There are moments when you know you’re part of history. Our cover story about the origins of Facebook captures the mood on Harvard’s campus 22 years ago, when a seductive new technology changed the student experience almost overnight—before it spilled out of the gates and into the wider world. It’s a juicy inside story that goes beyond the Hollywood version to show why “Thefacebook” was a magnetic force for a student body that was already ripe for change: primed for new technology, desperate for expanded social outlets. Of course, the story of Facebook is also a cautionary tale. Students and faculty understood that they were on the precipice of something big, but they didn’t foresee exactly what this new technology would do, or how it would change them, until it had already happened.
There’s no need to overstate the parallels with today, as society grapples with another powerful technology and imagines how it might the shape the world in which we live two decades from now. For the most part, University leaders are bullish about AI’s potential, and some stories in this issue highlight the role it’s already playing in research: assisting in promising therapies that could help prolong lives, guiding humans to give more effective feedback. But so much is still unknown about how AI will affect the way we communicate, work, think, and learn—and that future will be determined, in part, by decisions we make today. We can choose to take control of the technology, or we can let history happen to us.
History has come knocking at Harvard in other ways this summer, by way of the federal government’s unprecedented assault on higher education. Financial constraints, driven partly by government actions, have precipitated a massive reorganization within the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, including the College. The results include consolidated offices and roles, painful job cuts, the elimination of some College administrative departments, and the reappearance of others. That story will continue to unfold as students return to campus for a new academic year.
Their imminent return is always a thrill—because being in the presence of others brings so many possibilities. Another history story in this issue recounts the tale of beat poet Gregory Corso, who squatted in Eliot House for a year in the 1950s, charming professors and students alike as he found his literary voice. The beauty of a university—especially this one—is that human connections have consequences, for individual lives and for the broader culture. The networks that matter most are the ones we create in real life.
—Joanna Weiss, Editor
