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Reminds me of the time my university made headlines!...for attempting to regulate wifi. https://m.slashdot.org/story/49515 https://m.slashdot.org/story/49515

by NBJack 2y ago

dylan604 2y ago
Trying to decide if having a slashdot link as a reference implies anything about your age or if I'm just a jaded old fart
- NBJack 2y ago
  Jaded old farts unite?
rincebrain 2y ago
My former institution tried that for a few years - nobody actually obeyed it, but at the time I went there, they still made you pay a separate registration fee on arrival each year for internet access in the dorms, so they didn't put in wireless APs there when they covered the campus, and IIRC they tried to use Cisco's "kill nearby APs that aren't ours" setting before the FCC pointed out that would get them shoved in a locker. Nobody actually got punished, that I recall, for bringing a wireless router, but that was the nominal policy for a number of years before someone successfully got it into the annual tuition rollup so it stopped being necessary. To my recollection from when I left the school years after that, though, there still wasn't campus wifi reliably accessible in the dorms. (Of course, half of them also didn't have reliable air conditioning in muggy humid summers and would blow breakers if you tried putting window units in, so...priorities.)
SpaceNugget 2y ago
I have seen the name pop up before, but I have never actually visited slashdot before. I think it was popular a bit before my time. This link made me heavily reconsider how much "worse" I thought internet discourse had gotten in the past 10 years. It looks like way back in 2004, it was still a bunch of people who didn't read the article before commenting arguing past each other to shout into the void the loudest. I guess that's a bit comforting and a bit sad.
- NBJack 2y ago
  Slashdot was the Hacker News of its day twenty years ago. Imperfect, sure, but a good source of tech news, discourse, and insight. The moderation was community driven and a privilege to participate in. It's also a sad shell of its former self. But, yeah, lots of people skipping straight to comment too.

Reminds me of the time my university made headlines!...for attempting to regulate wifi. https://m.slashdot.org/story/49515 https://m.slashdot.org/story/49515

by NBJack 2y ago

Reminds me of the time my university made headlines!...for attempting to regulate wifi. https://m.slashdot.org/story/49515 https://m.slashdot.org/story/49515

dylan604 2y ago

Trying to decide if having a slashdot link as a reference implies anything about your age or if I'm just a jaded old fart

NBJack 2y ago
Jaded old farts unite?

rincebrain 2y ago

My former institution tried that for a few years - nobody actually obeyed it, but at the time I went there, they still made you pay a separate registration fee on arrival each year for internet access in the dorms, so they didn't put in wireless APs there when they covered the campus, and IIRC they tried to use Cisco's "kill nearby APs that aren't ours" setting before the FCC pointed out that would get them shoved in a locker. Nobody actually got punished, that I recall, for bringing a wireless router, but that was the nominal policy for a number of years before someone successfully got it into the annual tuition rollup so it stopped being necessary. To my recollection from when I left the school years after that, though, there still wasn't campus wifi reliably accessible in the dorms. (Of course, half of them also didn't have reliable air conditioning in muggy humid summers and would blow breakers if you tried putting window units in, so...priorities.)

SpaceNugget 2y ago

I have seen the name pop up before, but I have never actually visited slashdot before. I think it was popular a bit before my time. This link made me heavily reconsider how much "worse" I thought internet discourse had gotten in the past 10 years. It looks like way back in 2004, it was still a bunch of people who didn't read the article before commenting arguing past each other to shout into the void the loudest. I guess that's a bit comforting and a bit sad.

NBJack 2y ago
Slashdot was the Hacker News of its day twenty years ago. Imperfect, sure, but a good source of tech news, discourse, and insight. The moderation was community driven and a privilege to participate in. It's also a sad shell of its former self. But, yeah, lots of people skipping straight to comment too.