TPJCian Magazine Appears On International Newspaper

We did a blog search today and were pleasantly shocked that we were mentioned in an international newspaper 'The Republic' for our cyber-bullying articles. Check it out here:















[Click image to enlarge]

Hundreds Of Bloggers Protest Outside Ping.sg Headquarters

Our local bloggers are getting impatient with the administrators of Ping.sg, a website which aggregates their blog posts. About two hundred of them congregated outside the Ping.sg headquarters, located in Kallang. Many raised their disappointment over the lack of improvements made to counter the problem of sex-related posts dominating the 'most popular' list. Some when further and demanded the termination of cheat profiles. This is the latest and so far the most extreme call by Singapore bloggers to clean up their online reputations.



Bloggers protesting outside the Ping.sg headquarters.



A group of bloggers holding their banner.



Chaos erupts when a blogger demands for more freedom to express his criticisms against the website online.



Even the children decided to take part in the protest to show how they were affected by the content shown on the website.

PS: This is just an April Fools' Day joke. The speech bubbles were inspired by the blog posts written by several Pingsters. Of course, the protest never took place (duh). Please do not take this post seriously, yeah? =)

When Blogging Is Unhealthy

Written by azhar.

Sometimes, I do consider blogging as a form of therapy to help relax my mind. Have you ever noticed that whenever you finished blogging, you just felt a lot lighter? It could have been because you finally threw the heavy guilt away by confessing in your blog or it could have been because you have managed to release your strong feelings and opinions that used to bother your mind for quite some time.

Blogging also provides a space for us to develop our personalities. When we blog to share our thoughts, feelings and experiences, whatever we write becomes a subject of our readers' perspectives. People comment on what we blog about and present feedback to us. This process helps us understand, evaluate and improve our personalities.

Another positive impact that blogging offers is that it can help prolong our friendships. It acts as a medium for us to stay in touch with our friends as we keep our friends updated on our lives through our blog posts. Sometimes, it allows us to relive the sentimental (or funny) moments we had together as friends in the past. All these play a role in prolonging and perhaps strengthening our friendships.

Nonetheless, blogging can be unhealthy when we are addicted to it. Addiction comes when we rely too much on something for our normal functioning. In the case for blogging, the addiction sets in when we start to compulsively blog in order to satisfy ourselves. Where the satisfaction comes varies - it can be from earning huge advertisement revenues, attracting a consistently high traffic of readers or even a steady inflow of comments.

There are three reasons why addiction to blogging is unhealthy for us. First and foremost, it isolates us from the real life. It draws us further and further away from our family and friends. We are too engrossed in finding new materials to blog about and are too excited to figure out how our blog readers will react to it. We tend to spend too much time perfecting our upcoming blog posts so that standard of the blog remains at its peak. We check on our blog once every hour in anticipation of any sympathy or congratulatory comments by our online peers. We begin to lose our attachment to the real life.

Secondly, it can cause a withdrawal to us. A withdrawal is a symptom that occurs when we decide to reduce or discontinue our addiction. Anxiety can emerge once we make an abrupt decision to stop blogging. For example, when we are forced to go on an overseas trip, we may become anxious to know how the blog will progress. We worry that the traffic will plunge significantly when we stop blogging temporarily. In some cases, we may even be anxious to search for things to blog about regarding the overseas trip when we return home. Thus, we are unable to fully enjoy our lives, or in this case the trip.

Finally, the addiction may turn us into greedy individuals. And when greed begins to whisper in our minds, we tend to leave our character behind and blog recklessly. For example, we are not satisfied with the present volume of traffic and want to attract more readers. The fastest way to do so is to post controversial remarks or insensitive articles so as create a tidal wave (which carries our names with it) in the blogosphere.

Blogging can be recreational or therapeutic or both. It is an epicurean activity whereby we share our daily experiences and life journeys with our friends. It is also a quick-fix remedy for stress and depression. Nonetheless, excessive blogging can be unhealthy when we depend too much on it. When blogging becomes an addiction, it drags us away from reality and may poison our minds with greed.

Contact us: tpjcian@gmail.com

Sexting And The Accidental Porn Stars

Written by azhar.

I first learned about sexting while reading an article about a tragic incident that happened to an eighteen-year-old girl known as Jesse Logan. She used to sent nude pictures of herself to her boyfriend using her mobile phone. When the couple broke up, her boyfriend forward her naked photos to his friends (what an irresponsible person he is) who in turn shared them with the others. Jesse's private communication with her boyfriend turned public as her sexually explicit photos quickly spread around her school and beyond. That was the beginning of a period of public humiliation and embarrassment for her; one that eventually ended her life.

She became an accidental porn star and was continuously harassed by the students via virtual social networks such as MySpace and Facebook where abusive remarks were dropped on her profile page. The relentless online torment became known to her family when she finally decided to confide in her mother, Cynthia Logan. Like any other victims of cyber-bullying, Jesse only revealed a small piece of the ordeal she was going through. Her self-esteem had already plummeted and she had lost the trust with the people around her.

