Hundreds of courses have web pages, and some of the best have lecture schedules, links to related readings, and videos of the lectures themselves. Only a few years ago I would return from scientific meetings with precious proceedings in hand, and my graduate students would eagerly make copies for our reading group. Today, my freshman advisees are as likely to point me to similar information already published on a web site far from Harvard. The entire nature of student life has changed as a result. Team practice schedules, student group meeting notices, and entryway study break announcements all go out by e-mail.
Young lovers exchange sweet nothings by e-mail.
E-mail is a boon for communication with parents. In some families, it has revived the practice of writing letters, an art often lost to cheap long-distance phone calls. Alumni sometimes ask me if Harvard is producing a generation of socially isolated students who spend all their time staring at computer screens. Not at all. So much computer use is for communication that the technology revolution has enhanced, not diminished, human interactions at Harvard.