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Web Censors Prompt College To Consider Name Change
babbage writes: "The Philadelphia Inquirer reports that Beaver College is considering a name change. The president of the formerly all-girls college commented that she worries about derogatory remarks and jokes." And now she has Web censorship to deal with, too.
While insults and jokes have been around a long time (as has the word "beaver" as sexual slang), Web-filtering software has not. And some Web filters, which are by necessity based on logic not suited to all situations, block the college's Web site and e-mail. Check out the Inquirer article.
beavers.com, beaver.edu
I like how they're one of the 2000 top colleges in the US. Why is there even an award for that?
now talk amongst yaselves...
First of all, it is the PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER, not the NATIONAL ENQUIRER.
.edu domain??? Like there is going to be a porn site on a .edu? I somehow doubt that. How retarded this software is.
Second, why would any software block a
Yes, but my post was not a real post. It was humor. Darn, I forgot to put "HUMOR" in the subject line again...
:)
Besides, if they call themselves the "Inquirer", there will be that negative association. Why don't they change their name? Maybe web filters will eventually block all "suspicious-lookin g Inquirer sites too. Check out the link, their journalism isn't that serious. Anything that's written at a sixth-grade level for the below-average american can't be.
So what do you think? Inquiring minds want to know...
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pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Beaver College is really a nice place. You can't deny the jokes - when I was at Dow Jones we had a girl from Beaver College and it gave everybody a chuckle. More so because she was absolutely beautiful and smart. Btw, Glenside also has one of the coolest places to see a show - the Keswick Theatre. (http://www.thekeswicktheatre.com) I caught Dr. John there a couple of weeks ago.
The revolution will NOT be televised.
Whoops! They're at http://www.keswicktheatre.com
The revolution will NOT be televised.
Yes, there are school names that would NEVER have made it through test marketing today. I have have to say that an all-girl school named Beaver sounds the setup to a marginal joke. Imagine the testimonials:
Sigh.
Um... if they have less applicants because of the name, they could resort to getting foreign students who speak English but don't know the slang (yet :) ).
--
__
Men with no respect for life must never be allowed to control the ultimate instruments of death.
GW Bu
There is the Austrian city of Fucking (a somehow related link http://fucking.at/), where street plates are often stolen by souvenir hunters.
And there is the Japanese prefecture of Kinki, whose authorities actually thought of changing the name, because of ridicule from Americans.
--
__
Men with no respect for life must never be allowed to control the ultimate instruments of death.
GW Bu
As well as the "Microsoft Invents Symbolic Links" and "Care to Register Your Own TLD?" postings, both of which give the impression that the editor didn't bother to read past the first couple of paragraphs. (No, they're not simple symlinks, and no, under that stupid plan, companies wouldn't be able to buy the .sucks domain for their own name.)
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
And dont forget that when the polytechnic colleges were becoming universities, Newcastle Polytechnic nearly changed its name to the:
.ac.uk domain name to register.
City University of Newcastle upon Tyne.
Then I think they thought about what
[possibly file this under urban myths]
Indeed. As they say in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, you have to go through Blue Balls and Intercourse to reach Paradise.
"How many light bulbs does it take to change a person?" --BMcC-->
One of the TWs I mentored at a previous job was from there, and went home there. She pronounced it dooBOYSS with a sibilant S.
(Hey, Jennifer! Are you and Jeff reading Slashdot these days?)
"How many light bulbs does it take to change a person?" --BMcC-->
Federal Paranoia Institute
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Remember "Nixon is a Cox shucker"? (referring to Archibald Cox).
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Not to mention Slippery Rock and Hotchkiss.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
the name itself reduces the interest of possible students by 30% according to the college's market research data.
Probably not good for their finances, but it strikes me that the student who is willing to overlook a possibly funny name in the college is a lot more valuable than the Beavis and Butthead reject who says "Huh huh huh, he said beaver". Also, it seems that there should be several sites that help you screen colleges on different criteria (school size, undergrad only, student/faculty ratio, location, etc).
This all reminds me of the episode of "The Simpsons" I saw last night. Bart was talking with the school superintendant who gave his bio (as I remember it) "I grew up in Queens, attended Ball State before I moved to Intercourse Pensylvania ... Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going on vacation to Lake Titicaca". And this man grew up to be the school superintendant!!
JET Program: see Japan, meet intere
Yes, they're all ways to do it. But, since my hypothetical Californian doesn't know anything about Beaver College, she doesn't have any reason to make a special effort to investigate it. She's sifting through a list of 150 colleges chosen from a first glance through the monster book; she's got to drop 145 of them, and it doesn't make sense to spend research time on one that's more difficult to research instead of the other 149. And so, Beaver College gets dropped.
Anyway, it's only one of several reasons mentioned (not the "determining factor") in addition to jokes and the fact that the name itself reduces the interest of possible students by 30% according to the college's market research data.
