
Chinese Thesis Ghostwriting Scandal Reveals Huge Gray Market - ilamont
https://www.caixinglobal.com/2018-09-15/chinese-thesis-ghostwriting-scandal-reveals-huge-gray-market-101326436.html
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RileyJames
My friend makes a living writing these kinds of papers, primarily for Chinese
students in Australian universities. He’s brilliant and can write on any
subject (often the students provide notes / data, so it’s more about writing
than topic knowledge).

What annoys me is that this is rampant, and universities know it (or they’re
intentionally being naive). But rather than crack down on those who are paying
course fees, plus paying someone else to do their work. It would be nice if
they put some effort into finding those who are actually writing all these
papers and enabling them.

Make them tutors, professors, ‘student assistants’, what ever. Some people
will always cheat, who cares. In the end they cheat themselves, and it’s up to
companies to screen people to ensure they actually have the capabilities they
require. Rather than spend on removing the cheaters, spend on enabling the
honest. Or even better, transfer directly from the cheaters to the honest,
which is effectively what happens, but in the shadows.

But for my friend, who is a perfect match for academia, this is his funding
model.

I hope one day he can be credited with all the papers he’s actually written.

~~~
beerlord
Studying at University in Australia as an international student is not about
the education, its about the immigration pathway it enables. Australia has
something like 600,000 international students, second only to the USA, because
all international students are immediately given a work visa, and then can
permanently migrate to the country fairly easily at the end of the degree.
Once you have PR you can access welfare and medicare, and can bring your whole
family over eventually.

~~~
danieltillett
Yep the whole thing is a total scam. My local Coles (Australian supermarket)
is 100% staffed by overseas people who did a degree (mostly accounting from my
informal questioning) here in Australia and who got PR via this degree.

~~~
wp381640
It isn't a scam if it is working exactly as intended

It's a backdoor way into Australia that not many Australians know about and
nobody rocks the boat on because everybody knows the country needs the
migrants and investment.

Ditto with the investment visas. Pretty crazy when at the same time everybody
loses their minds over boats with a few hundred people on them

~~~
danieltillett
Australia does not need more migrants. Our entire economy is a Ponzi scheme
based around immigration driving ever higher house prices. The more the major
parties ignore this issue the more power it gives to those on the political
extremes.

The issue with the boats is it would not be a few hundred people for very long
as the Europeans have found out over the last few years.

~~~
woah
Maybe you need to build more houses? This kind of denial of reality and
xenophobia is rampant in SF as well.

~~~
danieltillett
We re building masses of houses. The problem is not the building of houses,
but the not building of all the infrustructure required to support all the new
residents - roads, schools, hospitals, public transport, sewerage,
electricity, water, etc.

It is not xenophobia to want to see responsible development where development
only occurs when it is supported by the infrustucture. If we can't afford to
build the infrustucture then don't create the housing.

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ausjke
Not just that, github is abused in china now, you pay and they will set up a
repo for you, star it for you, so you can show your potential employer "your"
github repo, it's a business operation now.

There is another group of people that will take the phone interview and the
remote online coding test for you until you get an onsite interview, since not
all phone interview has video chat. That too helped quite some to get accepted
into good companies eventually.

~~~
xkcd-sucks
Yeah so do all these fucking bootcamp graduates who copypaste their
classmates' code into new repos and star each other. Always ask the candidate
to walk you through the repo line by line!

~~~
aldoushuxley001
> Always ask the candidate to walk you through the repo line by line!

That seems a bit much, you're liable to scare away good talent that way.

~~~
Gustomaximus
Coudnt that be easily managed by saying:

"Sorry about this but we've had some candidates passing others code as their
own. So we've been asked to take all candidates through some code line by
line. Such a pain but we have to do it unfortunately. Ill try and get through
quickly. You dont mind do you?"

~~~
reitanqild
And if there is a need for follow up, some variation of "we quite clearly are
interested in you and value your time since we spend actual engineer hours
walking through your code.

