[UPDATE: Xoxo is working again from NDLS. See below. -1:50 PM]
The self-described “Most Prestigious College Admissions Discussion Board in the World,” Xoxohth.com a.k.a. AutoAdmit.com, has seemingly been blocked by Notre Dame. People off-campus report being able to access it, and it’s still accessible through Anonymouse [WARNING: Anonymouse may display NSFW ads!!], so clearly the site isn’t down. But when you try to access it directly from campus (well, from the law school, at least), you get a standard error message:
I personally feel a degree of contempt for Xoxohth that exceeds even my contempt for NDNation — the cretins who inhabit that message board are a bunch of dishonest, pretentious, snobby, racist a**holes who delight in anonymous character assassination and tearing down their fellow human beings — so I’m not exactly shedding any tears over this, if it’s true. But, as with the Billy Packer thing, I guess I should be outraged, free speech or whatever, blah blah blah. But seriously, Xoxohth sucks.
P.S. Xoxohth was recently in the news because, in the wake of the Virginia Tech tragedy, some idiot user posted a threat to Hastings Law School, as a “joke,” which led to the school being closed for a day last Wednesday. I have no idea if that’s related to the apparent ban here.
P.P.S. You can read more about Xoxohth, and the many controversies it has spawned, here. That post in turn contains links to various others.
UPDATE: Lisa, who tipped me off to this story, sends along a link to Notre Dame’s Responsible Use of Information Technologies Policy, which forbids, among other things, using computer resources for any “purpose which is illegal, immoral, unethical, dishonest, damaging to the reputation of the University, inconsistent with the mission of the University, or likely to subject the University to liability.” Specifically cited examples of such purposes include “harassment,” “libel or slander,” “posting or sending obscene, pornographic, sexually explicit, or offensive material,” and “posting or sending material that is contrary to the mission or values of the University.” Xoxohth routinely involves all of those things. No idea if that has anything to do with this, though.
UPDATE 2: According to a commenter on a Xoxohth thread linking to this post, “It’s not just ND. I emailed around. A friend in the northeast is having trouble, too.” Not sure what to make of that.
UPDATE 3: False alarm! Xoxohth is accessible again from the law school, as of 1:50 PM. Dunno what was wrong before, but I guess it wasn’t a ban (or if so, it was lifted very quickly).
Incidentally, I e-mailed OIT (the Office of Information Technology) at 12:48 PM and asked: “Has the website www.xoxohth.com (also known as www.autoadmit.com) been blocked by the university? It is inaccessible from the law school (and I assume from elsewhere on campus), but the site isn’t down, it can still be accessed from elsewhere and through sites like Anonymouse.” I haven’t heard back, and I have no idea whether my e-mail has anything to do with the site’s restoration, I’m just throwing it out there.
UPDATE 4: OIT wrote back and said they’re able to access the site. They seemed not to know anything about the problem. So who knows?
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Categories: Notre Dame, Law School
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April 26th, 2007 at 11:34:21 am
Wouldnt it be more fair to just ban the off topic mode if it’s that big of a deal? Honestly, XO is trash for the most part, but it does have some entertaining and informative threads. I also don’t value censorship at all, so I’m particularly annoyed by this.
April 26th, 2007 at 11:53:30 am
I agree with you in principle. I’m just not going to lose any sleep over this particular ban.
Yeah, yeah, I know. “First they came for Xoxohth, and I said nothing, because I don’t like Xoxohth. Then they came for BrendanLoy.com…”
April 26th, 2007 at 11:54:53 am
Seems like ND did this for one of two reasons. Either it wants to shelter the precious little (adult) students from content the school finds offensive, or the school is concerned that the students will see how poorly ND is regarded by other law students.
April 26th, 2007 at 11:55:56 am
I posted a link to this page on Xoxo: http://www.xoxohth.com/thread.php?thread_id=621125&mc=9&forum_id=2
For the ND folks who can’t read the thread, I’ll try to update my blog post here: http://xoxoreader.blogspot.com/2007/04/has-notre-dame-blocked-xoxohth.html
April 26th, 2007 at 12:01:34 pm
If ND is regarded poorly by the jerkoffs who post regularly on Xoxo, I consider that a badge of honor.
April 26th, 2007 at 12:06:43 pm
On the plus side, ND is probably still better than Loyola: http://xoxoreader.blogspot.com/2007/04/top-10-reasons-va-tech-loyola-law.html
April 26th, 2007 at 12:08:36 pm
Autoadmit is full of terrible people. I could care less.
April 26th, 2007 at 12:13:43 pm
Mr. Loy:
Allow me to clarify- ND is regarded poorly not just by “jerkoffs” on xo, as you so eloquently state, but by people everywhere. It’s a dumpy school in the midwest, and Chicago is the best you can hope for. Accept this, and maybe the chip on your shoulder will become easier to bear. Sure, you might impress some people who attend Urbana Champaign or whatever it’s called, but people at real law schools have always recognized ND for what it is.
April 26th, 2007 at 12:14:11 pm
Interesting. One of your classmates and commenters here was at one point one of XOXO’s most prolific (and grossest) posters.
April 26th, 2007 at 12:18:32 pm
Just a reminder, everyone:
Don’t feed the trolls.
There will doubtless be a bunch of them, now that Xoxo has linked to me. Don’t give them the time of day. They aren’t worth it, and will generally impeach themselves through their own statements. (I’m talking at least half to myself here…)
April 26th, 2007 at 12:36:39 pm
NDLS: Prefers Stormfront.org to Autoadmit.com
It’s a shameful, shameful day for all notre dame students, whether they are willing to recognize it or not
April 26th, 2007 at 12:52:30 pm
Brendan you should try using Shiira for a browser. 2.0 just came out this week and I am using it on my macbook and I love it so far.
April 26th, 2007 at 1:31:04 pm
Does ND block all the porn sites, too?
April 26th, 2007 at 1:37:34 pm
First, they came for the milk, and I said nothing because I like milk. Then, they came for the cookies and I said, “dude, that’s awesome” because I like milk and cookies. Then they—wait, what were we talking about?
I seriously hate that cliche, B.
April 26th, 2007 at 1:38:13 pm
I’m confused by this…I thought Notre Dame law students were adults. Why do they need the school to police what they can read on the internet? It seems incredibly paternalistic. I would think law students, who are adults and have been through college, would be capable of deciding for themselves what they will read. I wonder what other stupid and insulting policies Notre Dame has?
April 26th, 2007 at 3:33:05 pm
Yeah, ND blocks autoadmit but lets people access gay porn sites. Glad we had you on the case, Brendan, you cybersleuth, you.