In, Around and Online- Issue 17, Week Ending 12/30/94 ===================================================== Copyright (C) 1994 Robert Seidman. All rights reserved. May be reproduced in any medium for non-commercial purposes. In This Issue... ================ -Get This Newsletter Via E-Mail -What's New -Letters to the Editor -Prodigy to Offer WWW Browser at No Additional Cost -Prodigy Joins the Rest of the Pack With a FREE Newbie Board -Online Versions of Magazines Turn the Corner -Business Week is Online -Short Takes (take a short week off, but will be back next week) -My Thanks to... How to Get This Newsletter In Your Mailbox ========================================== Via LISTSERV: send an e-mail to LISTSERV@CLARK.NET and in the BODY of the message type: SUBSCRIBE ONLINE-L YOUR FULL NAME example: SUBSCRIBE ONLINE-L Robert Seidman What's New ========== Finally, a relatively light news week. So forgive me, just this one week, for using some space in ways that I normally wouldn't. Next week it's back to strictly business! Back on September 10 when I sat down to write the first issue of this newsletter, I wouldn't have believed that I'd ever have over 2,000 readers on a mailing list with an overall total distribution of somewhere around 10,000 , let alone 3.5 months later. I'd hoped that the newsletter would be well received, but had no idea it would take off as it has. I couldn't have done it by myself though, and my grateful thanks to some of the bigger contributors are extended at the end of this newsletter. Letters to the Editor ===================== Since this is a light week it seemed like a good time to address some of the issues and concerns brought up by the readers. In most cases I'm summarizing the sentiments of many letters received. --- "You write too much about America Online and not enough about my service. You come off sounding like a shill for AOL. Cut it out." -Cantstanza Aol. Since I don't make any money at newsletter writing, I unfortunately don't usually have the time for much "investigative journalism". As such, I rely heavily on the print media available about this industry. I don't make the news, I analyze it. America Online is in the news a lot. Often a lot more than anyone else. If CompuServe lowers their rates (as they surely will), I'll cover it. If Delphi finally launches a front end, I'll cover it. When GEnie announces phase 2 of their Internet services, I'll cover it. When eWorld launches their PC compatible version, I'll cover it. No "news" will be missed. If I seem biased towards America Online, CompuServe, and Prodigy and even services that are not around yet like "Interchange" and "Microsoft Network" it is because these companies are bigger or potentially bigger than the others and, as such, they receive more coverage from the print media. I'm somewhat hampered because this is a weekly newsletter. The good news is that you get the news sooner than you would in a monthly publication. The good news for GEnie and Delphi fans is that both services promise full fledged GUI front ends in '95. That will allow them to cut deals with hardware and software manufacturers to preload or bundle their front end software. That will get them more exposure and encourage content providers to put content up on their systems. ---- "You seem to worry too much about the length of your newsletter. I like it a lot and wouldn't mind if it had more content." -Tim E. Onmyhands Be careful what you wish for. I'll play around with expanded viewpoints for a couple of weeks. If it drives a lot of people to unsubscribe, I'll go back to the old format. ---- "Why do you always comment on AOL stock? You must own a lot of it and think you're a big man because you now have money." -W.H. O'Cares I don't own any stock in America Online. When $10 or so per share almost 3 years ago is now worth $112/share, I do, in retrospect, wish that I'd had the money to blow a load on it when it was at $10. The reason I often include the tidbits is because America Online is the only publicly traded company that is exclusively an online service. Prodigy is a joint venture of two HUGE companies. You can't analyze IBM and Sears stock and draw any real conclusions about Prodigy. CompuServe is owned by H&R Block and for now, their tax business is big enough that it is hard to analyze the stock on the basis of the online service. Do I think the price of America Online means anything? On a day to day basis- certainly not. If there's a good story on America Online in the Wall Street Journal, the stock goes up like a volcano. If there's a bad story, it drops like a pet rock. So, analyzing Thursday versus Wednesday doesn't mean anything. Overall though, the America Online stock serves as a barometer of what investors think about the entire online services industry. --- Long time Netizen and author Kevin Savetz took me to task by saying: "Don't believe everything