thebattalion ● wednesday,
january 18, 2012
● serving
texas a&m since 1893
● first paper free – additional copies $1 ● © 2012 student media
Longboa subcult Longboarders bring growing subculture to A&M campus Different decks ◗ Pintails: A popular style of board that has a teardropshaped deck that is typically flat and suitable for beginners. ◗ Drop-deck: Drop-deck boards have a unique shape where the middle of the deck is lower than where the trucks are mounted. ◗ Hybrid: These longboards include wheel cutouts, which provide room for the wheels to turn at sharper angles while avoiding wheelbite.
Haley Lawson The Battalion Some see it as the evolution of skateboarding. Others describe it as surfing on cement. Either way, longboarding, or “push” culture, has spiked in popularity around college campuses all across the country. As the size of the student population at Texas A&M has steadily increased, so has the popularity of the culture and sport of longboarding. Now, many students own a longboard and use it as their primary means of transportation between classes. Avid longboarder and junior mechanical engineering major Keatan Wallace has seen the longboarding trend take off at A&M. Wallace started longboarding in high school as a way to get around town before he had a driver’s license, but now spends evening with friends riding around campus and practicing tricks. “When I first moved up here about two years ago, there was about four of us in the A&M longboarding group,” Wallace said. “Now there’s over 200 members.” Longboarding is said to be the new “cool” or “hip” means of transportation. Longboarders said it can give a definite spike of adrenaline and is also a great way to exercise while on campus.
Cross-stepping: Left foot starts on the right side of the board and the right foot goes around the left, carving left to right.
Most longboarders do not just use their longboard for transportation to class, though. They also ride for fun and can be seen “carving” in parking garages or “power sliding” near Kyle Field. “I really enjoy the feeling longboarding gives while riding to class. It’s a mixture of pure adrenaline at times and intense relaxation,” said Sean Karbach, public relations officer for the Texas A&M Longboarding Club, known as Avant Garde. “Longboarding is a great way to stay in shape, especially on such a flat campus.” Student-longboarders acknowledged that longboards may look like elongated skateboards, but longboarding is not the same as skateboarding. Wallace said the longboard is much more versatile than its more-common four-wheeled counterpart, adding that skateboards are more oriented for flat-ground tricks while longboards are built for speed and riding downhill. Longboarding is a difficult skill to learn for some especially if they do not have any past experience. Senior political science major Jonathan Bundy joined the ranks of longboarders last semester. He remembered his first experience as a painful one. “The first time I ever longboarded, I really ate it and got messed up. My See Longboad on page 9
Hippie jump: Jump into the air as the board rolls underneath the obstacle, then land back on the board.
Photos by Robert Carpenter — THE BATTALION
Keaton Wallace, junior mechanical engineering major, winds down after the first day of class doing tricks on his longboard at the Zone Plaza in front of Kyle Field.
Shove-it: Press down on the front tail of the board and kick the board around 180 degrees before landing.
Grab Trick: Kick the board up and grab to rotate, take one step, then tuck the board underneath for the landing.
politics
campus
Piracy bill causes Wiki blackout
Changes to MCAT render test longer, more difficult
Jonathan Webb and Barrett House The Battalion In response to multiple Internet censorship bills being proposed by Congress, the owner of Wikipedia, Jimmy Wales, decided Monday to black out all 3,849,239 Englishlanguage pages Wednesday. “This is going to be wow. I hope Wikipedia will melt phone systems in Washington on Wednesday,” Wales tweeted Monday. The Protect IP Act is a bill under consideration in the Senate intended to protect Intellectual Property such as multimedia or writing, which can be easily copied. The Stop Online Piracy Act is a similar bill proposed by the House. Both are designed to crack down on sales of pirated U.S. products overseas. Supporters of the bill include the film and music industry, which believe legislation is necessary to protect intellectual property and jobs. Google, Facebook, Yahoo, Twitter, eBay and many others have spoken out against the legislation claiming that, if passed, it would damage the open Internet. “If passed, this legislation will harm the free and open Internet and bring about new tools for censorship of international websites inside the United States,” the Wikimedia Foundation said. Objections to the bill are present for many reasons. Essentially, the legislation would require websites to police their own sites. The result would block off portions of the Internet to all users. According to The Accociated Press, the most controversial provision is in the House bill. This provision would enabled federal authorities to blacklist sites that are alleged to distribute pirated content. Clark Caperton, a public service and administration graduate student, said regardless whether people agree or disagree with the legislation, reforms are necessary. Companies do have the right to protest like this, but the dilemma arises
Pg. 1-01.18.12.indd 1
Madeline Burns The Battalion
when Congress approaches the bills for a vote. “The merits of the bills are potentially lost when major players, such as Google and Wikipedia, exert enormous influence on public opinion,” Caperton said. While numerous businesses and websites disagree with the legislation, not all are protesting the same way Wales
Long regarded as one of the most difficult exams offered, the MCAT often takes months of grueling preparation, with many students taking the exam more than once. However, students planning to apply to medical school will be adjusting their studying strategies as the administrator of the exam Association of American Medical Colleges announced the most significant changes in 25 years. With the upcoming changes to the exam scheduled to take place in the next few years, the exam is about to become significantly more competitive. These changes pose challenges not only for the students, but for the university as well — which will have to revise curriculums to cover all of the new material. “Big changes are on the horizon means that the nearly 350 Texas A&M undergraduates who apply to medical school every year will be seriously impacted,” said Russell Schaffer, senior communications manager for Kaplan Test Prep. “Although not set to take effect for a few
See Wikipedia on page 7
See MCAT on page 7
Jay Kapadia— THE BATTALION
Wikipedia will blackout Wednesday to protest federal legislation regarding online intellectual property rights.
Info on the MCAT ◗ The Medical College Admission Test, MCAT, is a computer-based standardized examination for prospective medical students in the United States and Canada. ◗ It is designed to assess problem solving, critical thinking, written analysis and writing skills in addition to knowledge of scientific concepts and principles. ◗ The current length of the test is five-and-a-half hours.
1/18/12 12:02 AM