Furious Styles said:
And in all honesty they probably should block them too, but its a delicate balancing act (you don't want a full scale revolt on your hands). I know first hand how much time can be eaten up by pointless areas of the internet such as, well, this website, and online gaming is the ultimate unnecessary luxury and time sink. They block it? Good, that's what they should do. Their internet is not there for your entertainment.
Except for when it is for your entertainment. Just because something is primarily for entertainment doesn't make it inherantly useless and doesn't mean it has to go.
Part of why my college accepted the use of Facebook was because they knew that the majority of students would find a proxy anyway (and as a result would not only risk getting viruses and other nasty things on the computers but would be more inclined to do this during lectures too) if they didn't and that it was a major part of what a lot of people our age did with computers and the internet.
Applying this to the notion of online gaming, while I understand it being prohibited during classes and lectures (for very obvious reasons) it does seem to be going somewhat over the top to prohibit it
at all times, especially given how unlike college, a large section of the student body actually have to live on campus at university, this does mean that they have to be given a few more outlets for things such as boredom (and seeing as gaming is a much more wide spread past-time now than it was about ten years ago it isn't too unreasonable to expect a fairly large chunk of the students to be avid gamers).
Not all students are media students, and your area of study is... somewhat unique. it requires video and music, and such things should be access under some sort of course materials thing (if you're at uni, you should know that most libraries have an area for such things). Besides, just because its done by teachers does not mean it should be done by students. Oh, and my uni took a very disapproving view of even youtube, iPlayer and 40D, let alone websites like Pirate Bay.
Trust me, our media library was pretty much non-existant (they put most of their funding into making the new Arts and Engineering block if I remember correctly) so we were pretty much dependant on the internet for sources of music and stock footage as well as other useful things (like research), rather than frowning upon sites like 4OD and Youtube we actually found them
essential (this even resulted in a large number of students starting a campus-wide petition to get rid of some of the stupidly strict blocks and monitoring that went on with the college's internet).
We were explicitly told that one of the major changes we would be seeing between high school and college was that seeing as we were now adults we would be treated as such (as well as being expected to be accountable for our own actions), as a result I'd say it isn't entirely unfair to say that viewing the teachers being given free reign over how to use the college's resources should translate as the students being given the same privelleges (that is just one facet of the 'rights vs. responsabilities' thing).
some people actually do that.... seriously. A guy on my course started playing fallout on his laptop during a lecture.
Like I said before, I understand people having an issue with behavior like that. In lectures you're there to learn and study. Outside of them and in your free time, however, you're supposed to be on your own volition (or are you trying to seriously imply that the college or university should have say over what you chose to do even when you're no longer on the clock?).
One, the bandwidth issues which are real btw. I've experienced it firsthand, when the internet slows to a snail's pace because everyone, myself included, is watching TV or gaming online. I've also been in the position where I've been on the internet, trying to work, when its been slowed to a similar pace by other people doing other things and its truly fucking irritating. and yes, drinking and whatnot is just as big of an issue, but its not one that unis can possibly control outside of actually violating some actual human rights, i.e. freedom of movement etc. This is just one more niggling distraction taken away.
My college had slow and terrible internet and that was mostly because they had a terrible internet provider and most of the computers they had probably dated back to the 90's. It was also extremely annoying when the overly strict security settings put in place by the IT guys actually kept a large number of students (myself included)
from actually being able to use the computers at all seeing as we couldn't even log on.
And this arguement doesn't even make sense when you stop to compare it to other issues, downloading music or playing it online eats up bandwidth (probably more so than gaming) and could be just as much of a distraction to others as playing games and movies (have you ever tried to focus on writing an essay with someone playing a ridiculously loud iPod next to you?) and yet most of us wouldn't think to ban the playing of music on campus (hell, a lot of places have groups and gatherings specificically for it).
I'm a law student, we did about consumer rights last year and I'm almost certain that the right to online gaming in university dorms is not a consumer right. If it is, it is superseded by the right of the university to have control over its internet.
I would have to dispute that while that is perfectly fine while classes are in session and lectures are being done this gets somewhat more murky an arguement when we start getting into the realms of telling people what they can and can't do in their own free time (something the university or college shouldn't really have any involvement in).
No, I meant join a club, audition for a play, go out with your friends to the pub and have a quiet pint, become active in a university society. This is a decent summary of my time at uni. yes, I did the things I mentioned too, but the point is that if you engage with university life you simply won't have the time for much online gaming. I had my xbox with me all year and xbox live, and internet that let me use it online, and I didn't go online at all from the middle of october until the end of the year. There is more than two things you can do at uni, it isn't just about either getting rendered or staying inside like a hermit. University is as much about growing as a person as it is about learning, and no one ever grew as a person by playing WoW and they certainly never learned anything useful either.
While those are all perfectly valid pursuits for a person to take I believe that it's being somewhat simplistic and narrow minded to say that a person choosing to play games online isn't a worthy use of one's time (I stand by the princaple of as long as you're content with what you do then
no-one has the right to try and tell you that you're wasting your time).
Not everyone is an outgoing or social person (something I noticed that all of your suggestions had in common is that they required this as a personality trait or are geared towards outgoing people) and psuhing others into being extroverted and social just because you think 'it's what people are supposed to do' will probably not only result in it failing miserably but also probably backfiring and making that 'quiet guy at the back of the lecture hall' resent you and everyone else all the more for pushing them into it (I should know because I
was that quiet guy at the back of the class and I did resent a lot of the attempts other people made to try and push me into being social, as you can guess this makes opinions and statements along these lines something of a sensitive and touchy issue for me).
You make a point of people needing to be able to grow as individuals in college and university (and this is true) but I wouldn't say that playing video games specifically gets in the way of that as much as any hobby or interest does (obviously it's a different story when it's taken to excess but that's true of everything).
) and the fact that that means you can't play at home on the internet connection (which is likely part of your rent) is annoying collateral. You might be able to adress this if there is enough people with a similar problem, I don't have alot of know how but I'm pretty sure there could be a way around it to get a different set of restrictions in your dorm.
