So, about those plagiarism flags on 2170F...

Look, I’m going to address the elephant in the room.

If you’ve seen my recent submission [351054331] for problem 2170F, or if you’ve seen the downvotes on my recent comments, you know the situation. I’ve been flagged for plagiarism. My code looks suspiciously similar to a huge "cluster" of other submissions.

I get it. Honestly, I do.

If I were a judge or a regular user scrolling through the standings, and I saw 50 people submit nearly identical code, my first thought would be: "Okay, clearly someone leaked the solution on Telegram." It looks bad. It looks guilty.

But here is the incredibly frustrating reality: I didn't copy a single line. And I want to explain why my code looks like everyone else's, not as an excuse, but as a developer.

The "Hello World" Effect

Imagine I asked 100 C++ programmers to write a "Hello World" program. They would all write: #include <iostream> int main() { cout << "Hello World"; }

If 100 people submitted that, would you ban them all for plagiarism? Of course not. There is essentially only one optimal way to write it.

Problem 2170F is the "Hello World" of Offline DP.

This problem forces you into a tiny box. To pass the time limits, you have to use a specific set of tools. Once you pick those tools, the code basically writes itself.

1. The "Backward Loop" that got me flagged

People are pointing out that my inner loop iterates backwards (k--). They say this is the "signature" of the leaked solution.

Guys, come on. It’s a Knapsack-style DP. Iterating backwards is literally Rule #1 of 1D Knapsack optimization so you don't reuse the same item twice. I didn't write it that way because I was copying a cheat sheet; I wrote it that way because if I iterated forwards, the code would be wrong.

I am essentially being punished for knowing how to write a correct Knapsack loop.

2. The "Boilerplate" Trap

The problem requires handling queries offline. So, naturally, I made a vector of queries and iterated from 1 to N. Is that copying? No, that’s just... how you solve offline query problems. That’s the standard template.

Caught in the Crossfire

I think the reason I'm getting downvoted isn't because people genuinely analyzed my code and found proof of cheating. It's because the community is tired.

We are all sick of cheaters. We are sick of contests being ruined by leaked solutions. So when a massive wave of cheaters comes in, the "innocent until proven guilty" mindset goes out the window. It becomes a witch hunt. The system sees a pattern, and it nukes everyone matching that pattern.

I just happened to write the optimal, standard solution at the same time a bunch of copy-pasters did.

The Bottom Line

It sucks to grind on a problem, figure out the optimization (the "Rightmost Index" trick), debug it, submit it, and then get slapped with a plagiarism tag just because the solution is standard.

I’m not asking for special treatment. I’m just asking you to look at the context. Sometimes, "great minds think alike" isn't just a saying—in competitive programming, it’s often the only way to get AC.

I didn't cheat. I just solved the problem.

Thanks for hearing me out.