Joan's message led me to explore the site she described, and also to do a
Web search for similar sites.  There seem to be a number of sites devoted
to either selling or writing term papers at costs ranging from $6 to $10
per page.
 
Here are the addresses of some additional sites I found:
http://www.termpaperwarehouse.com/tpw/
http://www.execpc.com/~hppapers/
http://wahoo.netrunner.net/~dolphin/pprs.htm
http://www.termpapersonline.com/
 
Some of these contain clear, repeated disclaimers indicating that the
papers are not intended to be handed in as the student's own work, that
the owner will refuse to deliver papers to students if the owner believes
that the student will turn it in as his/her own work, that there is no
promise that the paper will satisfy the student's course if it is turned
in as the students own work, and/or that turning the paper in as the
student's own work may violate honor codes etc.  (One such site, however,
which contained such disclaimers, also contained an offer to provide
papers on disks "to avoid time-consuming retyping!"  Why would you need
to retype a paper that is being used for research purposes only?)
 
However, the site Joan pointed out, www.schoolsucks.com, contains such a
disclaimer only if the student specifically clicks for it.  In other
words, it is possible for the student to download a paper without seeing
the disclaimer.  Further, the site contains indications (through words
like "cheaters", "scam", and so forth) that it *is* intended to be used
for that purpose.  This particular site, I think, might be engaged in
wire fraud.  I have sent an e-mail message to the Justice Department
outlining the bare facts and asking whether they will investigate.
 
In the case of the sites with the repeated disclaimers, it's hard to tell
what recourse we have.  A site that loudly tells students not to turn
papers in as their own work, but to use them as research guides only,
probably can't be accused of conspiracy to do anything unless there is
some indication that the reader is supposed to know the warning is
insincere.
 
I think, therefore, that this may be a pretty serious situation.  You
can't get access to the papers on file without paying for them, in most
situations, and of course the newly-written papers are completely
inaccessible.  What to do?
 
Ken Schneyer
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