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The Lesson
By
Peter Mackeonis
Artificial Intelligence used for plagiarism would be easily detected, but policing those who think it's okay to use it could be complex.
Jason leaned back on the bench and whispered to Keko, “See, I told you I had this down.”
Keko wasn't convinced. “I don't get it, it was college level and and no one else gets higher than a B minus and you get an A plus!”
“You really want to know? Come over to my place later and I'll show you.” Jason's nervous voice told his real his intentions and they had nothing to do with homework.”
“In your dreams.” came the reply.”
Mike Williams slammed his hand down hard on his desk to quieten the noisy class. “I know it's Friday and we only have a few minutes left but everyone go back to your seats.”
He waited until the mix of bored and agitated faces had settled down before he continued.
“I know that technology is not my subject but before you leave today I'd like to ask how you think AI is going to effect your world.”
“I's gonna be useful” came the first to answer from the back row of the room.
“How, Jorge?” the teacher asked.
“Because my fridge will order beers when I run out.”
“or more vodka,” came a voice
“and my dad would like some puff” said another.
“Okay, calm down,” said the teacher as he was exasperated and fearful of their future.
He tried again. “Anybody else want to say anything?”
The class was silent apart from more laughter at Jorge's answer the teacher again took the stage.
He knew it was time to change the subject.
“How many of you like the Blues, Rock, Thrash Metal, or folk music?”
A few hands slowly went up.
“So how many of you like Taylor Swift?”
All the girls hands went up.
“So what would you 'Swifties' think if AI produced her songs without her being any part of them?”
“That couldn't happen” came a voice.
“Okay, why not?” he answered with more enthusiasm in his voice.” When I was a kid there was a period called the sixties...” he started and was interrupted.
“Yeah, all free love and drugs” came a voice, and the room erupted into whoops and cat calls.
“Anyway” he continued, ignoring the snarky comments, “Well, it was all homegrown and mostly came out of what were called garage bands, until the music companies saw how much money these long-haired amateurs were making and decided to make over the music industry, they killed the music by creating bands like the Monkeys, and then they manufactured Disco.”
“The monkeys were great.” Came a voice.
“Disco is cool,” mumbled another voice.
“Okay. Yes some of it was great, but my point is that in the end business always controls whatever makes money, so why wouldn't AI take over making music?”
The room seemed interested suddenly so he stayed on the music theme.
“Delta Blues, rock-and-roll, country rock, folk rock, heavy metal, Punk, Rap and Techno all came from people not computers, art and fashion is the same way. Styles change when new ideas come along. Stop the human progression and everything will look and be the same. But don't be fooled into thinking that computers on their own can create anything new because they can't, only people can create. Machines can only copy.”
As he finished, he looked around the room and realized that he'd gone too far and that no one knew or cared what the hell he was talking about. They just wanted to pick up their smart phones from the lock box and go.
But he wasn't done. And this was his last chance to try to reach the people that thanks to the system he'd failed for the last four years.
“Now, I'd like to talk to you about your essays as only one of them was good, some were passable, and five essays were exactly the same, which was so stupid that I didn't know whether to laugh or cry.”
As he continued to speak he picked up a small stack of essays. “Miguel, Alysia, Noah, Sheshaun and Keko please come up to the front of the class.”
Acting as judge, jury and executioner he spoke to the five as a group.
“I'm disappointed in all of you for not putting more effort into your cheating. Plagiarizing is one thing, even our politicians do it, but not trying to hide the fact and submitting identical versions was really dumb, didn't any of you think that I might have noticed? I feel quite insulted.“
He waited for the accusation to sink in but it didn't and wasn't going to because Noah's customers were focused on Noah and Noah not able to dig a hole in the floor and jump into it was trying to focus on the Smithsonian poster at the back of the room.
“ Now, what would you say if I were to order you to valet my car, mow my lawn and trim the hedges?'
“You can kiss my ass,” suggested Keko.
The rest of the room howled and whistled, but it wasn't in support of the young offenders. They were enjoying the low level blood sport.
“Okay, okay, that's enough. Quieten down and let's allow those who raise their hands speak.”
“You can't do that, it's against the rules, we'll report you for abuse,” said Sheshaun.
The teacher told Keko to go to the board and write the word 'plagiarism.'
Tugging at her skirt as she walked in an attempt to make it longer and arriving at the board she asked,”How's it spelt?”
