Prompt's TechBlog

According to the BBC, delegates at the Professional Association of Teachers' annual conference backed a motion calling for YouTube to be shut down. The reason is that the site has been used by students to communicate bullying messages and death threats against teachers.

Web forums can be used for communicating ideas and can sadly be abused by some to intimidate. Bad behaviour usually makes up a tiny minority of all activities. So web forums are basically a lot like schools. Given that they spend all day hanging around classrooms, I was surprised then that there was no mention of the Professional Association of Teachers voting to close down schools, then.

At first, I thought maybe the teachers' argument was ill-conceived. But then I read that Elton John is calling for the whole internet to be banned. Elton John said: "The internet has stopped people from going out and being with each other, creating stuff. Instead they sit at home and make their own records, which is sometimes OK but it doesn't bode well for long-term artistic vision. Hopefully the next movement in music will tear down the internet. I do think it would be an incredible experiment to shut down the whole internet for five years and see what sort of art is produced over that span."

Can't argue with that. Shall we switch it all off at half five then?