As universities across the nation become increasingly Juicy, Duke students are finding other ways to quench their thirst for gossip.
Some observers said student interest in the once-popular Juicy Campus Web site has dropped in recent months, though the site has continued to stir controversy at universities nationwide.
Launched last August on Duke's campus, the site has since expanded to include 59 universities.
"There are about 2,500 four-year institutions in the United States... eventually we'd like to be on all of them," said Matt Ivester, Trinity '05 and the creator of Juicy Campus.
Still, some Duke students said there has been a noticeable drop in discussion and viewership of the Web site on the campus where it made its debut.
"I think it took people a while to recognize that the site really served no purpose," Dean of Students Sue Wasiolek said.
Negative posts about Duke's greek life was once a major problem on campus, but it has gradually become less of an issue, junior Rachel Nordlinger, president of Panhellenic Association, wrote in an e-mail.
Although Juicy Campus was a hot topic last semester, it has not been discussed in any of the spring Panhel meetings, she added.
"Panhel has shifted our focus back to other issues that are more pressing," Nordlinger said.
Wasiolek said she has heard little positive feedback from Duke students about the site and added that she thinks students may have now realized the damaging effects of its posts.
Since the decline of Juicy Campus, other sites, including Me Too, have been launched to counter the negative use of anonymity on Juicy Campus with a monitored forum for students to express sensitive concerns. Junior Deepika Ravi, who created the Me Too Campaign, said Juicy Campus' decline in popularity on campus was inevitable.
"Students do seem to be talking about Juicy Campus less than they used to," Ravi wrote in an e-mail. "The outrage has died down and seems to have been replaced largely with disgust."
Although the purpose of the Me Too forum is to discuss personal feelings and the Juicy Campus agenda is more focused on targeting others, Web sites like Me Too may have contributed to the decline of Juicy Campus at Duke, she added.
Officially banning the Web site from campus would go against Duke's free speech policies, but encouraging other students not to utilize the site effectively decreases its influence on campus, Wasiolek said.
"If the students don't use it, suddenly it becomes irrelevant," she said.
Administrators at several schools, including Pepperdine, Loyola Marymount, Yale and Columbia universities, discussed banning the Web site from their campuses because of its promotion of malicious gossip.
Senior Michelle Diamond, president of the Columbia College Student Council, said opinions about the Web site varied among Columbia's student body. She noted that some students pushed to ban the Web site from campus, but others said a ban would violate their right to free speech.
After lengthy discussion, the CCSC decided not to purchase the expensive software necessary to ban the Web site. Even so, Diamond said Juicy Campus has recently lost some popularity as students started to realize its negative effects.
"Across the board everyone agrees that the content on this Web site is terrible," she said.
Although no universities have officially banned the Web site from their campuses, New Jersey Attorney General Anne Milgram issued a subpoena against the makers of Juicy Campus March 18, claiming the site violates consumer-fraud laws by not enforcing its policy against posting defamatory or abusive messages.
In Connecticut, Attorney General Richard Blumenthal also issued a letter to Ivester detailing his disgust with the Web site's intent.
Despite the legal action and several universities' attempts to ban Juicy Campus, Ivester said he is confident that his site does not violate any laws and will remain up and running.
"I think everyone is entitled to their own opinion about the Web site, but I don't think censoring speech is the right answer," he said. "So I would be very surprised if they ultimately end up banning the Web site."
For those students hoping for Juicy Campus to make a comeback at Duke, there will be several new applications added to the site next semester, Ivester said.
Although he would not go into detail about the new additions, he said the new applications "will go beyond just gossip."
Ivester added that plans to increase the Juicy Campus network to other universities are also in the works, as nearly 1,000 other universities have requested to join the Juicy Campus network in the last six months.
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