Netsurfer Digest Staff

Publisher & Executive Editor

Arthur Bebak

Vice President and Publisher

Sun Ming Lieu

Editor, Netsurfer Digest

Lawrence Nyveen

Production Manager and Netmaster

Bill Woodcock

Staff Writers

Regan Avery

Kirsty Brooks

Steven Bobker

Judith David

Jay Haight

Brendan Kehoe

Michael Luke

Elizabeth Rollins

Ken Schulze

Melissa Story

Grace Tierney

Jonathan Turton

Gavian Whishaw

Teresa Zelkas

Longer ago than he cares to remember Arthur was educated at the University of Illinois where he picked up a degree in Computer Engineering on a fencing scholarship (go figure). Fleeing Illinois topography for more vertically challenging terrain, he wound up in California designing mainframes and doing critical project management for Amdahl Corporation. He studied business administration at Golden Gate University and has worked with large Internet companies, such as Netscape, Doubleclick, SCO, ShopEaze and others. Today he helms Netsurfer Communications and uses his considerable and hard won experience to consult on matters of cyberspace. Arthur is the co-author of Creating Web Pages for Dummies, part of a popular series of technical guide books for beginners. In his voluminous spare time Arthur hallucinates in Perl.

Sun Ming Lieu - Vice President and Publisher

Sun Ming drifts through life catching fun and interesting projects. These include, in no particular order, being Chief Cat Herder at Cygnus Solutions, the first and largest Open Source Software company, capacity planning for Charles Schwab's web trading servers, a Ph.D. in Theoretic Plant (the little green ones) Morphology, judging the Global Information Infrastructure Awards, daytrading through the meltdown of summer 98, and remodeling fixer-upper houses, companies, and friends. Currently her eclectic outlook is behind the erratically-published Netsurfer Focus.

Bill Woodcock - Production Manager and Netmaster

Bill Woodcock is a TCP/IP and AppleTalk networking consultant in Berkeley, California. He's the one who maintains the hosts that bring Netsurfer publications to you. Being an engineer by trade and an artist by education, Bill likes to think of himself as a dabbler in each, by turns. He's the author of McGraw-Hill's Networking the Macintosh, and writes regularly for Network World and Connections, and occasionally for MacWorld and MacWEEK. He sits on the board of the Apple Network Managers Association, and sits on standards bodies of the AppleTalk Networking Forum.

Lawrence Nyveen - Editor, Netsurfer Digest

Lawrence (usually known as Laurie), was a writer and copy editor with Netsurfer Digest until tapped for everlasting fame and of all free time as editor. He grew up in Montreal, attended Rice University in Houston (B.A. in biology and anthropology), and soon found himself studying ornithiscian dinosaurs at Yale.

One thing led to another, and soon Laurie was walking across the stage, receiving his grad diploma in journalism from Concordia University in Montreal. After a short stint at a real job with Reader's Digest (Canada), he eventually hooked up with Arthur, who was looking for something he had to offer. It was probably the glamour of Reader's Digest. Either that or his tie.

Besides editing NSD, Laurie takes care of his two little girls, Elisabeth and Ilana; serves as DNRC Minister of Adding "ue" to Words That End in "log; sends people around the world to virtual flaming deaths in WarBirds; writes for Netsurfer Science; and does some freelancy stuff. He's responsible for hiring Barnes (q.v.), proof that the judicious purchase of beer for others can at times be a career-opening opportunity.

Staff Writers

Regan Avery

Regan Avery is a network programmer and Web surfer for an online company. Tricked into this whole Internet thing in 1991 by some friends, she received her M.A. from George Mason University in English, which naturally (?) led to a job in tech support. Like any good computer geek, she exists on a diet almost entirely consisting of caffeine and yellow #5. If you're in the Washington D.C. area, you may see her frequenting local circuses and Renaissance festivals, her true passions in life.

