Nick Mammatas, "the term paper artist," is a man who took up the business of writing "model" term papers for students in order to pick up quick cash. This line of business was something that appealed to Mammatas because of his expertise in writing and the ease he seemed to be able to finish assignments with. When he got wind of a legal system in which he could write papers for money, he took advantage of it. Years later, after dropping the trade, Mammatas wrote an article detailing his experiences in this line of work. Soon after, he was invited for a radio interview for WNYC (the link can be found here https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B8oJcRp-Ff7OZWZiZDczYzYtNGY3OC00YjE2LTkzZDgtZTExNjI1NTc2YWMx&hl=en_US).
The interviewer makes it very clear from the start that he is opposed to the idea of selling model term papers because of the questionable legality of the trade. Mammatas responds to the skepticism as if he has explained it to hundreds of people before saying that because of the first ammendment, Mammatas can sell his work to anyone as long as the client does not violate the clause by turning in the work of Mammatas. With the legal aspect out of the way, the conversation moves towards the types of clients who use Mammatas's service. Mammatas says that more than half of clients are dumb and cannot even explain their assignments to the brokers who then contact Mammatas. Despite this, Mammatas still insists that not everyone cheats. He explains how clients do what is intended with the service; they get the model paper, gather the information they need, then write the paper in their own terms. This is how the system is intended to work. But beyond these "dumb clients" there are many competent clients who are just up against the wall, so to speak, and need a quick paper. Mammatas helps out here too. He talks about how he has done papers for big business men and companies who need reports and the like on a deadline. A "cost-benefit analysis" is the basis for people who request Mammatas's work. In other words the client may ask themself, "do I have the time to sit here all night and write a half-decent paper, would it be worth it to spend a few hundred bucks to get this easy A?" This is what the whole business comes down to.
Mammatas preys on the dumb and lazy, those who would rather give up hard-earned money than work a little harder for the satisfaction of completing an original work. Mammatas should not be found in fault. He uses a perfectly legal system to help people who request it. The sneaky and unethical action comes in when the client abuses the model and does not use it as a true model.
-Mitch Peiffer