What would be disrespectful was if we ignored all your hard work and hired
someone not half as good as you because _they_ had more glowing reviews or
more stars on their repos."

Obviously I'm no hiring manager, but often a bit of honesty goes a long way.

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07d046
This is a problem from the top down. Even Xi Jinping's doctoral thesis
contains plagiarism, and it's possible that the whole document was written by
someone else.

[https://www.asiasentinel.com/politics/plagiarism-and-xi-
jinp...](https://www.asiasentinel.com/politics/plagiarism-and-xi-jinping/)

~~~
baybal2
I'm amazed that somebody outside China picked that up!

But yeah, that is symbolic of the cohort that Bo and Xi led.

Jiang and Hu era was a period of a relative meritocracy, with such shit not
being tolerated, or at least not highest levels. But yeah, being anticommunist
while being a communist party general secretary wasn't likely to be a working
arrangement.

What an irony.

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baybal2
My stance on that: ex-bloc countries have that¸ I tell you as one who did part
of my high school in Russia. Weak students cheat, strong students cheat, and
only few cranky principled oddballs reject the system and shout "Hey you, ex
university prof, throw whatever you want at me, I'll solve it and shred it to
pieces" \- those being universally hated for "making life harder for
everybody"

My mom once had fun listening to shitty talks from parents of other students
along the lines "hey, can you tell your boy to quiet down a bit, he raises the
plank to high for the rest of the class"

You can understand weak students' reasons: they simply can't do it otherwise.
But why do strong ones cheat? That what dazzled me about Russians, and Russia
in general. What that was is the gigantic, monstrous, totally pathological
fear of failure that permeates country's "socially endowed classes."

And secondary to that is the element of social pact: when pupils with
excellent marks begin cheating and copying from one another, they begin to
embrace the "omerta" created by this, sealing their social contract with their
peers.

Most rich, powerful people in Russia teach their children very intentionally
to behave along the lines - get close and sycophantic with others privileged
people. And you know, to infirm young minds, the reasoning that any privilege
one gets in life is through joining some "exclusive social clubs" of other
privileged people, is hard to challenge, especially when this comes from their
parents.

And after some time, their children become completely accustomed to not to
taking upon any challenge straight, because they genuinely believe that even
simplest things in life are not doable without tricks, cheats, and favours
from other power powerful people. This is the culture in which social elites
in Russia grow up.

After being around mainlanders for 11 years while working in electronics, I
feel it is very much the same for them. For both of above reasons, people from
both nations are extremely afraid of challenge, and more so when you deal with
people higher up on the social ladder.

~~~
markvdb
Thank you for this comment. Useful analysis, even if a bit overly broad. One
can only speculate how much for the former USSR this has to do with the trauma
of the crazy nineties.

~~~
baybal2
Nineties has nothing to do with it, that's more of Brezhnev's doing, and some
extend Stalin's. Whenever there is a talk of socially endowed classes, that
pretty much means ex-communists, and officials' families.

The amount of genuine self-made men who got to any level of prominence in
society is so small, they never influenced the societal dynamics in any
perceivable way.

Such are still being looked at as if they are some kind of space aliens by
regular people.

~~~
markvdb
One certainly could see continuity between this behavior in the Soviet era and
the nineties.

In the Soviet days, I guess not seeking connection meant a less interesting
social position. In the post-Soviet days, if I hear my friends from the former
USSR, it could mean getting close to startvation.

~~~
baybal2
Can't say the same, my parents were ones of few people making 6 digits in
early Russia. Mom working in one of first foreign banks in Russia as a de-
facto CTO, and father having a trade company. Opportunities were there, no way
to deny that. People who report stories of near starvation genuinely "had to
work hard" to get to that near starvation point. Even dockers and labourers in
my father's company in Vladivostok had few hundred buck net per month salaries
in 1996.

Ones who got to that point probably were commies themselves, or were the type
of people "sitting around and waiting money to suddenly fall upon then from
nowhere just for that, and a nice diploma they had" as they did back in "good
ol soviet times"...

