Maybe Mark Zuckerberg doesn't like all those headlines about social-network uprisings among Facebook's old student base. This week Facebook threw a bone to students, in the form of a new "Universities on Facebook" page. The idea is to help students better use the site for campus activities like newspapers, dorm groups, and student government. In an announcement, Facebook called the page an attempt at "reconnecting" with students.

"The very existence of a page like this serves as a reminder of how Facebook has changed—where it was once a site designed by and for universities, they are now a specialized audience with a page catering to their specific needs," blogged VentureBeat.

Still, this project doesn't seem nearly as controversial as the "community pages" that had college marketing types freaking out back in May. By one account, at least, those are "still a big mess."

University libraries nationwide are attempting to make scholarly research easier, whether with browser extensions or iPad applications. For technologies in the testing stages, though, low usage or lack of support can lead to an early demise.

MIT Libraries has created a place to for these tools after they've come face to face with the grim reaper—its Beta Graveyard.

Remlee Green, user-experience librarian at MIT, developed the site to remember search tools that have been discontinued.

“The spirit of experimentation is in trying new things,” Green said. “Even if it wasn’t perfect for us, there are some positives in those tools. We try to find out what works in something that’s broken.”

A headstone-esque screenshot on the site is accompanied by an epitaph commemorating the life of the particular beta.

The resting place is occupied so far by two applications: iGoogle and Facebook...

Josh Weinstein, a 2009 graduate of Princeton University, remembers waiting eagerly for his official college e-mail address the summer before freshman year. An address ending in .edu would give him access to Facebook, an online social network that only college students could join.

Oh, how times have changed.

Everyone and their mothers, and fathers, are on Facebook. But Mr. Weinstein hasn't given up hope: He's created a Web site where students can post messages, pictures, and events away from the prying eyes of parents and professors. The site, CollegeOnly, went up on Wednesday, and right now students from Cornell, Princeton, and Yale Universities can sign up. Those colleges were among the campuses where Mr. Weinstein's other creations—GoodCrush, an online matchmaking service, and RandomDorm, a college-only version of Chatroulette—were especially popular. Mr. Weinstein and his team plan ...

It has taken the University of Colorado two decades to come up with a new student-information system. And one of the first effects has allowed students to bull their way to the head of the line for popular classes, skipping past others already on the course waitlist. But the Boulder Daily Camera reports this week that the university has fixed the $50-million system—for the most part. "We've reduced the chances of this happening," university spokeswoman Malinda Miller-Huey told the paper on August 25. Students interviewed for the article were not so sanguine. "The new system sucks," said one junior.

The problem apparently occurred because the new software, MyCUInfo, held students on class waitlists for long periods, perhaps while checking their eligibility, officials said. Meanwhile, new students could log in and enroll.

Now waitlist status is being reviewed by the software every seven ...

Code is not something most reporters learn in j-school. But as media and technology converge online, a group called Hacks/Hackers is trying to bring together journalists (those would be the hacks) and programmers (hackers). Their agenda? To geek out, drink some beer, and maybe figure out the future of media.

Now the group and several other collaborators are expanding that dialogue into a new open online course that kicks off September 15. The idea is that media types and programmers will teach each other about their respective crafts. The class and its materials will be available free through P2P University, an experiment in open peer-to-peer teaching.

"There’s a big hunger in the media community to learn more from technology," says Burt Herman, a former Associated Press correspondent who founded Hacks/Hackers. "I think technologists realize, too, that they need great content."

The...

By Matthew Kalman

Jerusalem—A judge in Tel Aviv's small-claims court has fined Tel Aviv University because the institution refused to stop sending a student unsolicited promotional e-mails.

Judge Ronen Ilan fined the university 2,000 shekels (approximately $525) plus 300 shekels ($79) in costs for violating an Israeli law that forbids sending promotional e-mails against the wishes of the recipient.

The university had argued that it supplied and owned the e-mail service, and that students checked off a box when they opened their e-mail accounts that said they agreed to receive commercial messages at the discretion of the university. The judge said the agreement was too general and must be reversible.

Guy Mor, a second-year law student and a member of the editorial board of the Tel Aviv University Law Review, received an e-mail in February promoting a course in English...

E-textbooks are not forever. Most publishers make their academic titles available for only a semester, or a year, after which time, the digital files self-destruct.

Now the University of Michigan Press is trying an even shorter rental period for its e-books. Customers have the option of renting 261 of the press's most popular scholarly texts for either 40 percent or 75 percent of list price, for a rental period of either 30 days or 180 days. Essentially Michigan is combining two emerging trends in the textbook industry: rentals and e-books.

A digital book from the University of Michigan Press that originally cost $22.95 could be rented at $10 for 30 days, or $18 for 180 days. The clock starts ticking when the book is opened, and the digital file can be viewed on up to six devices—whether it be a PC, a Mac, or an e-reader.

Heather Newman, the press’s trade marketing manager, hopes the ...

Why do students have to pay for college textbooks? Couldn't the reading material be considered part of the college infrastructure paid for by officials as part of tuition, like classroom buildings and course-management systems?

Virginia State University is experimenting with that idea this fall, with a new effort to give free e-textbooks to students in its business school for eight core courses. The university recently negotiated a deal with upstart publisher Flat World Knowledge that treats buying e-books like buying campuswide software—with the institution paying a small per-student fee. The university plans to formally announce the deal Tuesday.

Student complaints about the high cost of traditional textbooks drove the university to try the giveaway. "For our accounting books senior year, there's nothing under $250," said Mirta Martin, dean of the Virginia State University business...

A group of information-technology specialists at Purdue University has found a way to beat the heat for a university data center's two supercomputers. This summer, when temperatures rose and the campus cooling system wasn't doing enough to bring them down, Purdue's IT team reined in the clusters' computing speeds to cut down on the heat the computers were generating.

The IT staff used its new tactic twice, once on a hot June afternoon and once in July. By cutting the supercomputers' speeds by about 70 percent, the staff kept the center cool enough for the computers to keep going.

The temperature in the data center, which nearly 50 research groups on campus use, is usually around 70 degrees, said Mike Shuey, a member of Purdue's IT staff. If the mercury reaches 90 degrees, IT employees typically start shutting down the supercomputers. If it gets any hotter, the computers shut down...

While a handful of colleges have opted to give incoming students iPads this fall, Williston State College is handing out iPads to its faculty members instead.

The giveaway at the two-year institution was the decision of the college's president, Raymond Nadolny, said Wanda Meyer, Williston State's vice president for instruction. The money to purchase the iPads came from funds set aside for professional development, Ms. Meyer said.

The faculty members received the iPads Wednesday at a morning-long training session on how to use them. Most of the professors had never used an iPad before, said Steven Grunenwald, an associate professor of English. "This was a new experience, so I think the learning curve was steep," he said.

Mr. Grunenwald isn't sure how he will use the new tool in his teaching. He has downloaded an application that allows him to access files on his desktop computer...