Steven E. Ehrbar
My favourite is fictional; Medieval England, Iowa (Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey). At least I hope it's fictional.
Not to mention how much faster the 'Net will be for the rest of us...
Yes, the major part of the story was the recognition thing, BUT the part that's relevant to /. is the filtering part. That's probably why the filtering part was mentioned.
I *do* want a Beaver t-shirt, before they change their name
Certified Black Helicopter Pilot *** Unwitting Dupe of One World Gov'ment
Fortunately, researching colleges (something I did fairly recently) does not require the internet at all. Otherwise, we would further depress the chances of people who start life impoeverished of reciveing the education they need to better themselves.
But as to how you can learn about Beaver College from California -
1 Just write to them
2 Buy one of the monstrous books that lists every college in the known universe
3 check the box on the PSAT or SAT or ACT that says (loosely) "I want junk mail"
4 Look at the resources your school has. In my experience, they have information from just about everywhere.
The Web is an invaluable resource for researching colleges. I know it helped me figure out where I want to go. But when particular people's access to your website is a determining factor in _changing the name of your college_ maybe we are relying a little to much on it.
Sam TH
Sam TH
AbiWord Developer
While you did enough research to find that article, you didn't have the time to read the one this story is about. If you had, you would have noticed that Beaver has admitted men since 1973.
Sam TH
Sam TH
AbiWord Developer
Well, the bates address is my old email. I first registered with slashdot quite a while ago (#10819), so it reflects my email as of then, which I haven't bothered to change, since it still works. I suspect you don't care, but I'm responding anyway.
Sam TH
Sam TH
AbiWord Developer
I actually had a friend who went to Beaver college for a year. And one time when I was visiting, I noticed that one of the schools main signs had been altered by some students to read Beavis College.
Guess you had to be there for it to be funny...
Beaver all girls school is just too easy a joke. I don't think I could say it with a straight face.
Maybe not today. But if you had to say it over and over you'd get tired of the joke quickly. And then - no problem!
Don't care too much about what others think.
It's interesting to see that Intercourse is not too far from Buyertown. Coincidence? I think not.....
C'mon, at least give Futurama the credit that they're due. (People kept making fun of the name of planet Uranus, so they changed the planet's name to fix the problem. New name: Urectum.)
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As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Now that's an applicable name for a university.
Just to be sure I am not passing judgement on the activities of students at the university, but I can understand if someone does based on this peculiar name.
There's a Boring, Oregon...
gues what, it's boring...
------- Oh damn.... the Sigfile escaped... -Great OM
CNN's bit on the South Park school thing.
_________________
rooooar
Arizona's got Wet Beaver Creek... now tell me that wasn't a joke.
"Beaver all girls collage" eh... damn, I think the President or whatever has the right Idea. The joke is just waiting to be made...
[ c h a d   o k e r e ]
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
Oh please. This post really goes to show that all you lemmings who drool on everyword from the Slashdot crew really don't understand one damn thing about web filtering. Trust me I work in the industry and most of the info posted about web filtering software on this place is pure BS. This is just the worst case of yellow journalism I've seen in a while.
What Fools These Mortals Be!
What did Exxon spend to find a name that would offend no one and was not an obscene or negative word in any language?
I used to live in Skiatook, Oklahoma.
I'm from central PA. The towns go, in order from northwest to southeast, from:
Blue Ball, to
Bird in Hand, to
Intercourse, to
Paradise.
There are very tasteful "I [heart] Intercourse" bumper stickers at tourist traps.
Also, they're towns noted for their Amish populations.
We're had problems in the UK with Compuserve and AOL banning Scunthorpe (letters 2-5 are the key), then there's Cockermouth and so-on. The problem doesn't lie with the words, it lies with idiotic filters.
Indeed, I dearly recall `Impeach the Cox sacker!' It was sweet to greet his image with it on his last announcement to the country, the night he resigned, as we listened from the balcony of my school's student center. My mother in law, recently come from Australia, at the time couldn't understand what we saw in him that called for such response; it was an unmixed joy to have helped bring him down.
Flames accepted as fuel for the alchemical furnace. Yes he changed relations among the great world powers; I'm just glad he was dumb enough to record his office.
Dude, um, the Philly Inquirer isn't really a step up from the National Enquirer. I mean, last week, they did the entire front page on the who wants to marry a mkillionare thing. Entire front page. It's not a newspaper, it might not be a tabloid, it's passable as a fishwrapper. Not that I don't like it or anything :)
itachi, who seems to have wandered off topic a bit
And I would say that it would be utterly stupid for them to even think about changing it. ... uhm, juicy in one of it. ;-) For instance - ebay in many east-european languages will mean exactly 'fuck' also. So now what? /. about some brittish South Park College?
I recall that there's about 6000 languages and dialects in the world. Now, possibly every word you can think of means something
Or say, do you remember a story here on
PS: BTW, what does 'byte' mean in french? Why do they use 'octet'?
I checked up the story. It was AOL's filtering software.
