Your Netsurfer Digest is really great. I have recommended it to my e-mail friends. Keep up the good work.
Carolyn Trimble - Hermiston, Oregon
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I subscribe to five or six weekly digests. Yours is by far the best. Good broad content - enough to please most people - plus live links to the Net. Love it. Just wanted to say thanks, so few do today.
Dick Graf
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Still the best and the only one that I don't "trash-it". I read it till the end.
Tom Berry
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I've been with you since the beginning (remember that thing with the heavens and the earth), and I think that NSD is definately the best bunch of URLs going. I also like your little intro pieces, which are very helpful (and even fun to read). Thanks again.
Norm Ershler
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You people do a very good job--literate, useful and timely.
John McGrath
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I have a class about the net, not a very good one, and the instructor asked me where I learned HTML. I said from reading Netsurfer Digest before I save it as an HTML file! I just thought I should give credit to the ones who deserve it. Thanks :)
Joe Milon
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I was reading the new issue of Netsurfer Digest when I came upon the reference to our "Thanks" page. Just to let you know that your review was the only one we've thought so far had a lot of thought behind it and made us laugh.
Andrew Vitale - Publisher, Enter Magazine
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I just wanted you to know that I have only just started getting your online digest and I already have withdrawls until the next one comes. Keep up the good work, as I can imagine how tough it is to produce a product that is as interesting as yours.
Jeffrey Fox
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While wandering around the World Wide Web a month or so ago I came across NEtsurfer Digest. Not being one to "subscribe" to anything, I went ahead and did it anyway. I am not sure what I expected, but it couldn't have been what I got. I have only received three but I actually look forward to them each Sunday, already. There is a lot of junk on the Web, and there are pearls. I suspect a lot of folks would agree, Netsurfer Digest is a pearl. Easy to read and digest (don't exactly know if I intended that as a pun or not) and all done, it seems, with the reader in mind. While I may not, I think I understand all that you write, something that is not always easy to come by in a technology-driven entity like the Internet. I am sure I will not always agree with all that you put up on my monitor's screen, and I will probably tell you about it, but, I wouldn't listen to me to much, I'm retired, getting old, and am only a visitor in this bewildering new virtual world. What am I really trying to say? Simply put, thanks.
Chas.
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I just wanted to give you guys some great feedback. I think your publication is just superb. It is consistently good with lots of great tidbits of info and not the usual crap that is put out there by people like CNET's newsletter or the others that I get.
I look forward to each issue you guys publish. My hat is off to you and your staff!
Bruce Bennett - Palo Alto, California
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I don't know to whom I should turn. May I ask you a question? Do we have a kind of newsletter telling us about cool sites or new sites daily?
And, I'd like to say that I'm a fan of Netsurfer newsletter. I will feel terribly if you stop. Please go on for sake of mankind :-)
Saran Maitreiwech - Thailand
Thanks for the kind words. I don't know of a daily newsletter like ours, but there are a few sites that post daily cool URLs. Try a Net search. - LN
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you asked for it if you ask me
but just to add to your
your the few compliments that you had received thus far
far i would like to add
like i really like the contents
like i really like the writing style here like are you guys really not just
asking for it for it when you mention how little letters you get get
i like the gosh i think this is enough enough am i going to get a reply for ?this pang!ouch...
KS Pang
No. - LN
alright so i was pushing it a little but really, thanks for that
that semblance of an answer it's a
it's a true classic.
cool.
now if i could just print it out and show some of my friends the kind of beautiful relationship i am developing over the net while they rot in their mundane life so that if they are as desperate as i was they need only suffer rejections like "no" over the computer screen. that is what i call mitigation. rejections like this i can't get enough of...
did i say you were ?cool
KS Pang
And then....
sorry i didn't mean to make a fan club out of the tirade of junk i sent over to the editor@netsurf
you must understand 21 yrs male college-newly-grad in malaysia just don't have a life
you invited trouble when you replied
but do pardon my indulgence
pang!ouch...
KS Pang - Malaysia
Is it really that lonely over there? By the way, that "No" was a steal from Winston Churchill, I believe. - LN
I read in the FAQ why you don't publish on a Web page:
"The second reason is that we do not want our WWW server to be a choke point for our readers. Why have thousands of readers trying to hook up to our machine and potentially wind up in a giant traffic jam, just to link to an unrelated site they read about in the Digest? From the standpoint of reliability and bandwidth usage it makes sense to mail out HTML source."
