Thursday, 3 February 2011

Gossip run wild

Sorry for the post-exam break, gave myself a holiday with my new found freedom from revision and blogging didn't come top of the list. I should be back to regular posts from here on though.

Anyway, I found this whilst flicking through BBC News today, and thought it was a bit stupid and reckless. It's basically a website where users can go on and anonymously post gossip about named individuals, where others can then search for their school/university and find all the gossip about their classmates. The potential for bullying and other negative consequences should be obvious to a baboon.


The idea that you can specifically search within your institution and have the gossip named is what tips this idea from simply being stupid to one that is actually harmful. And the fact that despite apparently making precautions against people under 18 using it (a title page asking if you're over 18) there are still schools on the list.

I'm aware that even by writing this I'm giving it undue publicity, but it stuns me that someone can be idiotic enough to consider this a good idea. And just to add pizzazz to the post I'll leave you with an appropriate quote from Eleanor Roosevelt which I really like:

"Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people."

With readers of the Daily Mail and the creators of this website clearly falling into the latter category.

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