Dear Datuk Dr. Zainal,
I would truly support UTP Management to close down IRC and DC++ regardless what reasons given by the students.
I agree that UTP facilities are meant for academic, not for entertainment.
As far i m concern, the request of not to ban IRC shall not be entertained at all. This kind of request carries no value at all as the matter of fact, majority of the students use IRC for non academic purpose, and i admit that i m part of the majority.
I dont understand the reason behind why these students still want to fight for it as if they are paying for the facilities for entertaiment? Why dont they spend their time to struggle and get 4.0 every semester?
So what if the students get the IRC? would they still perform well and obtain 4.0 every semester? Definitely NO because entertainment are more enjoyable than study.
Let's put it in simple term... Who provide the internet facilities? Student or UTP Management? Obviously is UTP Management. So the UTP Management has the fullest authority to do anything, and there shall no be any questions about it. If the students do not like it or dissatisfied, please leave UTP and go create their own IRC in other campuses. I believe there are thousands of SPM leavers and DIploma students who are craving to enter UTP.
Lastly, i hope this issue should have a full stop because it has been carry over and over again. Nothing to be negotiate anymore. Students should understand their responsibility as a student. And that explains everything.
I am sorry for such informal feedback. Perhaps i feel very close to you due to your concern of us.
Dear Anonymous (whoever you are),
Obviously you, either have not been in UTPchat during its glory, have not known any of our graduated older seniors, have not seen what the importance of living as a community, living for others, not only for yourselves.
In any organizations, its the people who made up the organization. The leaders, or organization authority, only lead the way and make sure everything is in control, but its the people who make the organization strong. Without their students, a university will just a building with lecturers and management team.
UTP graduates, since years ago, is well known of their ability to mix with people, and good in both life and studies. But seeing the juniors, I have a feeling that, the identity will no longer be there in the future. Since, they sit in their room, study ,study, study, trying to get 4.0, to the point, a lot of them, forget one important thing - being a good citizen and a good community person who cares about others.
There are more in life than only 4.0CGPA. Your exam results, will only serve you to get your first job, just that. Your future jobs after that, its not your results that matters, its your contribution to your previous employer. But, lessons you learnt from being a good community person, you will bring it to your death. If you look around you, a lot of newer students in UTP nowadays, have lost this community value. They care more about themselves. The spirit of living in community is just not there in them. In the previous UTP era, UTPchat, and Grapevine, served as the environment where this community spirit was built upon.
About the term "entertainment" you mentioned above, for your information, I am not fighting to legalize those DirectConnect hubs. Being an OpenSource contributor made me very familiar with all these Digital Millennium Copyright Acts and related. I am not fighting so that we can share illegal stuff all around UTP, what I am fighting for is, a way for these long lived communication mediums to be revived in a way that is legal, and beneficial for students. I have no problem with disabling filesharing etc, provided that there are acceptable, logic reasons for it. We IRC Operators are ready to cooperate if requested correctly.
There are more in IRC and Forums than just "entertainment". It serves as an convenient environment for people to share ideas, share opinions, voice out problem, discuss for solutions, etc. You, obviously have not been in the industry/world of which IRC and Forums are being used for professional purposes. Professionals, does make use Forums and IRC as a way for them to communicate with other people, usually asking for support or for a simple teleconference. I know because this is how my company do things. And how a lot of others (usually OpenSource industry-related), take advantage of these technologies as a way for them to collaborate globally. I am fighting to build this type of community within UTP, this is what my primary motivation is.
Let's put it in simple term... Who provide the internet facilities? Student or UTP Management? Obviously is UTP Management. So the UTP Management has the fullest authority to do anything, and there shall no be any questions about it. If the students do not like it or dissatisfied, please leave UTP and go create their own IRC in other campuses. I believe there are thousands of SPM leavers and DIploma students who are craving to enter UTP.
UTP provide the facilities, and students who pay for it. Granted, majority of us are being under PETRONAS Convertible Loan Contract, but read that again, its a LOAN. We will need to pay that back later after we graduate. Either by money, or by working with PETRONAS (read: you are going to be a bounded-worker, not being able to have your Freedom, for 10 years). Frankly, if its not because the Convertible Loan Contract stated clearly that my location must be at UTP, I have been long gone from UTP, to some other university that worth that Loan money which I put that 10 years of my future Freedom at stake. Knowing people from other universities, and involving with them, made me noticed that, I have missed quite a number of real-life opportunities to improve my skills, simply because I am stuck at the hidden desert of Sri Iskandar. Furthermore, all these policies, while might benefit the Engineering students in some way (through, well, restricting them from being in ICT), is a discrimination against the ICT students. ICT world is unlike Engineering world where results matters more. ICT world, skills worth more than the results. Results only shows that you have learn this,this,that formally, but not the students skills. ICT talents can usually identified from what the students have done beforehand, what they can prove they worth. And these marketable skills, are not acquired through formal learning, but through experimenting and exploring around with technologies and involving with the communities which share the same interests of that technology. However, the environment in UTP, is not condusive for such activities. I know UTP have more Engineering students than ICT/BIS, but that does not mean, we, the minority, can be ignored from our opportunities.
SPM students craving for UTP?. Think about it, its because the way UTP market themselves to those students, not because they really know how is UTP . Oh yeah btw, I believe, quite a number of students who joins UTP, is not because they want to join UTP. But instead, because they get that Loan-which-masquerade-as-Scholarship, I am quite confident that quite a number of students who entered UTP, are those who applied for Oversea studies with PETRONAS but failed and get to UTP instead.
UTP popular marketing phrase is "Well-Rounded Students", students, who have balance balanced in all aspect of life - not only studies. From what I am seeing now in UTP, well, a bunch of people who have their "Study" bar high, but other bars (especially in ways of living as community), low, which does not make a Round, but some random shape instead.
Lastly, i hope this issue should have a full stop because it has been carry over and over again. Nothing to be negotiate anymore. Students should understand their responsibility as a student. And that explains everything.
And a human, should understand their responsibility toward other humans. A person in a community, should understand their responsibility toward the betterment of the community. These are some values, that a formal education will never teach their students. Students will learn this, through living and contributing to a community. IRC and Forums, are some examples of the medium to build a community.
I doubt this will be a full-stop anytime soon, but this is what I believe in - I will try my best to make UTP understand the technical/community advantage and importance of these two technologies. These technologies have benefited me in my current career, and my community - #linux of UTPchat. I believe it can benefit others too if it is implemented in a proper controlled manner.
I don't believe in stopping these technologies ever fix anything, it'll creates new problem instead - or worse, losing what they can benefit for it simply because we are ignorant and treat everything is bad. What important here, is to educate people, the proper way to use these technologies so that it won't be abused. "There are no such thing as a bad technology, technologies have no mind to think, its the users who make it good, or bad." So, instead of living in denial through blaming that technology is bad, this technology is bad, the user themselves who should be blamed because they are not being responsible for themselves and abuses the technologies to the extent it corrupts them.