It is now possible to open an email account on the Web. It costs nothing, and is easy to use. The advantage of this is that you can read and send email from anywhere you can get into the Web: a cybercafe, for instance, anywhere in the world, or any of the University computers that can access the Web (for a list of these, click here).
This is extremely useful and convenient, even if you already have an email account with the University; you can set the software up so that it can check your University account and download your mail for reading to the email browser. Without deleting it from the University server.
This is a very nice arrangement; I've tried it, and I recommend it. If you want to try it too, click here; let me know how you get on. I think the only problem is that it is likely to suffer from the slowness of the Web. Otherewise, it's much easier to use than for instance the Pegasus interface. Try it, it costs nothing.
Update (21/1/97)
The Yahoo email service only works properly if you are using a recent version of the Netscape Browser: version 3 or 4. If you're using version 2 you will get puzzling messages about needing Java. Sorry about this. Moreover, the computers in the Aston Webb building use Netscape 2.0. The ones in the Library, however, are more modern, and Yahoo email works fine on them.