After he repeated the word several times the girl stared back at him with a blank expression as if he was speaking Swahili.
“One of you knows to spell it Keko, as it was a warning in big red letters on the first screen of the software used to create your essay.”
He repeated the warning word-for-word only to be rewarded with another blank look, and as he faced the other four, three had the same expressionless stare.
“So Noah, I would guess that you had the AI program write your essay and then you let the others copy it. If you are planning to go to college I'd major in politics.”
The room burst into more whoops and cheers that became deafening when the bell rang.
Now uncomfortable, realizing that his behavior that day had left him open to charges of malpractice the teacher walked to the door for the last time
“Can I go too?” asked Kiko, her voice now brighter as she realized that she was home-free.
“Yes, Keko. Your'e done” he replied with sadness.
As the room begin to empty his voice losing against the noise of laughter and chairs falling over he ordered everyone to stop.
“I want you all to be successful in life...” As he tried to continue over the chatter and some muttered insults, ”...and I try my best to give each of you your personal voice.”
The silence that followed wasn't out of respect for what came next, but just disinterest and contempt.
“So for the rest of the semester all essays will be delivered orally because memorization is wonderful for brain development and will help you later on in life. Enjoy your weekend.”
“Jason, wait for me,” shouted Keko across the yard.
Jason turned and just smiled at Keko.
There was real anger anger in her voice as she spoke. “He's such a creep, he didn't have to embarrass me like that and he was staring at my legs again.”
Keko had never been to the side of tracks where Jason's house was, and she was surprised to see that there were no posters on his bedroom walls and no furniture other than a bed and two impressively large monitors connected to laptops.
“So, you're a nerd?” she said without humor. “I always thought so. That's why you always get A's on his stupid hard essay assignments.”
“No,” Jason defended himself. “ I just like learning. It comes naturally to me, I'm just lucky I guess.”
“I don't see any luck,” and the half sneer on Keko's face said it all. “Your family's rich, so you don't have any problems. She was using the big and shiny BMW and the Mercedes sports car on the driveway as her guide. ”Anyway, what does your dad do?”
He's a programmer at a government department, but he doesn't talk about it much - it's all a bit secret.”
“So you got his brain? My dad works at the school.”
“Yeah, I know, he's the custodian,” Jason hadn't meant to blurt it out so he quickly changed the subject.
“So you wanted to know how I get the best grades?” And he brought up the plagiarist warning that the teacher had talked about. Clicking through the warning, he brought up another screen that said 'Jason's Stealth Mode.' “I programmed the AI kernel to create unique content that is ten million to one to be duplicated by anyone else using the software,” he said proudly to his obviously puzzled classmate
“I guess you haven't heard of Open Source?”
“What's that, a new taco sauce?' Keko replied,wondering why he'd suddenly changed the subject.
Jason ignore her comment. “Yeah, not quite. It's internet software that any programmer can change to make their own version. So I just made it write me a unique essay.
“Eh, yeah, so you did cheat?” Keko answered not understanding much of what she'd heard, other than she might have discovered a more reliable source than Noah's high priced garbage.
As Keko was now restless it was obvious to Jason that he'd better come up with something better, or she'd go home.
“Okay, how would you like to get your own back?” and as he spoke a monitor flicked into life an image of the teacher who'd annoyed Keko came on the screen.
“Sure?'' said his annoyed guest as she stood to go.
“So look at this,” and tapping out a key combination the teacher did a series of back-flips across the school yard.
“How'd you do that?”
“Easy. I just added his face to Miguel showing off.”
“So, what else can you have him do” she asked, and her face lit up, but not in a nice way.
“Anything. There's nothing I can't have him do,” and he tapped out another combination to bring the teacher to life singing Taylor Swift's latest song.”
Keko's expression was now tinged with evil and it wasn't pretty, but Jason had always liked her and he was just glad that she'd come up to his room.
Again she asked, ”So you can have him do anything?”
“Not him” Jason explained slowly, “The image or video has to exist first, all I do is just add his face or body to it. It's called a Deep Fake.”
“That's what I meant” came the reply, which was a bit terse. “If I send you a video can you put him in it?”
“Sure,” replied Jason as he felt his opportunity having Keko in his room for anything other than conversation slipping away.
Keko said nothing as she stood and left.
Later that evening Keko's email arrived in Jason's inbox with a porn video that she'd sent from her father's computer, with a request. “Use this.”
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