August 27, 2001– Newsletter #145

Greetings, Weekend Silicon Warriors,

Did you hear…

Look out for the name PathControl. It’s a product from
RouteScience Technologies that allows users to analyze
the Internet and find the fastest, least clogged-up,
path to get from here to there. PathControl is priced over
$100,000 USD so it’ll be ISPs and Company sites buying
it first, but sooner or later a home version will pop up. If
it does what it’s supposed to do, this will be a pretty big
seller.

The U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled
against Michael Doughney’s site PETA.org. No,
Doughney isn’t a supporter of animal rights. The site was
purchased to create the parody site “People Eating Tasty
Animals”. The joke not only lost Doughney his domain,
but also a third of a million dollars in court costs and
attorney’s fees. Ouch.

Guess what country uses the Internet the most? The U.S.,
right? Nope. It’s South Korea followed by Hong Kong
followed by the U.S. That’s according to
Nielsen/NetRatings. South Korean users spent an
average of 19 hours and 20 minutes online during July.

Now on to the opposite end of the scale, authorities in
France say that the Internet is just not catching on.
According to a CNN story only 20 percent of homes in
France have the Web. That’s down considerably from 2000.
Now cell phones, that’s a different story. Over half
of the country has one.

Now onto today’s topic…

This past Saturday evening, my wife and I went to a fish
restaurant that we were told was the greatest place within
one hundred miles. It wasn’t. In fact, my spicy catfish
was so bad I simply pushed it aside in favor of the Italian
bread.

Meanwhile, my wife was enjoying her meal so she was
little conversation. I began listening to the foursome
sitting next to us. The conversation dealt with a couple of
gentlemen attempting to pitch a franchise idea to a thirty-
something couple. It had to do with a record store
containing a malt shop. The pitchman likened it to a Sam
Goodies.

The pitch went on until the seller proclaimed that the
main company would provide a Web site.

But wait! There’s more! (To be performed in best
pitchman voice)

The thing that really interested me was that this couple
was seemingly clueless when it came to the Internet. The
woman freely admitted she had never been on the Web.
She was a mother and didn’t have a computer. The
husband had email at work and that was about it.

Well, this guy went on and on talking about how people
from other parts of the country can use the Web to check
out another city. One can read a local newspaper 1000
miles away and make reservations, and all the basics of
traveling to a place without actually traveling to a place.

Now, the couple wasn’t blown away, but they were
impressed. What got me was that I heard from them what
I hadn’t heard, or felt, for a while.

These people were in awe of the Internet.

It’s been a while since I have been in awe of the Internet.
I’ll bet it’s been a while for a few of you to. I liken it to
the first time I could drive on my own. My car was the
greatest thing ever invented. I couldn’t wait to get in it.

Now it’s just a way to get from here to there.

I make my living on the Web and sometimes, when
deadlines come looming, I get tired of the Web. I want to
walk away from the Web.

Cookies. Pop-up ads. SPAM. Privacy issues. Nasty
people. It all just piles up after a while.

If you haven’t read it yet, I urge you to read a column by
Andrew Leonard on Salon.com. It’s titled R.I.P. World
Birthday Web and you’ll find it at:
here.

It puts an exclamation mark on just what I had been
feeling off and on lately. The Web was no longer the
stunning thing that I couldn’t wait to get on. It had
become just a way to get from here to there.

Well, not to sound too maudlin, but listening to those two
people got me thinking about a newsletter. This
newsletter. What I actually had written for this week
you’ll get next week. I just wanted to get my ideas onto
paper right away. I bored my wife all the way home with
this one.

If the Web has become just a way of doing things, if it
has become just another way of communicating, if it has
become something that you somewhat dread using
because of one reason or another, stop and walk away
from it for a couple of days. Talk to a young kid just
getting on the Web.

The Web hasn’t become anything less than it was, we’ve
simply taken it for granted. We’ve gotten use to it.

If this is you, if you feel this way now and again, oh how
I wish you could have heard this couple being impressed
by this guy’s stories of the very basics of the Web. It
would have re-ignited the Web lover in you.

Think about it at its very basic level. You are sitting in
Snake’s Belly, Idaho and are emailing a guy in Lucerne,
Switzerland. That’s unbelievable.

Think about this. I am writing this newsletter on a
Sunday morning. This time Monday, over a quarter
million people will receive this text.

Think about that. I know using repetitive words when
writing is bad, but that’s unbelievable. It becomes even
more stunning when you compare what it would have
taken to get 250,000 people this text just fifteen years
ago. Could it have been done? Sure! It would have cost
a ton, people would have had to pay for it and it would
have made this newsletter a best seller.

Really! This newsletter goes out to more people than
have bought my HTML Goodies book…and it’s a best
seller!

That’s unbelievable.

If the Web has become just a way to do business or just
another form of communication much like the telephone
to you try to step outside of your world and see it all over
again. I was lucky enough to listen to a true newbie
being impressed with just the smallest thing.

I also think the next time I suggest to someone that I did
something on the Web and he or she passes it off as old
hat with a wave of a hand, I think I ask them if they really
understand what it takes for that to happen. Hopefully I
can get that person to stop, think, and proclaim…

That’s unbelievable.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

That’s that. Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed it.

Joe Burns, Ph.D.

And remember: What do these line have in common:
“Madam I’m Adam,” “Harrah!” and “A man, a plan, a
canal, Panama!” They are all Palindromes. They are
spelled the same way backwards as forwards.