Frankly, this rationale just doesn't make sense to me - everybody is publishing on the Web! And lots of them have thousands of readers.
Damien Barkan
We have over 60,000 subscribers _and_ another 50,000 readers at the home page. We have little servers, not great huge pipelines. Can you imagine how slow it would be if 100,000 people all tried to get the Digest on the same day? - LN
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Is there anyway to receive your subscription some other way instead of e-mail? Is it possible to receive some sort of written publication via regular mail?
Ashley Davis
Nope. Just e-mail. You can read NSD at our Web site too, but we don't put out a paper version... yet. Stay tuned for further developments regarding a certain computer magazine. - LN
Subject: http://www1.tip.nl/users/t850232/
The credit for this site having solutions, patches, etc. to "hundreds" of games stretches the imagination. In fact 32 games are now listed by my count with multiple entries for problem solutions. Perhaps this is a source of help for some but clearly your description exaggerates its value. A little accuracy always helps in journalism.
Bob Langston
I wrote that article myself. I said we didn't count. - LN
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I've been a fan of Netsurfer for many a month now, and find it an indispensable aid to surfing.
How wonderful to have dropped into my mailbox every week a list of sites that I can browse through, picking 5 or 8 that sound interesting and then later connect so that I can view them. And, as often as not, get at least one bookmarkable site. (Especially thanks for Evil People and Cool Tool Of the Day).
So it was particularly annoying tonight to find that your ad for Microsoft included a live graphic link, i.e. in order to read the Netsurfer Digest I have to go online, to collect what is undoutedly a silly graphic of no interest to me.
Please desist from this practice in future editions.
Janus - County Kerry, Ireland
Hey, we need to eat. I think the majority of our readers accept the occasional inconvenience in exchange for the cool, _FREE_ service we provide. A ravenous dog normally doesn't mind the styrofoam packing around a raw steak you throw in front of him. Not that you are in any way canine yourself. - LN
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l love netsurfer; most interesting stuff I've seen on the Web. But what's your business model? Just curious.
Wes Thomas
OK, it's not Angry Mail. But it fits. Wes, q.v. - LN
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This is an open letter to all Webmasters. My basic plea: please don't overdo it!
I connect to the net with a 14,400 bps modem, like many other people. The current trend to exotic images on WWW pages is wreaking havoc on my connection times.
I've heard about Java and ActiveX, animated GIFs, and other strange techniques. All of them seem to increase the time it takes for me to see a page.
I've seen pages that send a black-and-white GIF, and then overlay it with a color version of the same image! Where's the sense in that? Just send the color image and get it over with. There are the cutesy ones with the little animated icons, like the letter being put into the envelope, or the spinning globe, and all the others. Please, get rid of them.
Here's the bottom line: if I think your pages take too long to view, I won't view them. Keep them clean and simple, and I'll thank you for it.
Gerry Wheeler
Paying attention, people? - LN
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Does posting to a USENET Newsgroup or a LISTSERV mailing list constitute marking a message "for public use?"
John K. Mahony - Burbank, California
Although it hasn't directly been tested in court, it is generally accepted that this would be copyrighted, too, within the limits of fair use. You could not, for example, copy an essay someone wrote on some point and publish it yourself without the author's permission. You could, under fair use provisions, quote the essay or paraphrase parts of it for use in an original work such as a news article or position paper. Right now, the most common practice among Net journalists is to ask permission of the author before using a quote in an article, though the journalists may not legally have to do so.
Anyone out there able to add to this? - LN
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I have been in Canada for a couple of weeks and just read #18 &19. 18 was full of good useful stuff. Thanks for a great issue! I cut and pasted it to my business partner in Germany who is not on the Web yet to show him what the younger generation is doing on the WWW. He is 56 and I am 65 and worked for IBM from 1957 until 1968. I then became involved in the plug compatible industry and then spent my last 12 corporate years as a corp. V.P. at Dataquest. I am having a ball watching the WWW evolve and am becoming a techie again. Netsurf is just like having a Reader's Digest of the WWW. I read every issue and check out a lot of the sites.
Anyway, keep up the good work you guys!
