I needed a new angle. I stared at the Brick. Its operating system, ChromeOS, was locked down tighter than a drum. I couldn't install extensions. I couldn't change the DNS. But then I noticed the URL bar. The one piece of real estate the administrator couldn't lock because I needed it to type in homework addresses.
For a week, I was a god. I accessed coding tutorials, archived newspapers, even a live feed of a puffin nest in Iceland (for science). I kept a low profile. No YouTube. No games. Just the stuff the filter was too stupid to understand. I needed a new angle
I raised my hand. "Mr. Davis, I can't access the National Archives." I couldn't install extensions
The first trick I learned was the oldest in the book: Google Translate. The one piece of real estate the administrator
The filter works by reading the address of a website. But Google Translate acts like a tunnel. You type the blocked URL into the translate box, set the language from English to English, and click the link. The translator fetches the page, repackages it, and serves it to you like a smuggler bringing contraband across a border. Suddenly, I was reading a firsthand account of a East German border guard. The text was a little jumbled, but it was there .