Oxford's biggest student newspaper, produced by and for members of the University of Oxford, since 1991.
I saw one of my close friends – who importantly is one of my POC friends – the other day, and I expressed the unshakeable feeling I had of being rubbed the wrong way by some friends’ silence, in the recent outcry against the murder of George Floyd. She immediately validated my feelings and I […]
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One of the beautiful things about living in the age of social media is the speed at which news can travel and spread, irrespective of what part of the world you are in. Never has this been clearer than now – as the story of George Floyd has gripped a world struggling in the throes […]
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There is no doubt that technology has stepped in to attempt to fill the many voids in our lives created by the Lockdown restrictions. From education to socialising to entertainment, we all rely on technology now more than ever to allow us to continue with our daily activities. One of the most obvious ways in […]
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Sweaty selfies, videos of impressive loo roll kicking, and photos mysteriously captioned “until tomorrow”. As lockdown keeps people inside and online, social media challenges are springing up left and right. Most of these, like the toilet roll challenge, are a quick fix for isolation boredom. Others, like the “Run for Heroes” challenge, involve donations and […]
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Four Oxford students have set up a page dedicated to sharing the quarantine stories of students from around the university. Posting on Facebook and Instagram under the name OxQuarantine the accounts ask people to send in a 200-300 word description of their isolation experience along with a photo of themselves or something related to what […]
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Image Description: A girl using the Whatsapp messenger service to connect with friends. Five minutes ago, I left a four-hour Skype call with some of my Oxford friends. Yesterday, I spoke to another friend for four hours via Facebook. I have never socialised more than I am now. That’s despite being on vacation, so its […]
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Coronavirus, leaving us cooped up in our homes, has predictably also left many of us bored. We’ve been forced to rebuild our daily lives into some semblance of a routine. Once it became clear I had fewer hobbies and interests than I thought, I succumbed to downloading Houseparty to stay connected during lockdown. It was […]
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Smartphones are one of the best tools in modern history. We have a second brain in the palm of our hands, ready to help us answer and solve the many problems we cannot fix on our own. The Internet itself is a modern marvel and having access to it anywhere and everywhere opens up a […]
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Image description: Pepe the Frog. Like quite a lot of people, I’m not really about Facebook. I’m on it, sure, and I am worryingly reliant on Messenger, and find it useful for events. I don’t intend to bestow upon myself the kind of fashionably late aloof social credo that comes with deleting the whole thing […]
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Image description: Several people on mobile phones. The recent call for age restrictions on likes and streaks on Facebook and Snapchat is long overdue, but does not go far enough. Restrictions should not discriminate; people of all ages should be protected from the psychological damage caused by likes, streaks and other online ‘reward’ mechanisms used by […]
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Yes, Facebook is back in our news feeds. The Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee has published its long awaited 111-page Final Report on disinformation and ‘fake news’, and it’s fair to say that Facebook would give it an angry react. The work of over 18 months of a committee that has worked with 8 […]
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Image credit: Paul Hudson. Description: B from Superorganism performing live on microphone. Ahead of their headline show at the O2 Academy Oxford at the end of the month, we catch up with B from Superorganism on the phone to discuss technology, band politics and performing live. “There’s something so affecting in the reflections on my […]
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Image Credit: Sevda (CC0) With Love Island upping its average viewership to 3.3 million this year, as opposed to last year’s 1.1 million, I know I am not alone in obsessing over this most dramatic of TV shows. My viewing ritual is simple but effective, watching the show live whenever possible and on demand otherwise, […]
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An anonymous artist has erected a range of social media-themed signs across Oxford this week. The individual, who goes by the name of A34 on social media platform Twitter, previously hit the headlines when he changed road signs in Didcot to include fictional locations such as Gotham City, Middle Earth, and Narnia earlier this year. […]
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It’s a normal Wednesday evening and I’m eating a meal with friends. “Are you coming out tonight?” one of them asks between mouthfuls. Unable to remember if we had discussed going out that evening, I shrug my shoulders, confused. “Oh it’s the quiz down the bar, remember?” I shake my head. I don’t. “There was […]
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2018 has gotten off to a shaky start for the world’s tech giants. The major players in Silicon Valley have come under synchronised public scrutiny; for once, not about the quality of their products, but rather for their addictive nature. Last month, Apple’s biggest investors put pressure on the company to address increasing iPhone usage […]
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Christian Dior’s s/s ’18 show in Paris opened with a model wearing a long sleeve Breton shirt emblazoned with the words ‘Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?’. The quote comes directly from Linda Nochlin’s 1971 essay about the limitations and difficulties that women who are artists face within society. (I would just like […]
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The author Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn once wrote of his time in a Soviet gulag, “All history is one continuous pestilence. There is no truth and no illusion. There is nowhere to appeal and nowhere to go.” While this expression was borne out of suffering the likes of which most of us will never understand, little could […]
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Millennials today occupy a unique position of power. We straddle the social media revolution, and many of technology’s most rapid advances are within our living memory. We have witnessed the rise and fall of the mighty Bebo, hold fond nostalgia for MSN, and recall life before and after Facebook took up residence in our joint […]
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