Hello, all -

My name is Michael Bruton, and I have worked with educational institutions to assist in the implementation of Turnitin for about three years -

I would like to publicly respond to the allegations that were raised in the post entitled "Issues Raised by Use of Turnitin Plagiarism Detection Software" (located at http://cyberdash.com/plagiarism-detection-software-issues-gvsu, authored by Charlie Lowe, Ellen Schendel and Julie White) - I wrote a personal response to the authors yesterday evening and I was asked to post the response in a public forum to encourage dialogue, which I wholeheartedly support.  I would like this to be a springboard for discussing all of the issues raised in the aforementioned post.  I would also like this discussion to have as much visibility as possible, as I feel that the *misuse* of Turnitin can lead to many of the issues raised in the post but I feel strongly that the proper use of Turnitin can add tremendous value to both students and educators.  I am firmly committed to ensuring that we spread our 'recommended best practices' to as many people as possible.  Unfortunately, our company has spent very little time in working to change some of the ways that Turnitin is promoted in our promotional materials (this will be changing very soon), and I can see how that can lead to misconceptions regarding the most effective ways to use our service.  I strongly encourage you (the reader) to forward portions of this discussion to faculty members who are using Turnitin as you see fit - we are working to add many of these recommendations to our website so that they will have a broader audience, but I appreciate your support in assisting with this grass-roots effort.