Kirsty Brooks

Kirsty Brooks is the Director of Driftwood Manuscripts, an assessment and editing agency for writers. She has written for The Republican, Tribe.com, The Sunday Magazine, The Weekend Australian, Netsurfer Digest, Cleo, Adelaide Matters, Cosmopolitan, Australian Bookseller and Publisher, and On The Street as well as the internationally distributed board games Sex and the City, Popstars, Secret Sounds, Battle of the Sexes and Big Brother.

She has published two books, Hitching: Tales from the Byways and Superhighways and Mad Love. Her third, a novel, Lady Luck, to be published in April 2002 by Wakefield Press, has been judged a 'Hot Book for 2002' by The Weekend Australian. Her radio play On the Rocks will be launched at the Adelaide Fringe in 2002 for ABC-online. She has a Journalism Degree and has spoken at writers' groups, festivals, book stores, seminars and workshops.

She is currently working on a humorous P.I. crime novel, The Vodka Dialogue and the sequel to Lady Luck (working title, Bossy Boots).

Steven Bobker

Steven Bobker saw his first computers in 1964. He fell hook, line, and Fortran IV. Twenty years later Macs arrived - a real personal computer. What was merely a major hobby quickly became an all consuming passion, and then a job as Technical Editor on the MacUser start-up team. He soon became the editor-in-chief of MacUser and, later, its Chief Scientist and Chief Visionary. His long-held belief that computers were for the masses and not just the techy, geeky elite became firmly set during this period. In 1992 he created the editorial package for Windows User, serving as both editor-in-chief and editorial director. He has also written regular columns for MacUser, MacUser UK, Computer Shopper, and MacGuide. As an online service veteran of the late 1980's (he met Hilary, his wife, on CompuServe when he was in Palo Alto and she was in Brooklyn), an Internet addiction was a foregone conclusion. Now, with a 24/7 DSL connection, he is in heaven. As the owner of Raw Fish Systems (Webs and Words) he currently writes about and consults on Mac and Internet issues. Still one of the strongest believers that personal computers are for ordinary people, he also provides personal technical support for a select clientele. He does not do Linux and won't until it supports a GUI as good as the Mac's.

Judith David

Judith David adds to the disproportionately represented Canadian contingent at NSD. She never did settle on a major, but of what she learned in postsecondary institutions, propaganda studies and the philosophy and history of Western law seem to have stuck best. This, of course, didn't stop her from being editor for four years of the Canadian Medical Association's monthly publication on medical politics and economics. (It's Canada, folks. Remember health care as a social good and all that stuff.) She now freelances as a writer and small publications designer and - wouldn't you know it - works mostly with health care organizations. Judith's Irish wolfhound and Doberman do not share her interest in archery and Delta blues.

Jay Haight

Jay Haight majored in anthropology for a couple of years at a small midwestern college -- until it occurred to him that all known anthro graduates were waiting tables. Given this scenario, he opted out and moved as far west as he could go without actually falling into the Pacific Ocean. He ended up hooking into behavior analysis and modification, tying that to zoology, and finally working among very large animals. Along the line, he worked with computers. Room-filling ones. Little ones that took the place of the room-fillers (and didn't require all the flipping of toggle switches).

He still works with big animals, and still works with computers. There are more similarities than differences.

Brendan Kehoe

Brendan Kehoe has been writing since he was little, and using computers for even longer. Somehow these two obsessions haven't yet completely overpowered him, allowing him the ability to actually get married, move to Europe, and still go outside. After working as a hacker and a manager at Cygnus Solutions (previously known as Cygnus Support, and now part of Red Hat), Brendan decided to spend more time on his writing and on working with kids. This hobby of writing, which took the form of ``Zen and the Art of the Internet'' and ``Children and the Internet'' in the 1990s, is continuing in other book projects, magazine articles, and seemingly endless ramblings that are even occasionally read or heard by other people.

