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Matt Brown

® Communication Designer at Facebook Studied English at indiana University @ Lives in San Francisco, California

@ Married to Tiffani jones Brown

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What's on your mind? 4 Matt Srown August 29 3

Last Weekend / SF Moma (16 photos)

By Allie Davison, Staff Writer

© you remember your very D«= Facebook status? The first picture you posted? Game you

played? Person you friended? The exact day you joined Facebook? Probably not, but have no fear: Facebook has been keeping track.

I signed up for Facebook on March 19, 2007. The day my life changed— for better and worse—and I couldn’t even remember it myself: my Facebook Timeline told me. It also remembers my witty status updates—as well as my drunken ones, my boyfriends, the resulting breakups, and every single thing you ever posted on my wall. Ever.

Way too much information.

Overall, I find it all a little creepy. I don’t need to remember that guy I dated for three months several years ago, or all those drunken Facebook statuses from 2009, or The. Weird Way I Would Capitalize The First Letter Of Every Word. Not good times. In fact, I would rather not remember them, as some things from the past are best left forgotten. Now every time I check out my Facebook profile, I am tempted to browse through my years of Facebook history. Not only do I not always like what I see, but it adds on an almost unlimited supply of procrastination.

But it’s not all garbage: the Timeline does have some cool features. The new status update bar gives you 16

S&S Stories

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Update Info Vie

Friends 4

Recent Activity

® » : BB Mare kes Mountain Biking

_— & Mar subscribed to Tom Watson's updates

Matt Srown August 22

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Apps

a number of new options. The basic status update feature is still there, but you can now add Life Events to your timeline. They are broken into helpful sections, such as: Work and Education (you can Add a Job or Retire; Graduate or Study Abroad), Family and Relationships (Got Engaged or Married, Add a Child or Pet), and Living (Moved, Bought a Home, Add a Roommate or Vehicle).

Most of these are pretty cool, and I’ll probably use them the next time I have a child or buy a home. But there are a few stranger ones. Under the heading Living, you can document if you change eating habits or get glasses or contacts. Does the world really need to know if I became a Fruitarian or Omnivore, two of the five options available under new eating habits?

Sadly, the Timeline isn’t available to the public quite yet. Facebook is tied up in a lawsuit with Timeline Inc. over infringement issues, thus delaying this newest Facebook feature. The Timeline was originally supposed to go live on September 29, but it was pushed back to October 6. However, if you don’t want to wait until is it forced upon the rest of the Facebook community to get your Timeline, you can go to www. facebook.com/timeline and opt-in early.

Still, beware: once you’re in, there’s no going back. And you might not like everything you see.

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By Leisha Senko — The Sputnik (Wilfrid Laurier University)

BRANTFORD (CUP) — Plagiarism

is a conversation topic that flies under the radar for most of the academic year. It’s reintroduced to students only when papers are due or when ethics policies are reviewed at the beginning of a school year. But plagiarism is thrown into the spotlight when students are asked to submit their works to the online database turnitin.com.

Last year, I interviewed Jesse Rossenfeld, a former McGill University student who refused to submit his paper to turnitin.com. Back then, he was a lonely voice crying injustice, and although he won the right to a personal exemption, he did not succeed in getting rid of the site’s use altogether.

Recently, Dalhousie University took that plunge. Following in the footsteps of a few American schools, its Students’ Union has won the battle to get turnitin.com out of the school completely; this means there is no longer a contract between the two parties and professors no longer use the site to check for plagiarism.

This was a pleasant surprise, as after talking with the Dalhousie Students’ Union last winter, I was left with the distinct impression that the fight was proving to be tedious and difficult. Amazingly, student leaders stuck to the fight, citing the protection of intellectual property and necessary privacy.

I consider this to be an important victory, even though I know many naysayers will scoff at my optimism and call turnitin.com a useful or practical tool. But a critical examination of the site blows away its illusion of

Time to turn out turnitin.com

prestige. Rossenfeld and other academics said that a professor who is on his or her game would be able to nail any sort of plagiarism 10 ways to Sunday, and never need turnitin.com to find major issues. The site is also infamous for its false positives and questionable algorithm — that’s strike one, as far as I’m concerned.

Next, there’s the issue of intellectual property. Most students, when asked, aren’t particularly over the moon about giving their work to a company that will then use it to build its database and even market its product. Strike two.

Lastly, and most importantly, we should be seriously concerned about allowing businesses to come into the classroom as teaching mercenaries. They have absolutely no interest in improving the situation. For turnitin. com, the worst possible scenario would be a decrease in plagiarism or an increase ethical policies and practices that would bridge the divide between student and teacher and address the root causes of plagiarism. Strike three.

Academic plagiarism shouldn’t be our scarlet letter. It is a real issue, of course, but not one that should make us hang our heads in shame or turn our classrooms over to corporations. What we should be judged on, measured by and scrutinized for is how we deal with plagiarism. Do we pull together and stress a higher sense of ethics?

Do we strive to come up with more creative assignments? Do we reach out and provide more support services for students trying to write papers? Unfortunately, many schools — unlike Dalhousie University — aren’t making the switch to these more progressive policies.