For all the extra buttons, options and perks, the new Cisco phone system has one dangerous drawback: unreliability. As if the complicated installation process were not enough, the phones continue to spontaneously reset themselves for short stretches of time. Last Tuesday and Wenesday mornings, all campus phones simultaneously switched into configuration mode for approximately half an hour, during which no outgoing or incoming calls were possible. Unlike occasional Internet failure, this glitch wasn't only a nuisance, but a potentially dangerous situation - as neither the police nor escort service could be reached, from on or off campus. In case of an emergency, a Brandeis student would have no quick means of obtaining assistance.

Thankfully, no emergencies were exacerbated by last week's half-hour shut-down. But if Cisco cannot correct the software bug that led to the outages, or if more bugs occur, the results of the problem could prove dangerous.

Cisco has a history of telephone network outages that the University should have known about. In a July CNET article, a representative of Merrill Lynch stated that his company had abandoned Cisco for this exact reason. Merrill Lynch's system was in an office, however, which thankfully for them, closes at night.

The repair work that the University and Cisco attempted to complete twice last week at night, will be attempted again this week at night, which ITS said is to minimize the effect on students. But students should be able to make a call at any time, day or night. Merrill Lynch didn't have this problem, and they still gave up on Cisco.

Regardless of these complaints, ITS remains responsible for announcing any known phone reconfigurations, but no e-mail was sent to students before or after the outages occurred. And while computer glitches serve as mere annoyances to students, a phone outage can be a matter of life or death. Eliminating the element of surprise, therefore, will not ameliorate the perils of a disconnected campus.

A more frightening possibility is that these temporary outages were a surprise to both students and ITS. Brandeis claims it did its homework on the new phone system, but the results seem to indicate some details were forgotten. Students should remember that call boxes outside dormitories did not work at the start of the semester. The blue-light emergency phones, which operate over the old copper-wire system, but now feed into the new network-based system, were equally inoperable, and are at as much risk as our campus phones.

If occassional periods of isolation and vulnerability equal the price we must pay for a speaker phone and a digital directory, then we'd rather cut the cord and once more hear the sweet, automated voice of Miss Meridian Mail.