I guess changing their name to Beaver College, from Beaver Female Seminary , just wasn't good enough.
No one seems to have a problem with the name... but the paper sucks. (I used to deliver it ages ago.)
Does it make you happy you're so strange?
Well, being an MIT grad student, I actually am a beaver. So beat that.
Go Beavers!
You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.
They should just post links saying "click on the banner ad above" and get it over with already.
On the other side of the coin, it's thanks to Slashdot that I know about things like Junkbuster and Intermute - so I'm blissfully banner-free. Self imposed web censorship! I love it!
Must be some Amercian Colloquialism.
Like the word "fanny" being a cuter form of "butt"?
In response to growing demands by the public and its students, beaver college reported today that they were switching from a per credit tuition fee to a monthly, all you can learn tuition structure.
The administration also said that they would offer year long "memberships" for a 10% discount.
Said the administration "seeing the sucess of the subscription model in other ventures, we can only go up from here."
Ah, but don't forget Virginville, PA
My grandfather got himself a shirt:
"I went to Virginville, but I stayed at Intercourse"
That's hillarious. They'd rather have the town change its name than add word delimiter recognition or an exception.
And these people actually stay in business!
Oregon's state animal is the beaver, there's even one on the back of the flag. Heck, Oregon State University is home to "The Beavers" sports teams. I wonder if they'll eventually filter out the state and university's websites..
Driving from Las Vegas to Denver we always joke that we have reached the "Filmore-Beaver Valley" in Utah.
(sigh) if only
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Please give your mod points to others, Im at the cap. They will appreciate it more
Far from being a joke, Beaver College has a real quandry here. Something that readers who weren't liberal arts majors might not know is that they're said to be the biggest study-abroad program in the U.S., and changing their name could dilute or kill that "brand" in order to save the school itself.
The real enrollment is tiny (though I know someone who actually went there! Hi, Sally!) but the quantity of students from other schools that pass through the Beaver College programs is enormous: I did, my dentitst's receptionist's kid did, lots of random people do. That means that the larger of the two communities they serve is at risk with the name change ("Now where's that Beaver College that we used to use...?") -- but the smaller community is the whole reason for the larger community's existence.
As someone pointed out, it's a shame that the Beavis & Butthead crew lowest common denominator rules. I guess the idiot population finally passed the 50%/critical-mass mark...
I feel kind of bad for kids with a Beaver College diploma -- but I still bought a hat when I visited campus 'cause it says Beaver across the front.
If memory serves, there is a female dorm at dennison college in Ohio that is named "Beaver Hall". The jokes about it were few, but appropriate.
I don't see what the problem is. I'm from northern Minnesota (not too far from Fertile, MN) and one of the more appealing colleges in the area is Moorhead State University. Moorhead, MN, is across the river from Fargo, ND, for those of you who aren't aware of this.
The funny thing about this is that if you want to drive from Fertile to Moorhead, you go through Climax, MN.
There's even an urban legend about a woman who got into a car accident and died in Climax on her way down. (pardon the pun) Allegedly, the headline was, "Fertile woman dies in Climax on her way to Moorhead."
If you don't want to go to college in Moorhead, you can always go to BSU (Bemidji State U.), home of the Beavers.
So I don't see what the big deal is about...so waht if it gets a few snickers? It's not the end of the world.
-Vel
--
The shareholder is always right.
Does this mean that 'School of Hard Knockers' on the Simpsons is going to change its name as well?
(O.k. so I realize it was the name of a film and not actually the name of the school, but you get the idea.)
'This bra bomb better work Nerdlinger!'
-----
"Defenestration" is to throw out of a window; what's a word for throwing 'Windows' out of something?
Dudes, keep the name. It seems like every words and names can be used in a dirty way. Like baskets, balls, banana, etc.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Sorry, but you are wrong on that one. These spell checkers are on Viagra.
Of course, I'm sure 'checker' has a sexual connotation that neither of us has heard of...
--Jeff
Actually, it's the *new* Beaver 103, even though they changed thier name a few years ago. And, really, what more can you expect from a crappy radio station around here? I just wish 90.7 had a clearer reception in Bellefonte, where I live (and, I should note, where *Governor* Beaver was from), and that they didn't play so much (c)rap.
Okay gentlegeeks, and geekchix... Shall we run around Jericho or the end run around of making Canaanites evil enough to piss of the Israelites?
Politics... ugh!
The message on the other side of this sig is false.
You are one or more of the following: Overly cynical; saving face; not as smart as you think. But you are definately wrong.
However, these allegations are all ad hominum, so have a look at the extrapersonal facts:
1. The title of the story ("Web-Censors Prompt College To Consider Name Change") did not mention the name of the college, only the information relevent to a story about censorship in general. It's the title that does the eye-catching, not the synopsis underneath. If you were surfing for stories about sex, you wouldn't have read this one.
