[EAS] Is Email for Old People?

Peter J. Kindlmann pjk at design.eng.yale.edu
Thu Oct 5 17:54:15 EDT 2006


The label certainly fits me, I just hadn't realized how much the 
attitude of our students, actual and prospective, is changing.

I see changes also in appointments less likely to be kept as they 
become outmoded, because students more typically "home in" on each 
with their mobile phones. The concept of time as expressed in a 
schedule, started by the Benedictine monks in the 12th century when 
they invented clocks to mark the seven canonocal hours for devotions, 
seems, like much else, to be dissolving in the digital lifestyle.

    --PJK

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(from TL Infobits -- September 2006)
<http://www.unc.edu/cit/infobits/bitsep06.html>

IS EMAIL NOW ONLY FOR "OLD PEOPLE"?

According to an article in THE CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION (vol. 53,
issue 7, p. A27, October 6, 2006), "College officials around the
country find that a growing number of students are missing important
messages about deadlines, class cancellations, and events sent to them
by e-mail because, well, the messages are sent to them by e-mail." The
article cites research reported in a 2005 Pew Internet & American Life
Project called "Teens and Technology," which found that while college
students still used email to communicate with their professors, they
preferred to use instant messaging, text messaging, and services such
as MySpace to interact with their peers.

The Chronicle article is available online at
http://chronicle.com/free/v53/i07/07a02701.htm.

The complete Pew report is available at no cost online at
http://www.pewinternet.org/report_display.asp?r=162.

The Pew Internet & American Life Project "produces reports that explore
the impact of the Internet on families, communities, work and home,
daily life, education, health care, and civic and political life. The
Project aims to be an authoritative source on the evolution of the
Internet through collection of data and analysis of real-world
developments as they affect the virtual world." For more information
and other reports, see http://www.pewinternet.org/index.asp.

The Chronicle of Higher Education [ISSN 0009-5982] is published weekly
by The Chronicle of Higher Education, Inc., 1255 Twenty-third Street,
NW, Washington, DC 20037 USA; tel: 202-466-1000; fax: 202-452-1033;
Web: http://chronicle.com/.




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