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Creative Cheating: Corrupted Files and Student Ethics |
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Dr. Samuel Says -
Smart Design
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Written by Dr. Samuel Centralia, Ph.D., D.D.S., Esq.
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Friday, 26 June 2009 |
Back when I was an undergraduate at Harvard, we didn’t have the technology available to students today. Papers were written by hand, or laboriously pecked out on manual typewriters. No overhead projectors or PowerPoint presentations, either -- just cranky old tenured professors with chalk, blackboards, and dubious leftist politics.
 The kids today have it made, I tell you. My nephew Thaddius, for
instance, hasn’t attended a class in years. As a birthday present back
a few years back, I presented him with a clone of himself, which I’d
gestated from DNA samples I swabbed off his toothbrush. So for several
years now, 2Thaddius has been attending classes, writing papers and
taking notes while Thaddius Prime indulges his love of microbrew beers.
Everybody wins! Plus, Thaddius now has an organ bank for when his liver
finally gives out.
Anyway, all of this is by way of introduction to a new product now on
the market, aimed specifically at today’s modern, wired student.
Corrupted-Files.com sells -- yes, that’s right -- corrupted Word, Excel
or PowerPoint files which you can download at $3.95 a pop. The idea
being that students running late with an assignment can buy some extra
time by submitting the bad file, then feigning surprise when the
professor discovers that the paper can’t be opened.
It’s a modest little slice of pure genius. I do so admire creative
subterfuge in the young people today. Corrupted-Files.com assures
customers that the file can’t be traced back to the website. “We take
pride in our corruption!” reads the site’s FAQ.
Ethically, it’s not so hot, of course. But last I checked, college
students aren’t too concerned with ethics. In fact, Thaddius was so
pleased with his gift that just last week he ripped the entire Elvis
Presley catalog off some file-sharing service and put it on my iPod.
Sweet kid.
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