EVERYBODY'S INTERNET UPDATE ==================== Number 8 - December, 1994 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ An online publication of the Electronic Frontier Foundation Edited by Adam Gaffin, adamg@world.std.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ This month: 1. Around the world in 80 minutes 1.1 The journey 1.2 FYI 2. CyberChristmas 2.1 Dueling Santas 2.2 Dealing with holiday depression 3. Services of the Month 3.1 Business 3.2 Geology 3.3 News 3.4 Wine 4. Public-access Internet providers 4.1 Alberta 4.2 Manitoba 5. Contact info ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 MINUTES Wherein our intrepid editor determines to take a virtual tour of the whole wide world... 1.1 THE JOURNEY In 1872, Jules Verne based an entire book on the then unlikely premise that somebody could travel around the world in 80 days. Things have certainly changed since then. And with the Internet seemingly reaching everywhere these days, I began to wonder: sitting at my keyboard, could I circumnavigate the globe in cyberspace? And could I do it, not in 80 days, not even in 80 hours, but in just 80 minutes? Why not? With only a slightly raised eyebrow from my wife, I set out in search of provisions for my trip. First stop was work, to pick up a Toshiba laptop -- better to travel light than to try to lug around the old desktop machine, after all. Next came an electronic visit to Project Gutenberg's online library to grab a copy of Verne's "Around the World in 80 Days'' (available via anonymous FTP at mrcnext.cso.uiuc.edu as/gutenberg/etext94/80day10.txt). It just seemed right to try to replicate Phileas Fogg's original itinerary. Here's the route sketched out by Fogg and his companion Passepartout: London to Suez via Paris, Mont Cenis and Brindisi by rail and steamship; Suez to Bombay by steamer; Bombay to Calcutta by rail; Calcutta to Hong Kong by steamer; Hong Kong to Yokohama by steamer; Yokohama to San Francisco by steamer; San Francisco to New York by rail; and New York to London by steamer and rail. But how to simulate the actual challenge of getting from London to Suez, Bombay to Calcutta? I would start out blind, with no idea of how to get from A to B, hoping that, through some standard Internet search mechanisms, I could find the means to get from one city to the next and, ultimately, back to where I started. I would endeavour to do my traveling via the World-Wide Web wherever possible (more specifically, on Lynx), with occasional side trips atop a gopher (a very large gopher, to carry all those provisions). Of course, I would have no shadow from suspicious police inspectors, but you can't have everything. To stay true to Fogg's voyage, that means beginning in London. As you may recall, Fogg started out in a London's men's club. That club is long gone, Luckily, with the help of CityLive! magazine (http://web.city.ac.uk/citylive/), we settle in at the Ballroom Dancing Society in New Hall (http://web.city.ac.uk/citylive/clubs004.html) -- membership's only 3 pounds and 50p a night, seems like an excellent deal. And so we are ready, me and my faithful companion, Toshiba. The clock ticks toward 8 p.m. As the chimes on the grandfather clock ring out (oh, OK, "Babylon Five" comes on the TV), we are off. We hit g to go to EINet's Galaxy, (http://galaxy.einet.net), T.'s favorite Web searcher (you have to go to the bottom of a Galaxy page to find a search form). For the rest of the evening, we hope, Galaxy will join us on our expedition as tour guide, leading us along Fogg's path. But first to book package on a steamship line. How else to get around the world? I type in "steamship." Nothing. "Cruise." Nothing again. Gad, would we be stranded in London, unable to get even to the coast? Then Toshiba remembers another place to look -- Yahoo at Stanford University. Quickly, I hit g and type "http://akebono.stanford.edu/yahoo" (T. has a mind for these addresses). There's a search key at the bottom. Clicking on it brings up a one-line form. "Cruise,'' I type. Several items pop up. We don't really care about NetCruiser (Sorry Netcom). Ah, but what about The Avid Explorer - a travel server sponsored by Explore! Cruises & Expeditions (http://www.explore.com)? Sounds like we're getting warm. We connect and find it's a travel agency in Chapel Hill, N.C. that specializes in "leisure and international travel." Getting even hotter. Let's try "Travel Forums." Oh, look! "Cruising!" (http://www.explore.com/E_cruise.html). Pay dirt. Norwegian Cruise Lines. Carnival Cruise Lines. Looks like all the cruise lines in the world. But Star Clippers (http://www.explore.com/sc/SC.html) looks interesting. We learn this company specializes in ships modeled after 19th-century clippers. And then we come to the entry for the Star Flyer: "For 1994 the Star Flyer sails the Mediterranean in summers out of Cannes to Corsica, Portofino, St. Tropez, and Monte Carlo using either the Tyrrhenian Route or the Ligurian Route." We book passage immediately. We board quickly and head for France. Returning to Galaxy, we head for Paris. A quick Galaxy search finds