Jesse's cheerful life ended gloomily as her mother found her body hanging by the neck from the clothing rod in her closet. The tragic incident has shone light to the dangers and consequences of sexting and the cyber-bullying that comes with it. It further raises questions on how we can prevent the same experience from happening to other teenage girls out there.



Sexting is often described when girls voluntarily snap nude pictures of themselves while performing real or simulated sexual acts and sharing them with the others (usually their boyfriends). I believe sexting is now commonly used as a way for girls to prove their loyalty and trust to their partners. Unfortunately, their private photos are usually exposed by their boyfriends when the relationship fails to last.

This could inevitably lead to the girls becoming accidental porn stars and thus possibly destroying their future. In this new era whereby employers and principals use the Internet to research on the backgrounds of their potential workers and students, one can imagine how the victims will find it difficult to get a job or enrol in a college. Worse, since the photos will most probably remain in the Internet forever, the girls may have to live with their dark reputations for the rest of their lives.

Nonetheless in the short term, what comes directly when the sexting is exposed (to the world beyond the supposedly private communication) is none other than cyber-bullying. The victims will have to face public humiliation as other students start to associate them with the sluttish behaviour and even prostitutes. Since sex sells (and mind you, it sells fast), the victims may even attract unwanted attention from online predators seeking for any form of sexual services from them. All these will eventually kill the victim's self-esteem and they may consider suicide to escape the online harassment. When sexting meets cyber-bullying, the consequences are often deadly.

According to cyberlawyer Parry Aftab, about 20% of the teenage girls polled by Wiredsafety.org said they had taken a nude or sexually explicit cell phone picture or web cam shot of themselves and shared it with others (who are mostly their boyfriends). 14% of the boys share these 'private' images with others when they break up with their girlfriends. And 44% of the boys polled admitted to have seen at least one of these sexual images of a classmate.

The numbers are alarming and most importantly it clearly shows the pervasiveness of the sexting phenomenon among our teenagers. Although there are laws to protect them, once the damage is done, it could leave a black mark in the victims lives forever.

That said, I believe the best way to handle sexting and prevent innocent young girls from becoming accidental porn stars is to effectively educate teenagers regarding the risks and dangers that comes with it. I am suggesting we set up a Facebook and MySpace group whereby users can be informed of the issue. Instead of blaming those online social networking websites, why not we fully utilize them to fight for our causes.

What do you think?

Contact us: tpjcian@gmail.com

Secret Revealed: How To Edit A Post In TPJC.net

Written by azhar.

All right, I have to confess: I kind of intentionally sensationalized this post (a bit) with a catchy title. It is not really a secret.

Anyway, it has come to my attention that some of the JC1 forum regulars are complaining that they are unable to edit or delete their posts.

One particular incident is regarding Nurshahiylia Erdina Bte Sidin from 09A02 who wrote 'Also, you may also be thinking: Why this girl ah, just never edit her first post instead of posting in her own thread all the time?And that's because there is no edit button. So this is the only way I can tell people about which books are taken and whatnot...' in her forum thread which she used to sell her romance novels.

And just recently, Jonathan Wong Weng Keat from 09S29 wrote 'I think that the forum, no matter is school or class forum. We should have a edit and delete functions. There are some threads in my class that has been dead for ages and it kinda waste space and confuse people, so it would be better to have the edit and delete functions for all fourms in tpjc.net...' in another forum thread known as 'How can the college improve itself? Your views.'.

After reading the posts above, I feel that it is my responsibility (chey...like real) to share with you guys how to edit and delete your forum posts.

So what is the secret?


CHANGE THE SKIN!


(ok yeah, so how in the world do I change my skin, azhar?)


On the top right corner of the screen, select the function 'ChangeSkin'.


(uh uh, then?)


Then you are done. Now you can edit and delete your posts any time!


(hmmm...can I see how it looks like?)


There you go!

Student Suspended For Farting In Class

Yes yes, you read the title correctly.

A 15-year-old student, Jonathon Locked Jr., has been suspended from school as he was believed to be expelling gas intentionally in class. School officials explained that the student's actions were violating the school district rule against disruptive behaviour. They added that the student repeatedly passed gas to cause the other children to laugh. They also claimed that the smell made breathing difficult.
























Most of you should be laughing and shouting 'WHAT A JOKE!' silently in your minds right now. Some of you may start to question the severity of the punishment with respect to the offence made. Being suspended from school just because you farted in class seems absurd. It is a universal belief that expelling gas from our body is natural. Although we usually control the process so as not to expose it most of the times, it is inevitable that others around us may still notice it. That may be the case for the poor student.

Nonetheless, if the student had repeatedly farted intentionally, then he totally deserved the penalty. For all we know perhaps he was previously reprimanded a couple of times before and that the suspension was the final resort to teach him a lesson. The fact is that passing gas repeatedly and loudly is disrupting the class (unless of course he has a medical condition). Some will laugh and the others will be forced to pinch their noses instead of paying attention to whatever that is shown on the screen.

What do you think?

Video Of The Month (March)

A truly touching video reflecting the powerful connection between a father and his disabled son.



For more information regarding Team Hoyt, please click HERE and HERE.