The Interneeet!

For those of you who might not know me, I am quite an avid user of the internet- whether be it for entertainment of otherwise. And today, I wanted to write about it. Yes, the entire internet, and what I think about it.

I visit a lot of sites on the ‘web’ and have seen many a thing. Heck, for my A2 Media exam, I pretty much focused all of my research onto the internet as a whole. I have dove into the dark, the deep and the drastic sides of the internet out of pure interest, and have come out feeling, sometimes nauseous but otherwise feeling more intrigued of what the internet is capable off. It is a medium that is taken so lightly for what it does and does not receive enough praise for what it does and what it is capable of doing- and one that if it were to be shut down, daily life would crumble down. It is a necessity to our lives now- a digital brain we have constant access too.

Many people use it just for conventionally purposes, but myself and many others would consider the internet almost a second home to us- where we have built communities from the ground up, such as 4chan and Reddit. Heck, even on Facebook and Youtube there lies familiarity and recognition to others outside of the real world

Some not-so-hard-hitting-but-what-I-found-interesting news for you.

So, always being a public school boy, I am very familiar with the impromptu Ofsted inspections that sent shivers down my spine.  I always thought that they would shut down the school I was in, and contrary to popular belief, I was a student that actually didn’t mind the schools I was in. Now that I have moved on to the big wide world of Uni-life, when I was scrolling through BBC News I saw some Ofsted scandal, and thought it being a smaller story compared to the IS airstrikes and what-not, I wanted to have a look into it; for old times sake.

So through reading the article, it describes how, for whatever reasons Academies in the eastern area had started to receive tip-offs to when a surprise inspection was coming their way. It goes on to describe the course of events and Ofsted, as any well known industry would after being put under fire, trying to cover their butts for however it happened. Well, that is my view anyway, as we all know BBC keep their opinions to their selves. Also, I found it interesting how in any article (using this one as an example) whenever a company that deals with public interactions (such as a school or a supermarket chain) is interviewed to comment on events, they always seem to put their tagline, or goal as their final statement. I know why they do this, but I feel like it’s very, well petty– they have already talked about how they’re not in the wrong, now they just try to shove their amazing and awesome values down our throat. It’s almost as they’re trying too hard to defend themselves. And in this case, there is very little evidence shown to support the claims of inspection dates being leaked- so the fact the school (who use the tagline in this case) put so much effort to defending themselves, in my eye, casts a shadow of suspicion over themselves.

At this point, I kind of wanted to know more. I remember back in Secondary school, we would get told in the morning that a surprise inspection was to take place today, and I swear it was so silent, you could hear the faint noise of everyone swallowing their tongues as we all realised we were to be under pressure from the moment we stepped out of our form room to the moment we stepped on the bus. Now, hearing this slightly angers me. It is unfair that a school could prepare prior to the inspection and eliminate all that pressure as the students could essentially be directed how to act on the day, and the whole surprise element is thrown out of the window. So, I went to look and see if any other news outlets had any more information on the allegations. I skimmed through the Guardians reports on the events, to see much more detail. It was actually a bit surprising, as I know The Guardian are known for high detail, but there was so much information that they included that if the BBC had included, it could actually be made clear that there was evidence for the reports, but for some reason BBC left it out.

In their report, it actually depicts Ofsted a backed in a corner with very little to say or comment, as many accounts of dates being leaked to many different schools was shown. Further, it shows how and why it would be possible for the leaks to take place, actually giving logic an reason behind the reports and the leaks. For example, many of the school had close links to high up ministers who had access to this information in which they could of received the information from. Another was that the inspectors themselves were leaking to schools about their inspections that were upcoming. Even worse, the article goes into more detail on how Ofsted and other linked companies have been screwing up and saying negative things. Some being the fact they only report the ‘middle rate’ student, and not the higher achieving or lower achieving student, or that they had passed on report results into DfE, who then released the reports to schools before the official publication date. It is clear that the Guardian leave nothing to guess-work, have a clear view and opinion on events, and seem to want to back it up as much information and evidence as possible. So it seems it’s a hard life for anyone who goes against The Guardian’s views or do anything that seems wrong- as they will investigate and go into much depth to catch you out. While extreme, I give props to them as if something does happen that is against the publics interest, it should be known why, and how it happened, rather than two sides throwing sticks at each other trying to prove their innocence, and no result really coming from it (AKA, BBC’s coverage of this story.)

So yeah. After looking into it, I did find it interesting to see the difference of reports on a smaller scale story, that is still very relatable.

This was a more newsy time post for you. I will be…hopefully…posting another life update post later today.

I will probably want to sleep, but you know what that they say…

The show must go on.

Yes, that’s right. With a K…

So, this is it. The start of the rest of my life. I try and not use so clique lines, but in this sense, it’s probably the best way to describe my situation. After six weeks of doing near to nothing but stressing out and playing video games (which is a legitimate pass time, by the way) I finally can start to do more exciting things like…sit at a PC and write a blog? Wait…and sign up for Twitter? Oh…ok then.

While I make it sound like a bad thing, I’m actually enjoying writing this right now. It’s like a personal diary to share to the world. Or at least whoever I let found out about it anyway. The Twitter thing, well, I could be happier as I have never been the one for ‘tweeting’ but I am willing to adapt and change, besides, I have decided to launch an evil plot to became king of Twitter and rule over all the birds at my nest!

Get it? King…oh nevermind.

Bird puns, you have to love them.

Anyway, enough of me ranting about birds and blogs, let me tell you of my first two days in the wonderful city- or is it town…? Anyway; my first two days in Southampton. Upon eventually arriving, after the multiple times of getting lost, I was fortunate to bump into two of my lovely roommates right of the bat. Two seemingly lovely girls, who seemed nice enough. However, you have to be cautious of these things, they could be the devils incarnate…I’m sure they’re fine…right?

After unpacking, a very nervous and forgetful me gently reminded my dearest parents that they would need to, as they say, splash the cash, as I had left my TV at home, like a genius. I would of been okay about this, but unfortunately, TV = monitor for PC. PC = ability to type things. Finally, ability to type = this blog. So yeah, one ASDA and a interesting slushy stand later, I’m alone, in my room thinking about the day to follow. Weirdly enough, I didn’t really feel too upset, more just excited for the days, weeks and even years to come. Then I got a first taste for that the following day.

Now to make the following events seem as hard as they were for me when they occurred, I shall tell you in a manner of such drama, it will leave you in awe:

He, the lowly student, lay his gentle head upon his pile of clouds and nestled into a deep sleep. He dreamt dreams of day’s past, present and even future, luring him further asleep. But then, a loud noise erupted, smacking the peaceful student right in the ears, jutting him awake. In a manic frenzy, the brave student valiantly sat up, swung in a mad circle- trying to eliminate the danger that was present with him. Realising his foe was jittering beside him, singing its battle cry, the student stood, and pulled back…

Uh oh…

It was done…the foul beast slain. Now the brave adventurer could flee, and get ready to fight another day.

So, here I am. The blog, birds and the beast slain. Ready for day two of…

MY LIFE AT UNI.

Sounds epic right?