Facebook hacking, personal kegs and 'Jersey Shore Studies'

This post is part of our new series Welcome to Academia, which gives weekly updates about the interesting, weird and newsworthy happenings at Duke’s peer institutions.

University of Chicago is hosting a one-day academic conference called Jersey Shore Studies today, according to the Huffington Post. Papers to be presented at the conference include "GTL (Gym, Tan, Labor): Reproducing Labor-Power on the Shore," "The Jersey Saga: Honor Culture in Medieval Iceland and Modern Seaside" and "Foucault's Going To The Jersey Shore, Bitch!"

In hopes to replace Silicon Valley as the technology hub of the world with New York City, Mayor Michael Bloomberg is offering $100 million and city land to an academic institution that will catalyze technology growth in the city, and Stanford University and Cornell University are the two main contenders. If Stanford's proposal is chosen, the University will build a 1.9 million square-foot graduate school of applied sciences and engineering in the city, according to the Stanford Daily. If Cornell's is chosen, it will spend $2 billion to create its applied sciences campus, which would be the "largest building in the northeastern United States that creates as much energy as it uses," according to the Cornell Daily Sun.

University of Virginia student Farah Shah was sentenced Tuesday 50 hours of community service for computer trespassing last month, according to the Cavalier Daily. Shah had reportedly sent messages from the victim's email and Facebook accounts on four different occasions, and was  eventually discovered by the victim. She pled guilty to the offense and will not serve jail time.

A new Michigan state law to take affect Tuesday may prevent underage University of Michigan students from getting away with drinking from kegs, according to the Michigan Daily. Retailers now must attach to each keg that they sell a tag with the buyer's name, address, phone number and sate ID number. Police and law enforcement officials will be permitted to inspect the sales records at any time, and anyone who removes the tag may face serious jail time and fines.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology freshman and son of MIT professor and Nobel laureate, Satto Tonegawa was found dead in his dorm room Tuesday evening, according to The Tech. An odor was reportedly notice near his room, and he had not been seen for a week prior to Tuesday. Tonegawa is the second MIT student to have died in the past two months, following Nicolas Del Castillo, who was found in his room Sept. 4 after an apparent suicide.