Leading article: Cngrts!

While students on the rest of these isles are taking the low road to schools and colleges to pick up their A-level results, a fair few of their contemporaries in Scotland will be taking the hi-tech road to discovering their exam fate. Next Wednesday thousands of pupils across Scotland will receive their exam results by text. The Scottish Qualifications Authority has launched a "mySQA system" which will allow sixth-formers to learn how they fared via their mobiles while their more traditionalist classmates will have to wait for the news in Thursday morning's post.

With demand for university places in Scotland expected to be up by about 5 per cent, the 7,000 who have opted for electronic communication no doubt hope to steal a march on the other 153,000 students waiting for their Higher results when it comes to snaffling last-minute unallocated places. The system will also offer the advantage of a private moment to assimilate the news for those who have not done quite as well as they might want to admit in public. The discovery of exam results will no longer be a shared ordeal – but nor, for that matter, a shared joy.

Such early adopters will have to hope that they are not then forced into becoming early adaptors.