One of the more interesting debates in recent memory must be the new "trend" (I use the word loosely) towards disabling internet access within the school's classrooms. See, for example, this article regarding University of Chicago law school dean Saul Levmore's email to students announcing the decision.

I can see both sides of this issue. I can't imagine all those students clicking away at Solitaire or shoe-shopping sites would be welcome by the professor trying to engage the students in the Socratic method. On the other hand, I personally have gotten a lot of benefit in CLEs (the closest thing practicing lawyers have to a law school class, I guess) from being able to access the full text of cases being discussed by the presenter, or looking at the full text of a statute under discussion. The bar against web-surfing would prevent that, of course. (Although when I was in law school -- and I'm definitely dating myself now! -- there was no wireless access to the Internet. We had dial-up only. And we were happy! OK, no, we really weren't.)

What do you think? Is this in fact a trend? Has your law school instituted an internet ban in class? Good thing or bad?