~~~
markvdb
> Can't say the same, my parents were ones of few people making 6 digits in
> early Russia. Mom working in one of first foreign banks in Russia as a de-
> facto CTO, and father having a trade company. Opportunities were there, no
> way to deny that. People who report stories of near starvation genuinely
> "had to work hard" to get to that near starvation point. Even dockers and
> labourers in my father's company in Vladivostok had few hundred buck net per
> month salaries in 1996.

Good for them.

> Ones who got to that point probably were commies themselves, or were the
> type of people "sitting around and waiting money to suddenly fall upon then
> from nowhere just for that, and a nice diploma they had" as they did back in
> "good ol soviet times"... That sounds like a generalisation with very little
> empathy.

The people I have in mind are not ethnic Russians. They didn't live in Russia.
One of them had their parents deported to Siberia by the Soviets. Neither of
them were in the Komsomol. One of their children was born in 1990. The only
serious employer in their city stopped paying wages for months on end. If/when
paid, they received 120€/month (early 1997) - for skilled masters degree work.
They simply didn't have any buffer to escape the mess. They were definitely
not the only ones...

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moltar
News flash. This happens not only in China. It’s rampant in North America too.

Source: I know someone who does this for loving. Plus there are a ton of
services online advertising these services.

Universities know this. They don’t care. They are just squeezing out the last
juices from the dying industry.

~~~
sago
> Universities ... are just squeezing out the last juices from the dying
> industry.

I agreed up to this point. Can you say more what you mean? University
education is a dying industry? What about the massive and growing legislative
requirements for degrees in all kinds of occupations?

~~~
manfredo
This comment was probably specifically referring to universities specifically
in the US.This is probably more specific to the US, where university was
historically a means of socializing and networking for the sociopolitical
elite and has since turned into an indicator of class or status. A lot of
people are going into university because that's just what middle and upper
class people do - a lack of a university education imparts a big cut in terms
of status. Legislative requirements for degrees means that someone needs to
study for 4 years (most of which will be on topics unrelated their job)
otherwise they're locked out of employment options. People are forking over
tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars mostly because society expects them
to.

I think more and more people are realizing that the benefit of a university
education isn't very good for the cost. Don't get me wrong, it is a positive
return on investment, but it could probably be better structured as a
vocational school for most people. If my parents didn't pay for my education,
I probably would have tried doing a coding school and going directly into the
workforce. I learned a lot of cool stuff in university, and attending a
prestigious school opened up many opportunities. But most of the former was
irrelevant to my job, and the latter is basically just an elaborate means of
signalling status (which, while it definitely helped me I fundamentally don't
think it'd be fair to hire a university grad simply for being a university
grad if a non-grad as the same or better skills).

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zeroname
Mainland China has education all backwards, children get tons of pressure
during primary and secondary education, to the point of them commiting
suicide.

Then, when it's about university education, it's all business. Parents pay
good money for their children's "education", so they expect good grades.
Universities compete for students, not the other way around. It's a racket.

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downrightmike
This is sketchy and unfair to students that actually do the work. But
apparently it is a cultural accepted thing to cheat blatantly in china. And
Universities are more than likely going to do nothing to stop it because the
tuition rate for international students has a much better profit margin than
in-state students.
[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/101323...](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/10132391/Riot-
after-Chinese-teachers-try-to-stop-pupils-cheating.html)

~~~
volgo
It's interesting blatant stereotypes about Asian and Asian Americans are
thrown around like it's acceptable. Would you ever make statements like "it's
cultural acceptable for black community to condone thefts and petty crimes,
and politicians won't do anythign because it's inconvenient?"

Just because statistics reveal a uptick for one group, does not make it
acceptable for you to generalize. It's a racist remark, just so you understand
the unconscious bias

~~~
ndnxhs
Its not just statistics. Its painfully obvious to anyone currently in uni.
Every single person I have seen cheating has been Asian. And the teachers do
nothing. Had one guy in my class get caught cheating for the 3rd time and
still nothing has happened.

~~~
cortesoft
Oh, so the racism isn't based on statistics, it is based on anecdote.