you read in a press release. You should know better than to believe the statement that the WELL's is the first New Years Eve party to be organized and celebrated in cyberspace." Kevin is correct; I should know better. Just as I'm sick of surveys that manipulate numbers, Kevin is sick of stories and press releases that laud services as the "first" or the "biggest" or the "best" without first doing the research to prove their claims. I agree with Kevin and will endeavor to do a better job of editing. While I'd maintain that the Well's Cyberfoo was certainly worth a mention in the "Short Takes" section, a lot of people let me know that they'd attended other New Years Eve parties that had been organized and celebrated in cyberspace before... so Cyberfoo couldn't be the first. ---- "I like your newsletter, but you commonly make spelling and grammar errors. Please get a clue or a proofreader." Mrs. Mayo (historical reference to my 5th grade teacher) I definitely strive for an error free product. Time constraints make this a complicated issue for me. Several kind souls have volunteered to proofread the newsletter for me. Coordinating such an effort would add time to the overall production and delay the release of this newsletter. I understand that using "there" where I should use "they're" can be a big turn off. I've tried using the grammar check feature, but the state of the art in grammar checking software isn't intuitive enough. It warns you about everything. If you have the word "there" where you've used it correctly, it warns you. I end up clicking "next" so often, that I "next" my way right through the errors. My opinion is that in this instance, "time" is more important than a few minor errors. Please understand that my opinion would be entirely different if I were getting $.50/person/issue. Still, my opinion isn't the most important one; YOURS IS! So, if you have a definite opinion on this, send me a quick note. If you think I should go with a proofreader make the subject line: PROOF! If you're okay with things the way they are, send a note with the subject line: NO PROOF! ---- Keep the letters coming, they keep me on my toes. Prodigy to Offer WWW Browser at No Additional Cost ================================================== Prodigy announced that when it makes its WWW browser available in early '95 there will be no additional charges beyond the normal $2.95/hr PLUS rate and the necessary software will be downloadable for free. For those of you reading this from a service that allows unlimited access to the WWW for a flat rate, this is obviously not that big of a deal. I'd agree that Prodigy's decision to not levy an additional surcharge on WWW access is not a big deal. Of importance though is that they will be the first of the major online services to offer WWW access. More importantly, this opens up the WWW to a slew of people that never would have gone through the difficulties of configuring a SLIP/PPP connection, or an emulator like TIA(The Internet Adapter). If folks grow addicted to it and want to spend 100 hours a month surfing the WWW, then it becomes in their best interest to explore the other possibilities. For a lot of people though, getting 5 hours per month for e-mail and Internet access (and a host of other information) for $9.95/mo. is a good deal. I know 5 hours doesn't sound like much to a lot of online enthusiasts (myself included), but there are many people who don't have the need for more access. Even for people that use 10 hours a month, a service like Prodigy can still be a very competitive deal. Prodigy Joins the Rest of the Pack With a FREE Newbie Board =========================================================== Prodigy announced their "New Member Bulletin Board" this week. New members will have "free" access to this forum during their first 90 days on Prodigy. Prodigy joins the other members of the big three (America Online and CompuServe)in providing "free" areas for new users. Unlike Prodigy though, members on CompuServe and America Online can get their service related questions answered for "free" at anytime, not just during the first 90 days. (On America Online use Keyword: MHM to get to their "free" Members Helping Members forum. CompuServe has several "free" support forums, including a new member forum. To get the list use GO BASICFORUMS ) I don't want to chastise Prodigy for limiting service to '90 days though. They're probably the only service with a sophisticated enough billing system to pull it off. I applaud them for finally offering such a service. While many can (and will) debate whether such a service should always be free, 90 days seems a reasonable amount of time to get acquainted with the service. Offering such services for free on an ongoing basis would obviously be a nice treat for members. Still, my experience with the forums on America Online and CompuServe has been that