2. No other slashdot article on the main page, or even under "older stuff," has anything to do with sex, or anything else along those lines, suggesting the conclusion that slashdot isn't interested in selling out as the Jerry Springer show has. Only one article thus listed under "older stuff" isn't really news for nerds; the review of "Scream 3." Remember, though, that this is the work of Jon Katz, who thinks only somewhat clearly, and not at all completely, about what he writes.
3. Slashdot has such a huge amount of readership that a _slang term_ ("slashdot effect") has developed to describe the overloading flow of slashdot readership to _other_ websites. With this many hits, slashdot could easily double your salary with just 1 more banner ad. There is still only one banner ad to justify slashdot's existance.
Just because the Jerry Springer show exists doesn't mean everything else in all forms of media is equally corrupt, and nobody is a "starry-eyed youngster" for thinking so. I hope you'll think about who you flame in the future - the number one thing Jerry's show gets bashed for is its lack of respect for anything.
PUBLIC SPLIT ON WHETHER BUSH IS A DIVIDER -CNN scrolling banner, 10/15/2004
Upon seeing the box was too small, Schrodinger's Elephant breathed a sigh of relief.
Doncaster Metropolitan Institute of Higher Enducation was shortened by several of the lecturers to 'Dummy', the students being affectionatly referred to as 'Dummies'. They changed the name recently to Doncaster College. I think that was to do more with the embarasment of some tutors not knowing how to spell the former name.
threadeds blog
Why would someone applying to Beaver College be forced to use net nanny at all. They are most likely between the ages of 17-19 which to me is old enough to decide what they do and do not want to see on their own. And if they aren't god only knows how they managed to function through high school, let alone how they expect to go through college.
-- This post contains %100 recycled electrons Remove spam and eggs to send some mail.
Let's promote thsi kind of software! Once 50% of the web is blocked by these filters (most of it wrongly), not using a filter will be a "big feature"!
Opus: the Swiss army knife of audio codec
Focusing on the point about this site being blocked by Net Nanny et al.
.EDU server (or derivatives thereof) because you have to be a legitamite educational institution to register under that TLD.
Is it too much to ask the content filtering software to pass thru anything from a
If we can't trust educational institutions to not host porn or bomb making HOW-TOs, then who can we trust?
later
marty
PS. of course this assumption falls over once you start thinking of what might be on a page at students.institution.edu... doh!
"I can't buy want I want because it's free. Can't be what they want because I'm me." -Corduroy, Pearl Jam
Normal, IL. It is just too funny to go through there and see the cop cars that say NORMAL POLICE riding around town.
Arizona's got Wet Beaver Creek... now tell me that wasn't a joke.
I don't think it was - a comedy chat show host heard about that over here in the UK, and phoned up their tourist office, dropping all sorts of lines like
"So what time of year is your Wet Beaver Creek open then?"
And the woman on the end of the phone didn't see the joke at all - even with an entire audience in fits of laughter on the other end of the phone.
It has been mentioned in Finnish media that some Americans (don't remember for sure what kind of authority it was) had suggested that Helsinki, the Finnish capitol, should change it name. You know - Helsinki, sinkin' in Hell. Not to mention that the city's Internet domain name is hel.fi.
But there are certainly some quite hilarious town names in US too and hey, if it's not funny in English, it's probably either really vulgar or just silly in some other language...
-- Mikko Saari (msaari@cc.jyu.fi)
According to the article, it's not that they're afraid of people making fun of the name of their school so much as their dropping admissions.
In addition, the college's market research shows that the school appeals to 30 percent fewer prospective students solely because of the name.
That's a huge percentage. I remember when I was getting literature for schools, that was one of the school's that contacted me, and I blew them off because the name sounded small time and silly. Not having a very good Computer Science department didn't help them either, but my initial reaction was to the name.
It's one thing to be idealistic and say "what's in a name?", but the hard truth of the matter is that people are prejudiced, and base many of their behaviors on first impressions. For a business (that's all a college really is), the name is the first thing that people see, and if it's something that turns them off, well, you can see the results.
"May the Code bless you and keep you until the day of your Compiling." ~Requiem
If someone introduced themselves as Aimee Drumheller, I wouldnt care which university they went to. I would already be shitting my pants laughing.
Simon
The real linux_penguin has Slashdot ID 101961. Anyone else is an impostor. Including Bruce Perens.
"Do Bwah" is the French pronounciation
2 years and no mod points. Join reddit. Because openness is good.
The story may be true but do we really need stories designed to induce the majority of replies to try and make 'beaver' jokes. I can't imagine what this comment thread will look like by tomorrow.
Brace yourself for the slashdot locker room chatter.
no sig.
It's a fine line between clever and stupid.
There's also a town called near there called "Colon". It's pronounced "coe-lun", too.
And another called "Factoryville".
Who WOULDN'T like to be from Factoryville?!
i don't think they should change the name, because it suits them well... if Snead O'Conner went there, would should be considered a shaved beaver?? shaved beavers are coo....