~~~
darawk
Is it racism to be aware of another culture? What, exactly, makes this racist?

~~~
cortesoft
I mean, there are a number of racists things. Saying something like "But
apparently it is a cultural accepted thing to cheat blatantly in china" and
then "Every single person I have seen cheating has been Asian".

Imagine if someone said something like "Apparently it is culturally accepted
thing for cops to shoot black people"

I mean, you can find a ton of examples of this happening, and plenty of
examples of nobody doing anything about it. Does that mean it is culturally
accepted here?

~~~
darawk
> I mean, there are a number of racists things. Saying something like "But
> apparently it is a cultural accepted thing to cheat blatantly in china"

Maybe it is culturally accepted in China to cheat? Do you know? Is a statement
racist if it is true?

~~~
girvo
Some argue that yes, it’s still racist even if it’s true. Depends on the
context I think.

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scoom
By and large if a paper is published from a Chinese University, you ignore it.

Sounds like we should do that with the students as well.

~~~
ggm
This would be illegal in many economies,is grossly unfair and probably racist.

Plus, the rate of Chinese IPR and future knowledge is huge. Do you e.g. want
to miss out on Chinese PV and wind and emerging battery know-how?

Use the interview to weed out fakes. Don't make sweeping assumptions which
risk self harm.

~~~
zeroname
> This would be illegal in many economies,is grossly unfair and probably
> racist.

It's actually _not illegal_ to not accept somebody based on them having a
degree from a university of poor renown. It's called "qualification" and you
can discriminate upon it all you want. It's also not unfair. Unfair would be
accepting degrees from any place that hands out degrees like candy. It's also
not racist, a lot of Chinese parents send their children to study abroad
because they know Chinese universities suck. Those foreign degrees open up a
lot of doors, both abroad and domestic.

> Plus, the rate of Chinese IPR and future knowledge is huge. Do you e.g. want
> to miss out on Chinese PV and wind and emerging battery know-how?

What's your point? Hire Chinese with junk degrees now so that you magically
get to profit from future Chinese innovations?

~~~
gaius
_a lot of Chinese parents send their children to study abroad because they
know Chinese universities suck_

I'm told the value of a British degree, once highly prestigious, is rapidly
declining in China due to the number of degree mills (ex-polys) we have here
churning out degree certificates as fast as they can cash the tuition fee
cheques.

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ggm
My partner proofreads theses at an hourly rate well below market (students are
broke. Predating on them at the closure of their study feels bad) and still
can earn more than these quoted costs, fixing English language mistakes. Which
makes me wonder how good the originals are, since it takes literally hours to
correct semantic and syntactic confusions even by experienced domain-specific-
language aware authors. (And yes, she has been asked to write from scratch for
some clients and yes, she always declines)

TL;DR USD1,000 seems too low for writing a doctoral thesis. You can barely
proofread one adequately for this, sometimes.

~~~
thrower123
Even at Ivy League universities, many native English speakers can't reliably
write coherent paragraphs. Yes, it is mind-boggling, but this is my experience
even in junior and senior level history seminars - and history majors have to
read and write considerably more than many other majors, so presumably ought
to be relatively practiced at writing by that point.

~~~
whitepoplar
I think part of the problem is that students feel pressured to write Academic
English as opposed to regular English and they contort their thoughts in the
process of doing so. It happened to me while I was in university and didn't
know better.

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bitxbit
I don't really condone this but the world simply doesn't reward original work.
This is particularly true in corporate world. The whole concept of Modern
China is built on technology transfer so I don't know why we are so surprised
to find that plagiarism is commonplace there. That said, it is not easy to
come up with original thoughts and ideas especially in a world where it's
become increasingly difficult to "think" in isolation.

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anonymous5133
Like everything. These methods will work for a while until they won't.
Employers aren't stupid. They will eventually catch on once enough people are
doing it and then they will just be more aggressive in their the application
process. Probably more on-site interviews. More computer based exams and so on
that you can't cheat through.

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nikkiofearth
paywalled

