Count 19 chaos addressed
According to Mr Michael Jordan, a former Bedfordview resident who created the App with the pupil, Count 19 went viral and was used by pupils at the school to speak their minds.
Count 19, the social media app created for users to express themselves on matters they feel strongly about, was disabled last Tuesday.
The app is the brainchild of Saheti School pupil and Bedfordview resident Kyri Ioulianou.
According to Mr Michael Jordan, a former Bedfordview resident who created the App with the pupil, Count 19 went viral and was used by pupils at the school to speak their minds.
He said the App was intended to promote open discussion about controversial topics without the fear of judgement.
Mr Jordan said the school banned the App and threatened to take legal action against the owners of Count 19.
He also accused the school of bulling the programmer to give up his stake in the App.
“Students used the App, which has features to combat abuse, to speak their mind about the school and teachers. This caused the school to ban the App, take down the wifi, have an emergency assembly and sent some children home early. The chairman of the school embarrassed himself when he publicly swore at the student who had programmed it at the matric valedictory dinner. He also offered R300 000 to anyone who could hack the app. The school’s IT teacher also tried to hack the App and reveal the identities of the students who had made posts. This was unsuccessful,” said Mr Jordan.
The school’s executive headmaster, Mr Warwick Taylor, denied Mr Jordan’s claims that money was offered to anyone.
“I would specifically like to correct some of the information provided by Mr Jordan. The initial damage that was done was against students who were being cyber-bullied with derogatory and hateful comments, which constitutes hate speech, and as a result it was devastating to individuals. More recently, the board, school leadership and teachers have been targeted with hate speech. The chairman did use inappropriate language and has apologised to the pupil and family. I also addressed the inappropriateness of his comment immediately with the matrics at the valedictory dinner. The chairman did not offer money to anyone to hack the App. Hacking is illegal and our IT department has not attempted to hack the App. We have put pressure on our student, appealing to his ethical responsibility, to take down the App until he has time to add in the necessary software to allow for better moderation. We have a duty to protect the individuals within our school and Saheti’s good name, and we will explore all the options available to us. The school strongly condemns cyber bullying of any kind,” said Mr Taylor.
During a meeting with Kyri and his advocate, he told the NEWS he would not comment any further because of undisclosed reasons.
Read about Kyri’s plans for the future and the job offers he received, despite only being 18 years old, on page 5.