us at the Institut de recherce et coordination acoustique/musique at the Centre Georges-Pompidou (http://www.ircam.fr/ircam-e.html). We peek into what seems to be a telethon for sick children (http://www.ircam.fr/solidarites/telethon.html), where, we learn "En effet, plus de 60 000 personnes cotoient le Centre chaque week-end." T. is horrified at this Anglais at an institution at the very heart of French culture. I am equally shocked that the French are hosting a telethon for sick kids without Jerry Lewis. So we bid them a quick adieu. Back to Galaxy for Mont Cenis, but no luck; apparently there are no Internet servers there. We attempt to book passage to Brindisi, but again, we find that no cyber- ships stop there. We would have to content ourselves with a detour through the rest of Italy. First is the Piedmont Supercomputing Center (il Centro Supercalcolo Piemonte), in Turin, in the north of the country (http://www.csp.it/). They thoughtfully provide a clock, where we see it is "02 hours, 09 minutes and 20 seconds of 17 November 1994." We are making good time. We take a side trip to Sardenia, where we browse a history of Sardenia (http://www.crs4.it/~luigi/SARDEGNA/sardegna.html), in which we learn that "from 1365 to 1409 the kings or giudici of Arborea Mariano IV, Ugone III, Mariano V (assisted by his mother Eleonora, the famous giudicessa regent) and Guglielmo III (French grandson of Eleonora) succeeded in occupying very nearly all Sardinia except Castel of Cagliari (today Cagliari) and Alghero.'' Who knew? Now onto the Suez. Several searches reveal nothing in Egypt itself, so we to settle for the Archaeological Survey in the Eastern Desert of Egypt (http://rome.classics.lsa.umich.edu/projects/coptos/desert.html). It is now 8:25. India beckons. Returning to Galaxy, "The beauty of INDIA--Unity in Diversity" (http://www.cs.clemson.edu/~nandu/india.html) pops up. We find numerous files related to India, including one on the state of Maharashtra (http://www.clemson.edu/~nsankar/india/states/maharashtra.html), whose largest city happens to be Bombay (a fact we learn after opening several files on Indian states). We read that "If you want to see the vibrant economy of a new India, this is the place. The stock market may be of interest. Do the city tour, go to Elephanta Island, and look at some of the architecture - London in a tropical climate." But time is wasting. We need to book passage to Calcutta. Fortunately, this site also has detailed information on Indian trains (http://www.clemson.edu/~nsankar/india/guide.to.india.html#Section9). We learn that "Indian trains are great, and are good value, You can take trains everywhere, going overnight to save on hotel fare. Even travelling first class most of the time is still cheaper than staying in most guest houses and is much more comfortable (and private) than second or third.'' And so off to Calcutta, in the heart of West Bengal (http://www.clemson.edu/~nsankar/india/states/westbengal.html). We discover that Calcutta is "definitely, the most crowded of all major Indian cities. Visit the Victoria Memorial if you are interested in historic places. The Calcutta Zoo is the largest in animal population but too crowded for comfort. Try the hand pulled rickshaws for a novelty. Busy shopping centers in the cowrungee area. Lots of theatres and artsy places. Good seafood. WATCH YOUR POCKETS. Crazy soccer fans in the city so if you like the game try to see a match." All very interesting, and useful even. But are there no Internet resources in India itself? Yes! We find a gopher site on tourism in in India that is actually on the sub-continent (gopher://soochak.ncst.ernet.in/11s/mtdc). We return to the Star Flyer (even today, pound notes still talk) for the voyage to Hong Kong. Our baedecker, um, Galaxy, gives us several entries for Hong Kong. We go first to Hong Kong Net (http://www.hk.net), but there's not really much local flavor there. So we amble over to the Hong Kong Department of Building and Real Estate gopher://gopher.bs.hkp.hk/). Like our friends back in Turin, they have thoughtfully provided an online clock, on which we see it's 8:55 a.m. local time. We should be moving on, but feel compelled to look around a bit. Our perseverance is rewarded when we stumble upon an interesting set of statistics about skyscrapers: TALL BUILDINGS Name of Building Country/City Height/Storey Completion ---------------- ------------ ------------- ---------- Millennium Tower Japan/Tokyo 750m 2000+ Nina Tower Hong Kong 468m 1998 ChongQing Tower China/ChongQing 428m 1997 Petronas Tower Malaysia/KL 422m 1996 Sears Tower USA/Chicago 415m 1974 Asia Plaza Taiwan/Kaohsiung 400m 2004 Jin Mao Building China/Shanghai 395m 1997 La Tour Sans Fins France/Paris 393m ?? Empire State Building USA/New York 357m 1931 Central Plaza Hong Kong 291m 1992 Landmark Tower Japan/Yokohama 277m ?? (gopher://gopher.bs.hkp.hk/00/CAREinfo/HongKong/Technology/tallbuilding.txt). But now it IS time to move on. We reach Japan around 9:08, our fingers getting tired. NTT, the Japanese phone company (http://www.ntt.jp/), runs a Web server