There is a bit of a problem with students cheating in high school, in college, and now right on into graduate school – something that cannot be good for those of us counting on our doctors having memorized body parts and getting the multiple choice exam questions on tibia and fibula correct. We faculty face an uphill battle on cheating prevention and detection. However, we had found Turnitin, a software program that causes papers that have been lifted from or downloaded from the internet to light up like Christmas trees upon detecting those suspiciously similar passages from existing papers floating in cyberspace, including those featured on pay-to-get-your-term-paper sites. We had found a detective agency for ferreting out paper fraud. We fed 100,000 papers per day into the Turnitin data base. But, students from Fairfax County, Virginia and Tucson, Arizona protested mightily. You can’t download our papers and use them for free, they cried loudly with their iPods earbuds in place playing pirated music. So, the little darlings sued iParadigms, the LLC that developed Turnitin. Copyright infringement, cried they! A.V. A.V. v. iParadigms, LLC, 544 F.Supp. 2d 232 (E.D. Va. 2008) is the case, but Judge Claude Hilton had other thoughts for the youths. The students agree in advance to the use of their papers. In fact, the schools that subscribe to the Turnitin program must have their students submit their own papers to Turnitin, with a class “I agree” as part of the submissions process. The submitted papers are not used for any purpose other than for comparison with subsequently submitted papers for purposes of detecting plagarism.
But, bless their hearts, the high schoolers wanted to be reimbursed for their efforts. Either that or they hated the crackerjack detection process. Curses! Foiled again. Terms papers must still be written with blood, sweat, and tears, not via point, block, click, and paste. The good federal judge put the big kibosh on their inconsistent philosophy on use without payment. He tossed out their infancy and duress arguments and went on to hold that the site was fair use of their intellectual property:
Here, it is clear that iParadigms’ use of Plaintiffs’ works has caused no harm to the market value of those works. Plaintiffs have failed to present any evidence of harm. In fact, when asked in deposition whether iParadigms’ use of their works impinged on the marketability of their works or interfered with their use of the works, each Plaintiff answered in the negative.
Thank you, Judge Hilton. In fact, bless you.
About mmjdiary
Professor Marianne Jennings is an emeritus professor of legal and ethical studies from the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University, retiring in 2011 after 35 years of teaching undergraduate and graduate courses in ethics and the legal environment of business. During her tenure at ASU, she served as director of the Joan and David Lincoln Center for Applied Ethics from 1995-1999. In 2006, she was appointed faculty director for the W.P. Carey Executive MBA Program. She has done consulting work for businesses and professional groups including AICPA, Boeing, Dial Corporation, Edward Jones, Mattel, Motorola, CFA Institute, Southern California Edison, the Institute of Internal Auditors, AIMR, DuPont, AES, Blue Cross Blue Shield, Motorola, Hy-Vee Foods, IBM, Bell Helicopter, Amgen, Raytheon, and VIAD.
The sixth edition of her textbook, Case Studies in Business Ethics, was published in February 2011. The ninth edition of her textbook, Business: lts Legal, Ethical and Global Environment was published in January 2011. The 23rd edition of her book, Business Law: Principles and Cases, will be published in January 2013. The tenth edition of her book, Real Estate Law, will also be published in January 2013. Her book, A Business Tale: A Story of Ethics, Choices, Success, and a Very Large Rabbit, a fable about business ethics, was chosen by Library Journal in 2004 as its business book of the year. A Business Tale was also a finalist for two other literary awards for 2004. In 2000 her book on corporate governance was published by the New York Times MBA Pocket Series. Her book on long-term success, Building a Business Through Good Times and Bad: Lessons from Fifteen Companies, Each With a Century of Dividends, was published in October 2002 and has been used by Booz, Allen, Hamilton for its work on business longevity. Her latest book, The Seven Signs of Ethical Collapse was published by St. Martin’s Press in July 2006 and has been a finalist for two book awards.
Her weekly columns are syndicated around the country, and her work has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the Chicago Tribune, the New York Times, Washington Post, and the Reader's Digest. A collection of her essays, Nobody Fixes Real Carrot Sticks Anymore, first published in 1994 is still being published. She has been a commentator on business issues on All Things Considered for National Public Radio.
She has served on four boards of directors, including Arizona Public Service (1987-2000), Zealous Capital Corporation, and the Center for Children with Chronic Illness and Disability at the University of Minnesota. She was appointed to the board of advisors for the Institute of Nuclear Power Operators in 2004 and served on the board of trustees for Think Arizona, a public policy think tank. She has appeared on CNBC, CBS This Morning, the Today Show, and CBS Evening News.
In 2010 she was named one of the Top 100 Thought Leaders in Business Ethics by Trust Across America. Her books have been translated into four different languages. She received the British Emerald award for authoring one of their top 50 articles in management publications, chosen from over 15,000 articles.
Personal: Married since 1976 to Terry H. Jennings, Maricopa County Attorney’s Office Deputy County Attorney; five children: Sarah, Sam, and John, and the late Claire and Hannah Jennings.