there is usually a core group of members who'd like to use these areas as a "free" national BBS to talk about whatever they want. Since it's "free", you can't really blame them for trying to push the envelope of what's acceptable. Final analysis: Free is good, even if for only 90 days. Online Versions of Magazines Turn the Corner ============================================ When magazines first started cropping up online, industry pundits were pretty brutal in pointing out that the interactive versions of the magazines offered nothing compelling and that readers were best advised to stick with the print versions. Having followed the online efforts of Time Magazine, my initial reaction was the same. You got plain ASCII text and it was pretty boring. Searchable databases are nice, but that's not how most people read a magazine. Time Magazine has come on strong though, adding a "Time Daily" version that takes full advantage of combining pictures and text. In addition, the online message area that allows you to interact with the Time staff and other members is usually interesting. They also put on some engaging special events. These services do add value to the magazine content. US News and World Report on CompuServe has evolved in a similar fashion. Newsweek surfaced recently on Prodigy with an implementation that sets the standard for the others (note: I don't know what Interchange's implementation is like because I haven't seen it). Newsweek offers similar services as Time and US News and World Report, but the online version actually looks and feels like, well, Newsweek! (Look for more services like this on Prodigy when they unveil P2 sometime in '95). That it looks and feels like Newsweek has prompted some to say, "What's so special about that? If I BUY the magazine it looks and feels like Newsweek too!" For the most part, I'd agree with that sentiment. But the Newsweek implementation nicely integrates pictures and text and offers some nice soundbytes that you can download while you're reading articles. Further, since Newsweek is indexed and done in HTML they're able to link references to related information within the current issue as well as past issues. A new story about Paula Jones' case against the President might have hypertext links to related articles that appeared in previous issues. I don't view Newsweek as the online nirvana of magazines, but it is a step in the right direction. Now some publishers are beginning to experiment with WWW implementations. Time Warner has set up a site) for several of their magazines (including TIME) and CMP has set up a site for all of their magazines. Many more will find their way onto the web in '95. So far, I like what I've seen, but I don't like the message board implementations on the WWW pages of HotWired and Time. I think it is cool that you can post a message in HTML, but overall the interfaces are still very klunky. That's why it is the "experimental" phase. I tip the hat that often covers my balding head to all of the publishers who are experimenting. The most curious thing to me is all of the people under the belief that these services will be free forever. I get a lot of letters from people asking why they should bother with magazines on online services when ultimately, they'll all be available for free over the Internet. Maybe I'm way out of line to think the publishers aren't quite philanthropic enough to give away the entire content of their publications. I'm pretty certain that they're not so charitable that they'd fork over thousands of dollars to the likes of Netscape Communications for secure server technology just because they think Jim Clark and Marc Andreessen are nice guys. Rest assured, they want your credit card number and they want you to feel comfortable that no net snooper is going to filch it. Those under the belief that everything on the net is going to be free forever are in for a rude awakening and that awakening will probably begin sometime in '95. I think some items will remain free. Maybe publishers like Time Warner will make their weekly publications available for free, a month or so after they come out, as an incentive to keep you coming to their page and entice you to subscribe to the "full service". Many things will be tried. Nobody is exactly sure what will work yet. The Time-Warner site is: http://www.timeinc.com/pathfinder/Greet.html CMP's is: http://www.wais.com:80/techweb/corporate/current/default.html Business Week is Online ======================= Business Week is the biggest business magazine around and now its available online, on America Online (Keyword: BW). I've been an avid reader for years and it is one of my favorite magazines. Content is king in this industry and the ability to boast having Business Week Online is a definite plus for America Online. The Main Menu for Business Week Online, complete with the current cover, is nicely