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I'm starting out in IT, and one of the hardest things to do in my job is to explain technical terms that I've learnt and been trained about, to people with no IT training whatsoever.

I was stuck trying to explain cloud hosting to a client recently, and though it took me a while to perfect it, I eventually came up with the best way of getting it to make sense.

A cloud hosted-website is a website that operates on more than one connected server - like a network - rather than being limited to a single server in more traditional hosting. This way, the virtual processing power is unlimited as you can always expand by adding one or more new servers and expanding the 'cloud'.

That one wasn't too hard, but if I have to explain anything too complicated in the future I might take a few minutes to collect my thoughts and prepare first so I don't just throw a load of technical jargon at them!

Photo: akakumo (Flickr)

Despite all of the media furore at this moment in time I have to admit, I am kind of with the government on this one. Tuition fees should be raised, and what’s more, degrees should be dropped from 3 years to 2.
Now if you are still reading let me explain why. When university first became a more accessible goal for everyone in the UK it was taken as an option by those that wanted to go to Uni, because they wanted to persue something academic post school and college. It was grasped by those that were less fortunate that before would not have had a chance to go to uni. What has happened in recent years though is that Uni has just become the norm. Everyone goes, it’s just what you do. Subsequently, the academic merit has been completely lost and we are surrounded by people with pointless degrees that have no job at the end or worse a degree for a job that they never even wanted in the first place. This is not what Uni should be about. A degree is not just a badge of honour or a right of passage and the yobs that trashed Tory HQ have only further validated that.
Secondly, reduce the years. All anyone ever does in first year is smoke pot and get drunk and get laid. Everyone knows that you don’t really need to pass first year because it rarely contributes to your overall degree. So it’s not needed. Drop it. It won’t make a shred of difference in the long run.
Image: SSU