Plagiarism Resource Directory

Welcome to the Plagiarism Resource Directory, a curated collection of resources, case studies, news coverage, academic integrity organizations, ethics guidance, research misconduct databases, and plagiarism detection tools.

This site is intended for students, educators, researchers, journalists, and anyone interested in understanding how plagiarism is defined, detected, discussed, and addressed.

Human Note:

Nearly 100% of the content of this site was created by AI. Is this plagiarism? Cheating? Lying? Worthy of gatekeeping? Even punishment? This site was created for a deviant behavior class. Just one assignment, although the site refers to a "class" and includes many discussion questions. The site took 4-5 hours to build, plus another 1-2 hours to fine tune. Everything is very basic, inluding the need to copy and paste links. Hotlinks would be a major improvement, and I will try other options in time, but for now I don't plan to ungrade to a paid version of the plugin CoPilot recommended.

AI reliance is reportedly forcing some educators to choose retirement. Who can blame them? Online learning? We adapted and evolved. Covid? We pivoted the hell out of that one! AI? Well, this one is a major challenge - one that many educators are embracing. Are professors police now? NO WAY! Do students need to be threatened? In a surveilance capitilism world where lives can be ruined by politically motivated actors forcing their way into our classrooms? Again, no way!

I hope my desire to move forward in productive and respectful learning environments was somehow understood as I prompted CoPilot to produce this content. CoPilot wasn't shy about de-fanging a few of my suggestions, so the need for social control was triggered, but why? Did my employer request algorithm adjustments, was CoPilot acting independently to take off the rough edges, or was the robot simply looking out for me? (insert smiley here)

Is AI spitting out random words? No, it responds to prompts. It is also taking a chunk out of every user since we are"training" AI wih every interaction. Is this a fair exchange? How does the equation change when we add "plagiarism" to the mix? As this site demonstrates, copying the work of others is common practice - sometimes the "offender" is sanctioned, sometimes they are celebrated, praised, and given positions of power. AI can even "humanize" the writing. Does this eliminate the plagiarism? Is spell check cheating? What about Grammarly and other writing helpers? Spell check and other tools can teach us to be better writers. Thank you, robot, for reducing the torture of grading poorly written work. That is a good thing. And now we are engaging in all this hand wringing, and punitive responses, for something that equalizes the gap separating "good" and "bad" writers?

My point is that although we can't describe the infractions very well, we can be very good at applying sanctions. Maybe "who gets punished" is a better question than "what is plagiarism?"

Most on the menu links above are directly tied to the primary questions? Is plagiarism, fabrication, and AI reliance "deviant?," how is the behavior controlled and punished, and who is making the rules? I also want to acknowledge the costs, financial and otherwise, of AI. As such, one section above, with a dropdown menu like the other items, focuses on this issue, including a page discussing the cost of building this site.

Back to the Robot:

Discussion Questions

1. What behaviors should be considered plagiarism?
2. Should all instances of plagiarism be treated equally?
3. Are plagiarism standards changing in the AI era?
4. How should institutions respond to confirmed plagiarism?
5. Can plagiarism occur without malicious intent?

Site Purpose

The purpose of this directory is educational. The website links to publicly available resources related to plagiarism, academic integrity, and ethical scholarship.