I don't know how accurate it is, but local myth is that Camosun College (a local 2-year college) changed their name from College of Juan de Fuca at the last moment when the "Fuca U" T-shirts started appearing.
Does anybody know how these filtering tools deals with internationalization issues? Now that would be a humongous task. They'd need to deal with terms related to ant obejctionable material in ALL the world's languages and in many cases including tons of slang names. Just one more argument why all the web filtering business is just nonsense.
Don't forget that MS did NOT invent symbolic links, if you want to get an analogy with the Unix world, they should have used "hard links". Or "on the fly hard links"
<grub> Reading
And then you can come hang out in southwestern Wisconsin at the Bong Recreation Area.
The following error was encountered:
take a triptonica to subthunk
There's a city in michigan near Kalamazoo called "climax". We'd always make jokes about it while driving by.
Gotta wonder...
If you can't figure out how to mail me, don't.
For linux tips: http://www.linuxtipsblog.com
This is just another example of web censors failing at their job.
Its ridiculous for a college to have to change their name soley because some poorly written software decides to block all access information about the university.
Besides Beaver College must be making significant cash off their name. I've seen shirts and hats in stores all around my college's Campustown for "Beaver College" and I'm nowhere near where the college really is.
the web page says it's coed -- i'm thinking of going to beaver college so i can study abroad.
Treatment, not tyranny. End the drug war and free our American POWs.
See my user info for links.
Hmmm... Isn't Canada's national animal is the beaver? It's on the nickels, too.
I just don't like the idea that if they change their name because of it, it's almost like giving up on the word "beaver" to mean anything other than the negative things mentioned here.
Well done.
I think you have succesfully demonstrated why they changed the name.
In Cockney rhymng slang, theres a large selection of place names e.g Barnet -> Barnet Fair -> Hair, and Charing Cross -> Horse
All you need is some rude ones that you can associate with Harvard and Yale. Its about time the US developed its own cockney dialect anyway.
Sorry, there's no such thing as 'soccer', old boy.
Do you mean the Association rules for Football?
:)
"I Know You Are But What Am I?"
Adult Site
ENTER HERE
That's all.
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We have fought the AC's, and they have won.
- - - -
Hmmmm.... Does this remind anyone of newspeak from 1984? The limiting of public names to support censorship? In newspeak, there was no word for democracy, so no one could try and form one. Revolution could not be described, so one could not attempt one. Though this is definatly not as severe as 1984, it's a start. Hear no evil...See no evil...Speak no evil...Think no evil
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What exactly are the commercial possiblilities of Ovine Aviation?
Not much since it seems they're going to go through the expense of upgrading from College 1.1 to University 2.0 anyway. All of the costs you mention will be necessary for that change. I remember when Wichita State University changed their name to 'The' Wichita State University - perhaps to differentiate their facility from all of the knock-off Wichita State Universities abounding. Big bucks were spent just to add the 'The' (Oh, and the extra space that followed it).
carlos
--
As a matter of fact, I am a lawyer. But I play an actor on TV.
I think it's really wonderful that people are worried about these girls feelings. I mean... name calling is perhaps the greatest danger to our children today, and we need to do everything we can to protect our college students from this... Seriously though, can you imagine how much money and manhours it will cost to change the name of a college? They have to change all official documentation, all the pamphlets and fliars and comercials, all the signs and banners. They will have to buy and design new uniforms for all athletics and everything else that contains the Beaver logo. It will cost an insane amount of money to keep these poor poor girls from getting made fun of. Where they gonna get the money? What programs are they going to have to cut? Are they going to be unable to give out scholarships? The entire thing is a farce. I hope someone else has thought of this, because it'd be an incredible waste. Sheesh.
"All of it lost, like tears... in rain."
You're forgeting that the local radio station somewhat recently changed its name from "Bee 103" to "Beaver 103". And the mascot's name is "Bucky".
There's a town named Dubois (pronounced "Do Boys") and yes, there is a gay joke associated with it. Realistically, the name is French for "of the woods", but of course, having the word "wood" may associate it with more immature jokes.
Courses: Bonking 101 (How to hit rodents with a small mallet) Shirt Lifting 101 (Ironing made easy) Beaver Mangling 101 (Genetic Mutations) Campus Societies Ham Shank Club (Pork and other meat dishes) Pearl Necklace Soc. (Gems & Precious Metals) Fags R us (cigarrette and pipe smoking)
No sharp objects, I'm a programmer!
I do remember the advice in Steal This Book after the explanation of how to roll a joint:
Don't use needle drugs. The only dope worth shooting is Nixon.
The bus came by and I got on
That's when it all began
There was cowboy Neal
At the wheel
Of a bus to never-ever land
I'd rather be lucky than good.
They have a Lewinsky as their Financial Aid Director and a Boblitt (close enough) as their Enrollment Management Counselor. The place is rife with potential jokes...wonder if they will have to lay them off after the name change... --
Not only that but it's our national animal too!