Ken Schulze

Ken Schulze, a former medical editor, is a full-time Web developer for the Radiological Society of North America, a nonprofit medical society with headquarters in suburban Chicago. He was born in suburban Cleveland and, as the youngest of three children, grew up there and in suburban Detroit. An alumnus of the Univ ersity of Michigan with a major in English literature, Schulze has acted in college and community theater and had a brief career as a free-lance writer. He enjoys biking, swimming, and other cardiovascular pastimes such as driving a neat convertible and teaching his nephews the fundamentals of basketball. He also has active interests in science, technology, personal investment, pop culture, and condominium management.

Melissa Story

Melissa Story has been writing since she was a child. Abandoning her love of the written word, she established other forms of creative expression through acrylic painting and mixed-media art. Convinced she would lead the life of a starving artist, she sought "real world" career opportunities and found herself pursuing an Advertising and Public Relations diploma at St. Lawrence College in Kingston, Ontario. After college, Melissa was hired as an Event Planner for an event management company based in Toronto. Shortly thereafter, she was lured by a competing event management company and took on the role of Operations Manager for two and half years. Casting aside the bureaucracy of the corporate world, Melissa left to return to her true passion, writing. Currently working on several short stories and her first novel, she spends most of her day staring at the computer screen and developing various plots for the next big seller. In her spare time she enjoys creating strange pieces of artwork, digital video editing, reading, gardening, and spending time with her two feline companions. Presently residing in Ottawa, Melissa hopes one day to move to greener pastures and raise chickens, ducks, and Billy goats.

Grace Tierney

Grace Tierney is a writer by night and an Oracle database administrator by day. Her work has been published on ThoughtCafe, Adlib, Dig-it and NetSurfer Digest. Her first year on the web was 1993 during her Computer Applications degree, and she hasn't escaped since. She even got dragged back to do a masters about it, but finding her husband en-route was a pleasant distraction. She has recently realized that succumbing to her Gemini nature by being a tech-head AND a writer is the only way to stay sane. She is still mainly paid by the IT work but at least she isn't gibbering as much. During her increasingly chaotic free time in Dublin, Ireland she enjoys gluttony, reading, gardening, travel, watercolour painting, walking, motion pictures, yoga, crafts, alpine skiing, and juggling time. She claims that her experiences as a liturgical dancer have taught her how to laugh at herself, before everybody else does.

Jonathan Turton

Jonathan first got lost in the Internet when he fiddled with gophers at university. Graduating to the web affected his eyes and his sanity as he used it to research his Masters thesis on Montreal's economic competitiveness. Following some freelance work for the European Commission he was thrown in over his head at Corporate Finance magazine. He is now assistant editor at this (he asked us to say "prestigious") magazine which (again, we have only his word for this) is read by some 10,000 CFOs and treasurers of multiantional corporations. Though under pressure, he refuses to relinquish his Web Site of the Month column where he relives the halcyon days of running his university comedy society. Oh yes, he's British - and loves cricket.

Gavian Whishaw

Gavian Whishaw lives and works in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada and serves as CIO for a local business publication and media company. He received his undergraduate degree from the University of Lethbridge, Alberta and his M.A. in English Literature from the University of Victoria, British Columbia. He has worked extensively in marketing, sales and especially high-tech project management and administration for print and on-line media. His most recent project was software development director for a proprietary business intelligence application, of which he is very proud but none of his family understand why. He enjoys writing and reading fiction and has had a few short stories published here and there. Currently he is scheming about jobs in other locations, like Seattle, or Prague. He would really like to work for an electronic gaming company in the capacity of software development director.

Teresa Zelkas

Teresa Zelkas is a former writer and managing editor for print publications in New Orleans, Louisiana (Gambit, New Orleans Magazine) who moved to Thessaloniki, Greece so that she could throw herself a going-away party for which invitations were inscribed "It Ain't Easy Being Greecey", a statement that was to prove prophetic. These days she designs web sites and tries to avoid saying "epitagi horis antikrisma". Her interests include computers, art, books, puzzles, cooking, and four of the seven deadly sins.