organized. I also like the structure of the table of contents for the current issue. Though it will be confusing for those of you who've been surfing the web for a while. The table of contents is listed with an icon and text explaining what the icon is. I'm not sure if they were trying to mimic the look and feel of the Mosaic style browsers or whether they were just trying to make the text stand out, but they underlined the text that accompanies the icons. Out of habit, I click on just about anything that is underlined. It doesn't work here; you must click on the icon. The overall organization of the area is nice. There are message boards to interact with Business Week writers and other members. There will also be special "interactive" events. Like Time, the full text of Business Week will be made available to AOL subscribers before it hits the stands. As an added bonus, stories that appear in the International version of Business Week are also available. Other bonuses include the "Business Week Online Corporate Directory" where names, addresses, and phone numbers of companies listed in the 1994 Business Week 1000 are listed. In the "What's New" area you'll find "The Best Business Schools", "Business Bookshelf", and "Mutual Fund Corner". Current and past issues can be searched via a search dialog box. Past issues can be browsed by date or topic. It is definitely easy to use. My only complaint about the area is that they failed to take advantage of the capability to merge text in graphics into one form with the issues of the magazine itself. They do use this feature in other areas, but not in the magazine content itself. There are pictures, and they view pretty fast (thanks to the compression technology by Johnson-Grace), there are also charts that can be viewed. I'd like to see the pictures and text integrated. It could be that given that since most people are accessing at 9600 baud, they wanted to give users the option whether to view the pictures or not. But the truth is, the pictures view pretty quickly even at 9.6 Kbps. That they didn't take advantage of this feature (it does exist- to get an idea, go to Keyword: USNEWS and click on "Photo Center"- this will only work for those using the new Mac and Windows front ends) leads me to believe that what several people in attendance at Internet World said is true: the AOL authoring tool, "Rainman" is difficult to use. We'll see what happens next week. What is found in the "Business Week Material to Download" file library piqued my curiosity. There were two files: Adobe's Acrobat Reader for Windows and Adobe's Acrobat Reader for the Macintosh platform. Personally, I'd LOVE to download Business Week in Acrobat format and read it off line. I'm not sure why the files are there. Maybe it is just a coincidence or maybe Business Week has decided that they can't do everything they want to with the "Rainman" tool. Or maybe it is something else entirely. We'll find out in the weeks to come. Business Week Online has online ADVERTISING. Recently an article in an industry publication quoted me as praising online advertising. In fact, I am extremely opposed to "in your face" advertising. But I am not opposed to subtle advertising. Especially if it provides useful information, offsets production costs and ultimately drives rates down. Business Week Online's advertising is even more subtle than I could've hoped for. If you click on "Offers and Info" one of the choices is "Reader Service Online". Clicking on that will take you to a list of "advertisers". Currently it is pretty sparse with offerings for the Power Macintosh, Baltimore, Fannie Mae and the Kansas City area. Here, they DID utilize the forms that combine text and graphics. If you click on Baltimore, you get text on what a wonderful city Baltimore is accompanied by a panoramic view of the Baltimore skyline as seen from Baltimore's Inner Harbor at dusk. There's even a "Reader Service Order Form" so you can order additional (free) information online. There are many who are adamantly and fundamentally opposed to any sort of advertising online or on the net. I'm not sure why anyone would be opposed to the method that Business Week Online has used. It is there if you want it; if you don't, it leaves you alone. I'm not as impressed with Business Week's implementation on America Online as I am with Newsweek on Prodigy. But remember, content is king and this content shouldn't be missed. I'm glad to see Business Week Online and hope to see it evolve into something better. For now, I wish the gang at Business Week Online luck and hope that they're sneaking looks at Newsweek over on Prodigy to get some ideas. SHORT TAKES... ============== My Thanks To... =============== -Clark Internet Services (ClarkNet)- I pay for my account, but they've earned thanks simply for having to put up with all my questions, rants about service and even a few raves