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Computer networks are changing campus life, and at colleges and universities, electronic mail systems are replacing paper mail and telephones. Telecommunications-related social and ethical problems that will eventually confront the larger society are being worked out on campuses. About 10 percent of Americans communicate via personal computers, but at the University of Michigan, almost all students do so. In the courtyard of the university's Angell Hall, 320 microcomputers are available for communicating throughout the campus or worldwide. Link Resources Corp estimates that 40 percent of today's microcomputers are equipped with modems, compared with 25 percent in 1989. Subscriptions to on-line services, such as America Online, CompuServe, GEnie and Prodigy, are increasing at about 30 percent a year. Computer Cablevision Inc soon will offer cable access to the Internet, the network of networks that functions as the world's biggest E-mail system.

IBM has cut its research budget by $1 billion a year and laid off 180,000 employees in the past eight years, yet extravagant employee benefits continue to be provided. Three country clubs equipped with golf courses, bowling alleys and skeet-shooting are maintained for IBM employees, and the company runs a management school that has all the amenities of a resort. IBM also has nine private jets to transport its executives around the world looking for ways to make the company more efficient. Ironically, IBM is enduring more in losses and layoffs than any other company. IBM stock has dropped in value by 75 percent since 1987, and in 1993 the company's annual dividend was cut 79 percent to $1 per share. IBM justifies its practices as necessary business expenses.

Developers of interactive products and services are ecstatic over the planned acquisition of Tele-Communications Inc by Bell Atlantic Corp; they believe the mega-deal with legitimate their efforts and hasten the advent of a mass market for interactive television. Much work is being done by tiny companies in San Francisco such as Brilliant Media, MusicNet Inc and PF.Magic. MusicNet subscribers can use their telephones to preview and order records. A forthcoming Apple Macintosh-compatible compact disk from Brilliant Music will allow listeners to chose which instruments they want to hear on a music video. PF.Magic makes 'Third Degree,' an interactive game show. Other novel interactive services and products are discussed.

Topics ranging from the Internet to Thinking Machines' CM-5 supercomputer are discussed. Advertising may become an integral part of the Internet network; advertisers have been very interested in the Internet because of its access to approximately five million users worldwide. Technical publisher O'Reilly and Associates will be distributing magazines that include ads via the Internet. Some clients of IBM's new mail-order PC company Ambra Computer Corp are complaining that they have been having problems placing orders. The federal government will be offering a variety of public information online and a number of congressmen now have Internet e-mail addresses. Thinking Machines' CM-5 supercomputer was used in the movie 'Jurassic Park.'