Just when you thought college gossip sites like JuicyCampus had disappeared, more college students are posting salacious, unsubstantiated gossip about their peers on a similar Web site called CollegeACB. (The initials stand for Anonymous Confession Board.) Colleges are again pondering two questions: whether they should ban the site, and whether doing so is a freedom-of-speech violation.
Peter Frank, CollegeACB’s creator and a Wesleyan University student, told The Chronicle in an e-mail that the site got more than 10 million page views from 250,000 unique users so far in September. Viewership has shot up fivefold since JuicyCampus shut down 19 months ago, according to figures Mr. Frank gave to the Wesleyan student newspaper.
That kind of heavy student use was too much for Millsaps College.
Millsaps blocked access to the site a month ago after student leaders suggested a review of the site contents, said Brit Katz, vice president for student life and dean of students, in an e-mail to The Chronicle. Millsaps had also banned JuicyCampus.
Dawn Watkins, vice president for student affairs and dean of students at Washington and Lee University, said administrators there pulled the plug late last year after their numerous requests to Mr. Frank to remove most content mentioning the university were denied. Ms. Watkins said a number of reported cases of cyberbullying among first-year female students prompted those requests.
When asked whether restricting access to the site was a freedom-of-speech issue, Ms. Watkins and Mr. Katz both said their primary responsibilities were to prevent anonymous postings that name individuals.
The reaction has been different at Tulane University. The student paper reported that worries about limiting speech have kept a student resolution to block CollegeACB, passed during the last academic year, from being put into effect as of September 17.
At Tennessee State University, which had banned JuicyCampus, students can still log on to CollegeACB. “We do not search for these or similar sites, nor do we look to include or exclude them,” Michael Freeman, vice president for student affairs, said in an e-mail to The Chronicle. Mr. Freeman said that a situation that presented potential harm to students—he declined to give further details—prompted the block on JuicyCampus, but that he has yet notice similar issues with CampusACB.
5 Responses to To Ban or Not? Gossip Web Sites Still Pose Troubling Questions for Colleges
arrive2__net - September 27, 2010 at 10:42 pm
I think it is a tough adjustment for society to figure out how to handle these kinds of issue and paradoxes which are likely to be with us indefinitely into the future. Bernard SchusterArrive2.net
drjeff - September 28, 2010 at 11:27 am
It’s not a paradox at all, just a simple question of priorities.If you’re unwilling or unable to say whether free speech or limiting defamation, slander and bullying is more important, you might pretend something else is the issue.Like most computer-related problems (and legal issues), this one is only a “difficult” problem because of fuzzy thinking and unwillingness or inability to be straight about it.I’m not taking sides, because it’s not my call to make. But whoever’s job it IS to make that call should (1) make a decision, (2) explain why (s)he arrived at it, and (3) live with the inevitable criticism. That’s what they get paid for! You could even add a step: (0) listen to the opinions of any interested parties, though in this case it’s likely to produce more heat than light.I am thoroughly sick of reading about administrators getting huge salaries when they cannot (or do not) follow that simple 3-step process, instead inventing reasons why it’s better for them not to make a decision while their institution flounders.
girolamis - September 28, 2010 at 12:25 pm
This is not a freedom of speech issue. Where’s the network’s acceptable use policy when you need it? Seems pretty clear cut to me.
drjeff - September 28, 2010 at 4:39 pm
Chances are, the existing acceptable use policy doesn’t cover this explicitly enough that a network admin can say Yes or No, so it’s still a question of whether you want to amend the policy to cover this sort of thing. You just kicked the question up one notch, so to speak.A leader would amend the policy; most University presidents would probably not.
lostfox - October 4, 2010 at 4:49 pm
Determining whether educational adminstrators should limit student discussions because they are (1) offensive and (2) carried on using university networks seems very much to be a free speech issue. Although, reasonable decisions can be made either way, I am reminded of a great dialogue between those two modern philosophers, Bill Maher and Dennis Miller, talking about how college campuses are some of the most restricted places for speech. Neither plays campuses anymore bc of it.