about the service. Also, they put me in touch with L-SOFT International, and that's how I got the LISTSERV. -RC (who shall remain anonymous) for putting up with me and letting me bounce ideas for the newsletter off of you and for occasionally teaching me something that I didn't know. Don't get a big head, the emphasis is on occasional! -U.NOHOO (another member of the anonymous club) for always, always, always making me think. I don't always agree with you, but you always make me think. I'll strive to be smarter in '95 if you strive to be nicer. Deal? -FYI Online- My employer! This may seem like a shameless plug, but... without the news filtering technology FYI Online has developed, researching the information for this newsletter would have been a real hassle! -John M. Higgins - For including "In, Around and Online" (and giving it a great review too!) in his monthly "Net Letter Guide". To subscribe to the "Net Letter Guide" send an e-mail to: listserv@netcom.com and in the BODY of the message type: subscribe net-letter . The subject line is ignored. -InterNIC Information Services. Somebody told the scouts at the "Scout Report" about my newsletter and the scouts saw fit to include it in an issue of the "Scout Report", thus putting me on the map (even if you need a really powerful magnifying glass to find me!). The Scout Report is a weekly publication offered by InterNIC Information Services to the Internet community as a fast, convenient way to stay informed on network activities. You can get the "Scout Report" by e-mail by sending mail to: majordomo@is.internic.net . If you want the ASCII version type: subscribe scout-report in the body of the message. If you want the HTML version, type: subscribe scout-report-html . Also available via WWW at: http://www.internic.net:80/scout-report/ . -John Labovitz - For letting me know about his E-Zine-List and including my newsletter in it. Available at: FTP (etext.archive.umich.edu: pub/Zines/e-zine-list); Gopher (etext.archive.umich.edu: Zines/e-zine-list); WWW (http://www.ora.com:8080/johnl/e-zine-list/). -L-Soft International- for providing me with a LISTSERV to automate subscriptions to this list. I couldn't have managed a list of 2,000 myself. Okay, maybe I could've, but I wouldn't have had time for anything else, including this newsletter! For information on commercial licensing of LISTSERV, send mail to: sales@Lsoft.com . -AS who isn't really all that interested in the stuff that goes into this newsletter but reads it anyway! Thanks for the Seinfeld tapes and all the lunches, especially when you know who was there. -Gleason Sackman- For his tireless efforts in compiling the "Net Happenings" list and for the frequent rebroadcasting of my newsletter to the subscribers on the "Net Happenings" List. If you want to know everything that is happening on the net, and I mean EVERYTHING, this is the source! "Net Happenings" is a service provided by InterNIC Information Services and Gleason Sackman. It is available by e-mail by sending mail to: majordomo@is.internic.net . To get each message as it's posted to the list type: subscribe net-happenings in the body of the message. To get a digest version of the list type: subscribe net-happenings-digest . -GS (not to be confused with Gleason Sackman)- your patience and understanding have been inspirational. Thank you. -To the likes of America Online, CompuServe, Delphi, GEnie and Prodigy as well as the entire Internet community for making this newsletter possible to begin with and providing me with countless hours of information and enjoyment! And in the spirit of WIRED magazine... -The hardware and software- Dell Computer for my 486-DX266. I paid a lot for it, (about $2600 1.5 years ago) but it has served me well. -Netmanage- for making the Internet easy to use long before most of the others started getting the idea. -Netscape Communications, for a fantastic WWW browser! -Lots of modem companies for cranking out reasonably priced 28.8 modems. May the new year bring even faster (and cheaper) ones. -The Music- Tom Petty (and the Heartbreakers), The Rolling Stones, Counting Crows, Gin Blossoms, Badfinger, Toad the Wet Sprocket, Pearl Jam and REM and lots of others for rocking me through 17 issues. And most of all... -You, the readers! For reading it, passing it along to your friends, writing in with comments, and making this the pleasurable experience that it has been! Thank you, thank you, thank you! And MORE than most of all... -Suzanne- My mom- who knew about the newsletter and encouraged me. I really miss you. I trust though, that your celestial connections have finally allowed you to "jack in" to our meager info superhighway. I bet they have some really killer multimedia there, huh? Maybe you can talk one of the hallowed muckity mucks into allowing you to send me an e-mail sometime. Thank you for everything! Happy New Year! See you next week.