Yea! for Canada. We like our beavers!
...Beaver is an excellent school. My wife spent some time there on a volleyball scholarship and speaks very highly of the quality of education she recieved while studying there. It was also perhaps the most challenging school, but she felt it prepared her for the work force.
Now she is in her final semester at University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and thinks its a horrible waste of time. There is very little hands-on work, the class sizes number in the hundreds, the professors are ill qualified to teach anyone, and most importantly she does not feel prepared to do any sort of valuable work with what she's studied thus far at UNC.
I admit, I've always had a great time giving her a good natured ribbing about the name of the last school she went to. Every time she said "Beaver", I snickered just to give her a hard time. Yes, I also asked her to bring me home a Beaver tee shirt but she never did.
All of this isn't too odd though coming from Pennsylvania. Not far from there in Lancaster County there are such towns as Intercourse, Blue Ball, Bird-In-Hand, etc.
Screw Micro$oft.
I propose that names be submited for here for inclusion and consideration in a /. poll. The winning name or names to be submitted to Beaver U. I'll start off with some suggestions. A change that has a rather sedate image and still is rodent is 'Woodchuck.' If they want a name that has high marketability especially with sports teams, I recomend 'Rabid Bat,' or perhaps 'Rabid Racoon' if they want to stick with rodents. :-)
"Open code, in other words, can be a check on state power." -Lawrence Lessig
you would have noticed that Beaver has admitted men since 1973.
Sounds like a pr0n movie series waiting to happen...
"Rod Johnson's Freshman Year at Beaver College"
Follow the adventures of freshman Rod Johnson as he goes to class and gets some ass at Beaver College. In our first episode, Rod learns about anatomy from everyone's favorite biology professor, Dr. Busty Lusty. Later, physical education takes on a whole new meaning when poor Rod stumbles into topless girls sorority party.
Rated 'H' for 'Hemos loves to masturbate'
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I am the Lord.
God Hates Moderators.
The software must also have fun with anything related to the (English) counties of East SusSEX, West SusSEX, EsSEX. Could filtering in english libraries lead to the library's own site being blocked, from itself?
Last time I went there I didn't see any beavers though... whatta waste of a name.
" STUDY aBROAD AT BEAVER COLLEGE... A chance to see more than our 'Back Yard'..."
The summary says "formerly all-girls college."
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but the Philadelphia Inquirer is the major Philadelphia newspaper. It's real. It does *NOT* have articles regarding the end of the world, elvis, or how to lose 30 pounds in 30 minutes.
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First, why is Slashdot linking to the Inquirer? I know it's gotten bad here, but... Oh well, there's always the Weekly World News, right?
Second, what web filter would look for "Beaver" as a word to block? What about all the legitimate "Beaver" sites out there about little furry creatures who like to "get wood" and chew on it?
Feel free to change the name of your college; it's a dumb name. However, think about your reasons.
What could be stupider than letting a word-matching computer with the brains of a spell-checker on prozac decide what content you allow yourself and others to see?
That's about as smart as reading all your text files with 'grep -v [blahblahblah]'!
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pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Those are the kinds of wackos that will be deciding what kids get to see on the net?! Methinks we're quite screwed if this stuff becomes too widespread.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
My personal favorite (especially since I have gone around it many times) is Detour, MD
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"L'IT c'est moi!"
Maybe is people were willing to do more research than just look at the fancy graphics in choosing a college, this would not be such a severe problem.
Except, of course, that the research probably won't even include Beaver College as a possibility unless you have the Web. I'm willing to bet that 99.9% of Californians don't know anything about Beaver College (except maybe the name) and also don't know any alumni from the school. So how would one determine if one even wanted to bother to call up the college to send some literature?
What the Web does is put all those thousands of college brouchures on the web, which makes starting with a larger pool of possibilities easier. Otherwise, you're stuck investigating a handful of schools with national reputations and a handful of schools geographically close enough for you to have heard of them, instead of finding the small college on the other side of the country that fits your needs perfectly.
Steven E. Ehrbar
is that with talk about sexual matters still taboo in many places, people have always resorted to 'double talk', suggestive language and innuendo, speaking 'martian' etc - you catch my drift? I heard That! Often it's not what you say but how you say it. So even the phrase 'hard disk' can have an obscene meaning if it's used with a wink and a nudge, say no more, say no more. All filters can do, at best, even with a huge ammount of sociological research going on every day to keep up with latest language trends in the singles and bar scene, etc. is just block trendy words that have taken on another subtle meaning to those 'in the know', and damn those who are stuck with a domain name in the older sense of the word. I might have a very happy web site for children who have a 'gay' old time like the Flintstones, and then suddenly I'm being blocked because some censorware has decided that ANYTHING with that term in it is inappropriate and offensive, and there goes my click-thru rate and ad revenue.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
dude, "pair" of beavers?
