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| Annie May Swift Hall is way more old school than Annenberg. |
Get moving, Penn–you’re losing to Northwestern.
I’ve griped about Penn’s long-awaited ditching of the school’s undergraduate e-mail systems, and I’m going to again. Why? Because Northwestern is moving past us.
Smack dab in the middle of the upper Mid-West, Northwestern isn’t exactly the most tech-savvy school in the world. I spent a summer there and while they have some computer labs and high-tech equipment, Wharton’s plasmas in Huntsman would make most NU kids drool.
We do share one thing in common: both schools use e-mail systems called Webmail. And, as a result, both schools have been negotiating with outside providers to outsource e-mail provision. The DP first broke the story about the potential switch on the editorial page way back in April, and the University has been “in negotiations” ever since. All we know is that since that story, three possible providers–Google, Microsoft and Yahoo–have been whittled down to just Google and Microsoft.
Now that’s…um…quite a lot of…um…progress for 11 months.
Northwestern, on the other hand, decided this week to take the plunge: All Northwestern students and faculty will have school e-mail accounts through Google’s Gmail service by June. Its colors may be purple and white, but at NU can do some things right.
Back in April, when the DP learned of the possible switch, the newspaper called it a bold move. Well, it’s getting less bold by the day (because boldness implies actual implementation), and that boldness took a big hit when Northwestern passed us. We could have set an example for other universities to follow, but pretty soon we’ll be playing catch up. (No doubt this guy is happy NU is ahead of the game).
Penn, it’s time to move forward. No more procrastinating. Make a decision–I’d like this great University to have some better e-mail systems before my kids apply here.
PS. We’re all rooting for Gmail over Microsoft.
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