of shrewd effectiveness. People who utilize text rewriters are very much aware of their intentions, which ordinarily boil down to expanding activity or income while doing as meager work as could be expected under the circumstances.

At long last, text rewriters create work that is probably going to be “spun” once more, or perhaps summarized, or even refered to by more moral writers who don’t remember it for what it really is. In the long run, dialect will be diminished to poor written work and absurd jibber jabber.

I have little regard for bloggers and other people who utilize text rewriters to take crafted by journalists. No doubt about it: Writing is diligent work. The individuals who utilize text rewriters comprehend this, and they are trying to go around the need to do any work whatsoever, for themselves. It is commensurate to taking, and they trick themselves to contend something else.

Traps Abound

I’m fairly sure I could bury bits in the original that would be passed through the spinner intact. It’s probably more work than it’s worth. But beware, if using this technology in an attempt to fool anyone: The technology, itself, can still be fooled into giving you away. And Bailey adds a cautionary tale for the unwary student — this Reddit thread, where a teacher mocked a student who unwittingly submitted in a paper on George Orwell’s 1984 that morphed the famous “Big Brother is watching you” into “Enormous Sibling is viewing you.” If only all the indications of unoriginal and machine-generated content were so obvious!

This article is all mine. I wrote it originally as a bit of a rant on my personal blog, where it has languished for a couple of years. I’d forgotten all about it, myself, until I read Timothy Key’s Story:

I only mention this because I kind of hope you’ll run this one through a plagiarism checker, or a Google search, find my blog, and maybe read more of my writing, there. Just don’t steal anything, at least not until you’ve read the sad, cautionary tale of Ivan Mor Smirnoff…