with tourism information (http://www.ntt.jp/japan/TCJ/TOURING/00.html). We spend several minutes looking for anything in Yokohama, finally finding the address and telephone number for the Yokohama International Tourist Association. We want to find something more substantial, but there's no time to dawdle. It's now 9:15, and we still have roughly 9,000 miles to go! Onto San Francisco, and step on it! Disaster strikes. We try to get back to Galaxy and... Nothing. Something's wrong. Galaxy is not responding. Precious seconds tick away. We disconnect and try another route. Most Lynx installations have as their default home page the original World-Wide Web server in Geneva (http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/DataSources/WWW/Servers.html). Quickly we run through the geographic list until we get to California http://www.llnl.gov/ptools/california.servers.html). There, we find the Bay Area Restaurant Guide (http://emerson.netmedia.com/IMS/rest/ba_rest_guide.html). We hit enter to get there. Again, something's wrong -- we can't get in! This also happens with a Bay Area hotel list. Arrgh! So there we are in the middle of San Francisco, with nothing to show for it. But again, no time to waste. For the first time in our trip, we are forced to use a site whose address we already know -- the gwis.circ.gwu.edu gopher, which we know has gopher://gwis.circ.gwu.edu/00/General Information/Train Schedules/Amtrak Train Schedules/1._About_Amtrak"> Amtrak schedules. We race to the train station and jump aboard. Back to the CERN Web server, we jump to New York and find the Spydoor Web On-Line Magazine at New York Internet provider Panix (http://www.panix.com/Spydoor). It's all about the Big Apple, so we pause for a quick look. In the "Features" section we find "Tales from the front: The hunt for a Manhatten Apartment,'' by Abby Ellin and "The Cabs of Manhatten County,'' by Crisp. We pause momentarily to wonder about New Yorkers who can't spell "Manhattan" right, then jump aboard our waiting clipper and speed back to London and the Ballroom Dancing Society. The clock reads 9:20 p.m. We've done it! And we retire to the kitchen for a well deserved pint. 1.2 FYI If you want to follow in our footsteps, perhaps at a more leisurely rate, point your Web browser at http://www.std.com/NE/worldtour.html. 2. CYBERCHRISTMAS Tis the season and all that... 2.1 DUELING SANTAS Great, it's not enough that you have to explain to your kid why there's a different Santa at every mall you go to, now you have to tell her why there's at least three Santas on the World-Wide Web. Yes, it's dueling Santas! Who has the better North Pole weather forecast: Snowflake the Elf at northpole.net or Donder and Blitzen at Citylink? Do you go for the cutesy reindeer recipes at Citylink or the more realistic (i.e., gross) recipes over at north.pole.org (not to be confused with northpole.net)? Send e-mail to Santa or fill out a Web form to him? Oh, it's enough to make one hope for a visit from the Grinch! In the interests of research, let's visit all three. We find Santa Number 1 at http://www.neosoft.com/citylink/xmas/default.html. First thing you see is a free "letter from Santa'' that you can customize for your very own child. All you have to do is download the thing, load it into a word processor, subsitute his name for "(Child's Name)" and print it out. Whee! Next is "Santa's Christmas Favorites." That could be interesting. But open it up and, guess what, it's an online mini-catalog just full of expensive stuff that Junior couldn't possibly want (Scarves? Clocks? I don't think so). Sure, Santa and commerce are inextricably linked, but is the big guy so strapped for cash that he has to turn the workshop into a showroom? I flee to Santa Number 2, at http://www.northpole.net. There we find another canned message from Santa, along with similar messages from Rudolph and the Elves. And, oh, look, for only $5, you can order an "I e-mailed Santa" button! Oookay! Onto... Santa Number 3 at http://north.pole.org. Here we find a Santa with an Attitude (more precisely, elves with attitude, Kris himself stays pretty much out of the limelight here). One thing though: no crass commercialism here. In fact, the first thing you see is the Cyberspace Christmas Campaign, where good little boys and girls can get lists of worthy causes that could use some donations. In fact, every time someone visits one of the homepages of the listed charities, corporate sponsors give a dime to the charity (just like a telethon, but without Jerry Lewis). Kids can also fill out a North Polargram to send to Santa, and even look up some recipes from Rudolph: "A tasty concoction of the best from the frozen tundra. Rudolph says the green slimey moss works the best. He mixes in the exotic taste of ginger and penguin feathers to create a true taste treat." "Penguins" is highlighted; click on it, and you read: "Yeah, yeah, yeah. We know! 