Slashdot Mirror
Web Censorship on the University Campus?
Censored Prof asks: "I teach at a private university in San Antonio, TX. Besides some horrendous bandwidth issues, we have lately been subjected to Lightspeed and/or Websense blocking. This means that suddenly, university students are unable to see content that the rest of the (free) world sees; and more importantly are often blocked from very legitimate information crucial to their area of study. Papers like Village Voice are blocked. Anatomy sites are blocked. Electronic Art sites are blocked. Anything with ".mp3" is blocked. Our CIO has assured us that this is not uncommon and that there are good reasons to do this on a university campus. It strikes me as odd that students must leave campus to learn, and smacks of censorship in horrible ways. So my question: Is this unique to our university? Who else at what other universities are subject to similar web-content blocking? Are we alone, or part of a disturbing trend?"
There was a time when information was distributed with books. Students would read them and learn... Too much to ask?
Because I swear I could have read "China."
Never monkey with another monkey's monkey.
It's only censorship if 1) the students are prevented from leaving campus to search for information and 2) you as a teacher are prevented from bringing in outside material for your classes. Otherwise you and your students are free to do what we've been doing for hundereds of years: bringing in outside knowledge and incorporating it into our education.
I can't speak for every university, but the private university I attended never had a hard copy version of the Village Voice or other such material on campus (my college years were pre-internet). If I wanted such material, I had to go off-campus to get it. I knew where to find it, but I had to go off-campus.
The above-cited just seems like juvenile ranting from a teacher. Is the only way to learn to leave campus?
What humorless moderator moded this down?
Powered by caffeine and sugar; BSD