The internet in school

Oh dear.

The front page of today's EDP screams something about kiddies in Norfolk schools getting access to, well, dodgy content (I don't want this blog filtered by using the obvious words, so it will remain DC and we'll all understand what I mean).

Here's what it says in the lead paragraph:

Norfolk children have been exposed to... [Dodgy Content] ...while using school computers, with education chiefs admitting last night they have no “100pc safeguard”

Shock! Horror!

Well, that would be my interpretation of the lead. I'd be thinking "Oh noes, there is DC rife throughout the schools and the council isn't doing anything about it".

And I'd be wrong - and the EDP should, in my opinion, be ashamed of it's front page today.

You see, reading the article further turns up that:

• there are 180,000 school children in Norfolk schools
• there are 450 schools in Norfolk
• there were, over the last two years, 25 incidents of children accessing Dodgy Content

Hang on, let's think about that. 25 incidents? 25 in two years? By 180,000 children?

The EDP has it wrong. Norfolk County Council is clearly doing a splendid job at stopping it's school kids accessing DC. Let's face it - how many of those children do you think access the odd bit of DC at home? Or on their phones? Or hear the odd DC phrase (because that's included in those 25 incidents - not just images, but words as well).

But, oh no, the EDP assures us that

parents will be concerned by evidence that even schools are not 100pc reliable in protecting their children against [DC].

No! Parents should be applauding Norfolk County Council for restricting this to 25 incidents. And, to be honest, anyone who doesn't appreciate that hasn't got the faintest clue how the internet works, let alone how it's used by teenagers.

Yes, it's worrying that 18 of the 25 incidents were in primary schools. But overall I'm with this view:

With so many new sites constantly being created, no internet security system can provide a 100pc safeguard, but our systems our in place to spot and act upon inappropriate site and 25 instances in two years, given the 30,000 computers being used daily in schools, shows that in the large majority of cases the system works robustly

Exactly. Demonstrating, yet again, that journalists know little about schools and usually less about the interwebz...

How to misunderstand the interwebz...

Sometimes big companies puzzle me.

There's this internet thing, yeah? It works pretty well. Stuff is easily available - you go, click, read/listen/watch and then go someplace else. Fine.

Now, what happens when you run across a site that requires you to log on? If it's offering something unique or interesting then maybe you might bother to register and put up with their spam.

But what happens if you have to pay to get that content?

I dunno, maybe I'm just cheap, but I reckon that 99% of the time I go someplace else. Particularly if it's something, like the news, that I can get free just as easily and just as good.

So, maybe someone might want to explain that to Rupert Murdoch - obsessed as he seems to be with making money from the internet (other than the advertising space he can sell). Seems like access to all the Murdoch press (the Times, Sun etc...) will be restricted to those who are willing to pay for it.

Stupidity.

It's not as if news and comment isn't a plentiful resource on the interwbez, what with all those bloggers and so on who seem happy to comment on just about anything (cough). Or as if there aren't plenty of competitors out there who will give you the news for free - let me think, oh yeah, there's that BBC thing.

Here's the thing: the internet works best when it's free. Make your money from adverts or some sort of premium content (in the Murdoch press? - yeah, OK...), but if you don't let me in to get the basics then I am going somewhere else.