When Ellen Waite-Franzen took over as the College's vice president of information technology in 2007, the glory of BlitzMail was already fading fast. The growing number of complaints that Blitz was too much of an antique to function effectively led Waite-Franzen to bring before the Computing Council the suggestion to research, innovate and replace our outdated version of Blitz. After discussing renovations that would significantly aid students and staff, the Computing Council set up the Taskforce on E-mail and Collaboration Technologies, composed of students, faculty, computing staff and a representative from DHMC (where they have also been looking for an alternative to Blitz).
Michael Belinsky wrote on Blitz's formatting problems, security issues and lack of a search function ("Making Technology a Priority," April 22), but those are just the tip of the iceberg. A core idea that Waite-Franzen brought before the Council was to modify Blitz to have calendar and planner applications.
I imagine this would be a Blitz-specific version of an application similar to what is on Microsoft Outlook. On Outlook, in addition to having a regular electronic calendar, e-mails are able to carry an invitation for events or meetings, and one's acceptance of an invitation adds the event to the user's calendar. On Blitz, one could highlight any piece of text (such as "Show at the Hop") and then have an option (with a hot-key alternative) to add that relevant text onto precise days and hours of one's calendar.
The calendar could easily double as a daily, weekly and monthly planner. With other programs such as Outlook, one can set reminders and alarms for any task or event (snooze button included). Adding these features to Blitz would mean a lot less of forgetting where you are supposed to be and a lot less of accidentally double-booking yourself. The fact that Blitz happens to be open on most computers most of the time anyway only adds to the usefulness of such a planner. A search bar to navigate through your own calendar (search: "party on the Green" or "Wednesday, May 14") would provide additional convenience. If I had that kind of time management available to me, I might even be able to keep absolutely current on my class readings.
The taskforce is collaborating with the Student Assembly to reach out to students and to set up focus group meetings, where students can add their own ideas on how else to improve Blitz. One small idea I had was for Blitz to have a lost and found section. This way, students who lose a cell phone or a jacket don't have to bother all of campus. Lost item interactions would be limited to the individual who lost something and the individual who found it. Also, students who don't have access to a campus-wide Blitz list would no longer be disadvantaged when retrieving their lost possessions.
I think that the idea of focus groups for innovation at Dartmouth is, in itself, a notable occurrence. Aside from Blitz, there exist other areas where Dartmouth is technologically lacking and could profit from student-initiated ideas. For example, I would argue that Dartmouth students could greatly benefit from College workshops on Microsoft Excel and Photoshop. A separate Assembly-sponsored focus group on innovating Dartmouth as a whole, perhaps even made into a competition to add incentive, could revolutionize our College and insure that we stay ahead of the technology curve.
If nothing else, a new Blitz would significantly aid students in their work and planning. Programming our e-mail server to have a planner and calendar, as well as other useful applications, would not only help students manage their time but could also consequently help us gain ground in the race to excel against our future rivals in other colleges. Tapping into the ideas presented by alternative software programs as well as the innovative ideas put forth by our own staff and students could once more make Dartmouth the pioneer of campus-based Internet. Ellen Waite-Franzen and the Taskforce on E-mail and Collaboration Technologies are initiating a revolution, and I for one eagerly await their results.
