You can barely swing a dead cat these days without hitting something in print about the Internet.

NBC News lists their E-Mail address. CNN frequently spotlights the Internet. The White House has a Home Page on the World Wide Web. Any Internet user can send the President a personal E-Mail message. We might even find Mother Theresa surfing the Net, if IBM's recent advertisements are an accurate indicator.

During the January earthquake in Kobe, Japan, we saw a report on the television about how the Internet was being used to get information in and out of Japan. When the Tienemen Square fiasco went ballistic, the Chinese Government prohibited journalists from sending video out of China. Guess what they used to get the news reports out?

The Internet is an amazing thing. It's like a living organism, constantly changing and evolving, and expanding at an alarming rate, sort of like Rush Limbaugh.

So, have decided to "hang out our cyber-shingle" and merge a few metaphors onto the on-ramp of the Information Super Highway for you aspiring digital commuters. It was none other than our current Vice-President, Al "You Can Call Me Al" Gore, who is credited with coining the phrase, "Information Super Highway". We promise that we will NOT use the phrase any more, now that we have used it here. No one is really sure what he meant by it, but it provides a wonderful source of metaphors for journalists.

Here's what will be covered in future issues:

Learning the Language of the Net: My POP can beat up your POP

Try these on for size: TCP/IP, SLIP, PPP, FTP, Archie, Veronica, Jughead (really), Gopher, WAIS, Finger, WHOIS, T1, 56K, Shells, POP, UseNet, Ping, Mosaic, Flaming, and Spam. These terms, and more like them, are used in casual conversation among Internauts. We'll attempt to explain these in plain English.

Choosing a Provider: Can I get this through Cable?

Here we will talk about the types of connections available and compare providers, detailing the types of services they provide.

The World Wide Web: Step Into My Parlor...

We think that this is the hottest part of the Net. The WWW (as those who "surf" the Web call it) is a global network of documents that are all linked together, usually at some very oblique angles. In a Web Page, one can promote anything one can think of, and spice it up with pictures, sound clips, video, and pretty much anything else that can be put on a computer.

The beauty of the Web is that for you to actually use it, all you basically need to know is how to do is operate a mouse. When you are reading a Web Page, it may contain a word or phrase in a different color (like in Help screens in Microsoft Windows). By simply pointing to the word or phrase and clicking it, in a matter of seconds (depending on traffic and the Speed of your modem) you "jump" to the place where the thing lives, and it is effortlessly brought to you. All for the price of a local phone call.

We'll compare the "Web Browsers" such as Mosaic, NetScape, Cello and Lynx, along with what it takes to use them and where to find them. By the way, they are mostly free.

E-Mail: In Cyberspace, Junk Mail Travels Even Faster

This article will examine the phenomenon of E-Mail, and how it can be successfully used to do everything from communicating with your family to getting support from software companies.

We'll review several popular mail reader packages and discuss how E-Mail could potentially do away with the U.S. Postal "Service", displacing thousands of heavily armed Postal "workers".

FTP: Forget diskettes - You can get your software through your modem...

This column addresses the extremely powerful File Transfer Protocol, which is quickly becoming the standard means by which software is moved about the planet. We'll compare several popular FTP client packages and list some sites where you can go for lots of free software.

HTML: If You Can Use A Word Processor, You Can Make a Hundred Bucks an Hour

This will cover HTML, the HyperText Markup Language, the "language" used to make up Web Pages, with a sample page, a summary of the most frequently-used commands (tags) and even a sample screen capture showing what it looks like.

It will also provide listings for HTML resources of on-line documentation and places where people can set up personal Web Pages for free.

Netiquette: In Cybserspace, Spam takes on a whole new meaning.

There is protocol on the Net. And we're not just talking about the tech stuff here. Those who don't follow these mostly-unwritten rules can quickly find themselves deluged with hate-mail, commonly called "being flamed". This can have serious repercussions, not the least of which by pushing the wrong person's button, one can have their entire life wrecked in a matter of minutes.

The list of subjects could theoretically be endless.

See you next issue.

Jon Sisk
www.jes.com

Original article for Computing News & Review, January 1995

Copyright © 1995 Jonathan E. Sisk.