The UW-Madison campus is more wired than ever, according to UW-Madison Division of Information Technology spokesperson Brian Rust.
The DoIT Student Computing Survey released Wednesday stated that for the first time in the eight years DoIT has conducted the survey, student ownership of laptops exceeded that of desktop computers. Also, according to Rust, while 62 percent of surveyed students use wireless Internet on campus, 54 of that 62 percent also use wireless at home.
""That was kind of surprising this year,"" Rust said. ""That's a pretty high number of kids using wireless everywhere they go.""
DoIT employee and UW-Madison alum Kevin RomA¡n said he has certainly noticed an increase in the ""plugged-in"" culture on campus during his five years in Madison.
""It's not even a matter of being practical,"" RomA¡n said. ""I feel like it's also a very social thing now, too. People want to have the iPods and the latest computers.""
""Even the Rocky Rococo's on Regent has wireless,"" he said. ""I don't know who would go there to use wireless, because it's not a place where you can sit down and have coffee or anything, but it's cool that they have it.""
The DoIT study also emphasized the presence of cellular telephones on campus; the reported cell phone ownership dropped to 79 percent from 87 percent in 2005, a result Rust tentatively attributed to combination devices, like Blackberry's, personal digital assistants and cell phones with instant messaging capabilities, cameras and e-mail access.
""It's anybody's guess as to what they're talking about when they answer the survey question—are they talking about a cell phone? Are they talking about a Blackberry?"" Rust said. ""Just saying cell phone doesn't necessarily capture the full range of all the devices students have.""
The survey also illustrated a significant increase in MP3 ownership on campus; 35 percent of surveyed students said they owned an MP3 player in 2005, while 53 percent reported ownership in 2006.