;)
Mebbe you guys down think that beaver means
something different than what Canadians mean. We
do have alot of beaver here so we knows what we
talks about.
(note the plural is the same as the singular. *AHEM*)
Math.
I would hope that they keep the name and not cave in to the drooling segment of society that considers "Beavis & Butthead" to be high art.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
Perhaps we can use a situation like this to eventually get sites filtered.
Just start using common web names in derogatory ways.
"First he told me to lick his msn hole and then he unzipped his fly and started waving his amazon around. Next thing you know he'll be trying to have sex with mpaa's."
Hey, it's a thought...
Educational sig-line: Choose rhymes with lose. Chose rhymes with goes. Loose rhymes with goose.
Edu. sig-line: Choose rhymes with lose. Chose rhymes with goes. Loose rhymes with goose.
Comparing? THEN use THAN.
"The problem is, they're changing their name to the College of Bearded Clams."
My favorite? Jersey Shore, right there in the middle of the state....
Then again, they DO have a point -- Beaver all girls school is just too easy a joke. I don't think I could say it with a straight face.
_________________
rooooar
I grew up attending Hempfield Area Senior High School, although interestingly, kids never seemed to make fun of that name.
Sorry, but it seems silly to rename a school simply because people might make fun of it. Can you imagine everyone named Dick or Randy deciding to have their names changed? If all the Dicks in the world can live with it, then I think a college can certainly live with it.
I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar.
People who don't make an effort at choosing a college generally go to one they've already heard of, usually a nearby school (of all the graduates from a given HS that attend college, it's not unusual for 90% of those attend the same college (or one of 2-3 colleges)) .
However, if I were shopping for a college, I would give their website a thorough look, since you can see a lot of really great stuff: course materials, office hours, reading lists, etc.
And I would be very leary of a school that appered to have no web page (but for a CS school that would be pretty sad).
But I doubt that there are many good schools that can't find enough qualified students each year. They just like to have lots of applications because:
1) With more apps to choose from, they might get 'better' students.
2) One common measure of a schools worth (I said common, not fair or accurate) is how many applicatins they get per open slot.
3) They get 30-50 bucks per undergad application , 50-100 for grad and up to 200 per app for med school! KA-CHING!
- bridgette
A couple of years ago many filters blocked pages with reference to the town of Scunthorpe (due to substring at index 1-4). I don't know why the software couldn't check for spaces around the blocked words, but Scunthorpe council got quite annoyed. They complained to one of the firms producing the software and the reply was that they ought to change the name of the town to Sconthorpe. Caused quite a stir...
I found it hard to believe at the time that a site would be banned simply for having the letters s-e-x WITHIN a word. But these days, nothing surprises me when it comes to these filters.
I told them that these things have really stupid rules for determing which sites to block and the only thing they really could do is change the name of their college since attempting to find every version of filter software out there and getting their site unblocked would be time consuming and probably futile.
Sigh...
Needless to say, during the conversion, there was much ado made of the change.
Such stupid behavior for an alleged institute of higher learning....
www.eFax.com are spammers
Since potential students can't reach their website, what would keep them from filing a civil law suit against the censoring companies?
I go to Penn State, and I live in Beaver Hall, which isn't that far from Beaver Stadium, and East Beaver Avenue. Everyone makes fun of me when I tell them I live in Beaver Hall, oh well, I don't care (and I am not kidding either)....
I don't really see a particularily good point in changing the name. I don't think they should accomodate some crappy censoring program, it should be the other way around, that is what is wrong with censorware.
Ben
Must be some Amercian Colloquialism.
What?
I'm British, and have never been to the US, and beaver has been acceptable slang for female genitalia for as long as I can remember.
The problem with names is that any name, no matter how well intentioned, will be made fun of, eventually. Especially if people want to.
Ever been in a group of people where someone decides that it is fun to find and make fun of the sexual connotation in whatever anyone else says? Ever notice how s/he is able to do this with virtually every sententence? It will always be true.
Even if, at the extreme, a mascot or team was replaced with something so arbitrary as a number, people would find ways to make fun of it. 69, anyone?
My point is that unless the name or mascot is offensive and dated, like the Cleveland Indians Chief Wahoo, it should not be changed, as whatever new thing that is created will be at least as easy, if not easier than what was there before. And some filters block the term "beaver"? It makes the blocking of "soccer" seem almost... not completely insane?
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Not what you think, though.
EAGER BEAVER COMPUTERS
SERVING SPOKANE SINCE 1989 Hee hee.--
We have fought the AC's, and they have won.
I think the school ought to sue the software companies whose software filters them out. :-)
"Open code, in other words, can be a check on state power." -Lawrence Lessig
Everyone's friend Jon Katz notwithstanding, maybe this is a sign that the Internet is not always a liberating force. I suspect that the name calling hasn't changed much in a long time, but the _neccessity_ of a high-visibility web site in the college admissions business is certainly a recent development. Maybe is people were willing to do more research than just look at the fancy graphics in choosing a college, this would not be such a severe problem. (Maybe that's a little harsh)
Aside from that, blocking an entire domain that is obviously legitamate is just so ludicrous that it suggests that the people writing this software simply have no intelligence, in addition to not having a clue. Unbelieveable. (shakes head)
Sam TH
Sam TH
AbiWord Developer
The article itself mentions the problems with filtering software, but that is not the main focus - I mean after all, how many people are really not going to see the college web page because of filtering software?
