The coolest school in the world!

Post Reply New Topic

http://antarcticaedu.com/

Quite literally....
I wouldn't want to go there!!

But interesting, especially the facts and myths page. 1950s+ is pretty recent though.

Why's it so great?

They really need a new website, BTW.

I have a suspicion that University of Antarctica is a hoax, at least the physical campus of it. (The online school of the same name just might exist, operating out of one of the scientific bases.) The pictures on their website look like they were taken somewhere else (maybe even Alaska), since I see trees, lakes, roads, and cars in parking lots. The campus building and the restaurant menu items have an inordinate number of Slavic-sounding names (like the Gazprom Field or Navoyka the restaurant). The (fake) photos of buildings have Greek or Neoclassic architecture, which would be cost-prohibitive to build in a remote place like Antarctica. Heck, you're lucky if you can bring in sheet metal, glass, and plywood. Most importantly, there are Google ads on the university site; how messed up is that.

This raises a lot of questions. Why is the whole site only in English, since many non-English-speaking countries have bases in Antractica? Also, the site has a .com, rather than a .edu extension, which clearly shows that University of Antarctica is not an accredited school. If, and that's a big if, it exists, it's a trade school like DeVry once was, or worse, a diploma mill. Now, I don't mean to burst everyone's bubble, but I have a problem with hoaxes like this. It gets aspies excited over what a truly great concept, only to find out that it was a big lie the whole time.

I have no desire to attend that University. Although, I previously thought that Dunedin, New Zealand had the most southern University.

[quote="Yupa"
Hahaha, are you seriously that thick that you thought it might be real in any way, shape or form?

It's supposed to be a parody of actual university websites.[/quote]




I thought it was real at first. There's a lot of poorly constructed university websites, and I know nothing about Antartica.

And I think you've portrayed yourself poorly here. You seem to be attempting to make yourself feel good at the expense of someone else by making fun of them for being unsure about whether or not they are being tricked, i.e. making fun of someone displaying a trait common in Aspergers, a trait that is not matter of "thickness" but probably of a different form or even superior intelligence.

Of course I thought it might be real! This is an aspie support site, for crying out loud, so it's perfectly reasonable to expect truthfulness on here. Now, if an NT on the street told me about University of Antarctica, I'd have a hard time believing him, and pretty much know right away that he's just yanking my chain. But here, I figured, "hey you never know". Then I found all sorts of inconsistencies, which I described in my previous post. Here are some examples:
* Suspicious-looking photos (Are there really paved roads with cars in Antarctica?)
* Uncharacteristic architecture (Buildings with Greek columns are usually pretty old.)
* Slavic-sounding building names (Did Russia sponsor the university or something?)
* Descriptions of nightlife (There wouldn't be enough clientele to make it profitable.)
* Lack of an .edu domain and Google ads on the site (I should have noticed these first.)

Maybe it's just me, but this kind of hoaxes bother me. Not because I fall for them; I've gotten too bitter and jaded over the years to be convinced by a smooth-talking website. But it's taking a great concept, getting someone excited about it, then telling them it was all a big lie the whole time is what bothers me about it. Google is notorious for hoaxes: Google Romance, Google Gulp, Gmail Paper, Google's moon colony, and using pigeons to rank websites.

Sounds great, I'll go on exchange there.

Ryan, I'm sure you already know, but either way, UANT doesn't exist, and their website is fake. (The photos on there look like they were taken in Norway or Iceland.) Still, if you overlook the prohibitively high costs of building a European-style university campus in Antarctica, with a heating grid and everything, it sounds like a really cool concept. If you read through the site, the descriptions are very realistic, almost convincing enough to be true. "Almost" is the key word, though.

http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Univ ... Antarctica

I've read that Uncyclopedia article. I didn't like it as much as the "official" site. The "official" site at least tries to sound official and convincing, and it almost had me going, until I found a lot of inconsistencies, which took some effort on my part. The Uncyclopedia article sounds outlandish and comedic, so you know immediately that the school you're reading about is fake; the inconsistencies are right there in your face.