'There are no penguins at the North Pole.' We hear it all the time. Bet you think reindeer can't fly either!'' There's even a variety of digital Christmas trees and ornaments free for the downloading, starting with the City Tree (A moderate tree with few colors. Kind of like those pitiful artificial trees you end up with when you're stuck someplace you'd rather not be) and ending up with the Juniper Supreme (when only the finest will do, this JPEG file will turn your pixels from mere bitmaps into bundles of Xmas joy. Dragging this data through woods may tire your modem out, but these bits are worth the extra effort. For extra fun, decorate the national tree with Socks the Cat!) This Santa is good friends with the folks who do the "Geek of the Week" radio show on the Internet and other sound-intensive activities, so it's no surprise that a lot of the choices are sounds of elves hammering away, singing songs and the like -- which is no doubt really nice if you have the time and equipment to download and play these things. Conclusion? Kids will probably prefer Santa #2 at http://www.northpole.net. Adults, though, should head straight for Santa #3 at http://north.pole.org. 2.2 DEALING WITH HOLIDAY DEPRESSION Some people just do not deal well with the holidays. Although a telephone call or in-person visit with a trained professional or even close friend might still be the best way to deal with holiday depression, there are some on-line resources to which you can turn. For 40 years, the Samaritans have offered help to people thinking of suicide or who are seriously depressed. In July, the Cheltenham, England branch of the Samaritans set up a "Help by E- mail" campaign. They report receiving up to 3 messages a day -- 40 percent from the U.S. The address is jo@samaritans.org. Another resource is Griefnet, a gopher with lists of groups that help one deal with bereavement, suicidal thoughts, serious illness, etc. Connect to gopher.msen.com and from the main menu, select Good Causes, then Rivendell (or if you are using a Web browser, the URL is gopher://gopher://garnet.msen.com/11/causes/rivendell). 3. SERVICES OF THE MONTH 3.1 BUSINESS In addition to the resources mentioned last month (netupdate.007), there is an entire hierarchy of clari. newsgroups that carry wire-service business news. If your site has a Clarinet feed, look for groups starting with clari.biz. The Small Business Administration, which has long run a toll-free bulletin-board system, is now available over the Internet as well, via both gopher (www.sbaonline.sba.gov -- yep) and via the Web (http://www.sbaonline.sba.gov). 3.2 GEOLOGY Why does California have so many earthquakes when New York doesn't? Why is there so much oil in Texas? A couple of months ago, the U.S. Geologic Survey started its Ask-a-Geologist e-mail service to answer questions like these. Send your questions to ask-a-geologist@octopus.wr.usgs.gov. The service promises a reply within a couple of days. But please don't ask questions about specific sites -- like whether your house is in a floodplain. 3.3 NEWS Der Spiegel, the German newsweekly, is now online on the Web at http://spiegel.nda.net/nda/spiegel. Although most of the online content is in German, there are some English summaries. And Time is online as well, at http://www.timeinc.com. 3.4 WINE Look for information about the grape beverage on the Web at http://augustus.csscr.washington.edu/personal/bigstar-mosaic/wine.html. Besides links to other Internet resources, it also lets you leave tasting notes for other enthusiasts, as well as special information on wineries in Washington state. 4. PUBLIC-ACCESS INTERNET PROVIDERS 4.1 ALBERTA Edmonton. Edmonton Free-Net, (403) 428-3929. Log on as: guest. Menus. $15 a year. Full access requires completion of written form. Voice: (403) 421-1745. 4.2 MANITOBA Winnipeg. MBNet. (204) 474-7100 or 275-6132. At the UMnet prompt, type "enter mbnet" and hit enter, then, "enter guest". $50 a year for 25 hours, plus $1 an hour above that; $25 set-up fee. Manitoba residents only. 5. CONTACT INTO Everybody's Internet Update is published monthly by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Current and back copies are available by anonymous FTP or ncFTP at ftp.eff.org in the pub/Net_info/EFF_Net_Guide/Updates directory; by gopher at gopher.eff.org (select Net Info, then EFF Net Guide, then Updates); and by WWW at http://www.eff.org/pub/Net_info/EFF_Net_Guide/Updates/ To receive the updates via e-mail, write to listserv@eff.org. Leave the subject line blank, and as your message, write: add net-guide-update To obtain a copy of the entire EFF Guide to the Internet, use anonymous FTP or ncFTP to connect to ftp.eff.org and look in the /pub/Net_info/EFF_Net_Guide directory, or use gopher to connect to gopher.eff.org and then select Net Info and then EFF Net Guide. You'll find several versions for different types of computers. The file netguide.eff is the generic ASCII version. To reach Update Editor Adam Gaffin, write adamg@world.std.com. For general information on the Electronic Frontier Foundation, send an e- mail message to info@eff.org. To ask a specific question, write ask@eff.org. Everybody's Internet Update is copyright 1994 by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Washington, D.C.