It does mention numerous non-internet related problems - a 30% less appealing rate to prospective students not because of blocking, but simply because people would be embarassed to say they were going to school there. Even worse (and also part of the problem) - graduates from the school are deciding to not include the name of thier college due to fear of rejection by employers.
They are voting to decide if they want to change the name, so at least the students have a say - perhaps they could change it to "Dam Mammal". I know I wouldn't mind saying I had graduated from "Dam Mammal". If you pronounce it with a French accent it sounds quite distinguished!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
whoa! Nice pair of universities!
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
The actual Inquirer web site is here, and the actual article is here.
-ac
NPR did an interview with one of the "Media Representatives" from Beaver College today, and the sexual connotations of beaver was one of only three reasons that beaver was problematic. The web filtering part is just not that big of a deal; they are more concerned that people associate "beaver" with weak or silly. (One poll they did found that 30 percent of applicants wouldn't even apply because they didn't like or respect the name) Not everything everywhere happens because of the 'Net.
Beaver College
Ball State University (Ball U, BSU for short)
Morehead University (yes please)
The word 'beaver' too often elicits ridicule in the form of derogatory remarks pertaining to the rodent, the TV show Leave It to Beaver and the vulgar reference to the female anatomy," Beaver president Bette E. Landman lamented in a letter sent Feb. 15 to alumni, parents, staff and students.
They have caved in and picked a new name, I guess selling the old domain was worth a lot more than the cost of changing the letterhead. So for school year 2001, it will be officially know as U of Pussy. From rodent to feline. Wow.
Keep the name and put up 20-50 web cams all over campus (and dorms of course). With the ca$h they'll make tuition could be free!
Pennsylvania is known for all it's silly and slightly odd town names. I mean while you're visiting Beaver College drive through Amish country and go to Intercourse, if you run out of gas before you get there, you'll end up in Blue Ball. Oh, and if you're worried about anti-drug web censorship then don't mention that you're from Smoketown or Pottstown.
I hope my point is clear.
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So, next time you see a cute girl walk by, be sure to say to your friends, "I'd like to see the Harvard on that!"
I could not justify my existence if I were a turkey farmer. Would I terminate myself? Undoubtably, yes.
First of, there is nothing new in censorware malfunctioning like this. There is nothing new that censorware block sites they shouldn't. Take a look at peacefire.org for lots of examples.
.. and so forth.
.. I *am* my abuse department. When I answered to their complaint that they were being childish, and that they should stop sending *fake* abuse-messages (complaining about SPAM? When I send them opinions and feedback?). The freaking head of solidoak answered that they had sent the case to the "FPI" for investigation (I have a feeling that the nutcase have some problems with writing "fbi" or something ;)
beaver.com should pursue every maker of censorware that blocks their pages. They block legitimate pages, legitimate universities
Furthermore, I read that the inquerier article "promoted" cybersitter from solid oak software. Well, take a look at the aforementioned peacefire site. Solid Oak software don't want criticism. They block every page that critizises their software. Like www.spectacle.org which has delivered quite a lot of criticism.
Not to mention. I wrote to solid oak once, and told them my opinion about them blocking peacefire, and that I would NOT buy any form of product from them, as long as they had that kind of attitude. You know what the jerks did? Heck, they mailed my abuse@department. The funny thing is
Ohwell. Enough ranting.
--
"Rune Kristian Viken" - arcade@kvine-nospam.sdal.com - arcade@efnet
"Rune Kristian Viken" - http://www.nwo.no - arca
Between this and the LophtCrack article, it is getting rediculous. Everytime there is a mention of something that could be connected to something the "hacker community" doesn't like, we get a yellow journalistic story.
Beaver College is considering changing it's name because alumni are being discredited and recruiting is hurt because of it. That is a SERIOUS problem for a institution of higher learning. The web filtering stuff was kinda a flippant icing on the cake, yet the story here would appear that it is a major part of the story.
The Lopht crack story involved someone charged with using it for committing computer crimes, and one of the minor charges was possession of burglary equipment. That is kinda like charging a double homicide defendent with 2 charges of murder, 2 charges of assault with a deadly weapon, and one charge of illegal possession. Clearly the murder and assault w/ a deadly weapon are the REAL charges, but the minor one is throw in.
Can the "editors" please READ the articles? If it is real, consider it, if it is yellow press by someone more concerned with getting a story line on slashdot than reporting really news, kill the story. This discredits slashdot, and is kinda silly, because a lot of the posts are people like me complaining.