Cliff Lindsey - Whidbey Island, Washington
p.s. In case you are still reading, my current crusade is to find a big player to license our proven technology (patents) to allow printing of daily newspapers in the home and office on eraseable paper. Change the paper once a year. Cost, same as home delivery. Getting good response, but nobody wants to take the lead yet. We have 10 million eraseable plastic loyalty cards in use in Japan, and two deals cooking for 10 million card orders. We think there is a 20 year market window for the newspapers before the internet and wireless media replace it. Any thoughts from your end on this?
So you no doubt have noted the particularly Canadian flavour of NSD. I am from Montreal; one of our writers is, too. Another strange parallel: I used to work for Reader's Digest in Westmount, Quebec.
Your idea may work, but I don't think paper will be replaced soon. Until you have some medium with which you can lie in bed, or put your coffee cup on, newsprint and/or glossy magazines will stick around. They're just too comfortable and flexible. Maybe battery-powered, waterproof flat screens.... - LN
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I watched a PBS program on TV tonight on the Internet, and they highlighted your service, I registered to try it for a while, so I will see what comes forward. It is good that one of the principles in your company has been educated in Canada, at McGill in Montreal, that means you will have excellent content! The PBS show was an excellent advertisement for your service, get them to run it again. Good luck.
Allan Purdy - Halifax, Nova Scotia
Sun Ming Lieu, who you are probably referring to, got her McGill degree in biology in the early 1970s. She has little to do with the Digest, though she has an active role with the parent company, Netsurfer Communications. I'm guessing you mean Sun Ming - I haven't seen the program.
But even without Sun Ming, there is a strong Montreal/McGill connection. I grew up in Montreal before attending university in Texas. A bachelor degree in biology/anthropology and a year of a Ph.D. program later, I returned to Montreal and worked at the McGill Nutrition Centre for four years.
The really funny (ironic, not haha) thing is that I left grad school to attempt to get into med school. McGill was one of many institutions so sorely lacking in judgement that they passed on me two years in row.
So basically, the Digest, through me, has a Montreal attitude in general, though not specifically McGill. Well, let's modify that statement - it has an informed Montreal attitude. You'll never see a homeopathy page in our publication, for example, or astrology.... - LN
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I popped right over to Bingo Zone after reading your digest. I played all day long yesterday and today. At the 6:30 PM game today, I had a bingo and pressed the appropriate button. I got a message saying that I had called a 'BAD' bingo. I went back and rechecked my numbers. I had all the right ones checked, and all that were checked had been called. I also won the same game on another card. I sent them an email message and have not received a reply. Just thought you might like to know that just possibly, they are not on the up-and-up!
Deborah DeStefano
I sent a letter off to Bingo Zone asking about this and got the following reply.
I am all too aware of this person. Unfortunately, she is not only in the wrong, she is hostile and threatening.
Ms. Stefano wrote us to dispute a bingo claim she made which was not declared a winner. The reason it was not delacred a winner -- the reason it was a "bad bingo claim" -- is because while the game being played was a "frame" style bingo game, Ms. Stefano mistakenly believed she was playing in an "X" style bingo game. Ergo, when she submitted an "X" style bingo claim, it was rejected. This was explained to her. (As you might imagine, we keep very stringent controls on and records of our game data in anticipation of exactly this type of user query.)
Nevertheless, Ms. Stefano has persisted in harassing us, escalating what began as (what we thought) was a routine user query into... into... we don't know what. Ms. Stefano has become more and more incensed and has begun to threaten us.
(For an insight into Ms. Stefano, note that in her letter to you she complains that she has not yet received an answer from us. Her note to you was sent Thu, 20 Jun 1996 20:13:46. Her first letter to us was sent Thu, 20 Jun 1996 18:56:49, that is, only one hour seventeen minutes earlier.)
We are happy to submit this dispute to you or anyone for arbitration. But may we submit that -- since we have 30,000 registered users and 100-450 players per game, every game, every 30 minutes -- if we were in some way scamming or defrauding legitimate winners, we would a) be inundated with complaints, and b) quickly become the brunt of flaming and considerable negative commentary all over the Internet? Neither of these is the case.
We will without hesitation supply you with whatever materials you require: copies of all the correspondence between Ms. Stefano and The Bingo Zone, copies of her specific, disputed bingo cards and bingo claim submissions and the records/schedules of the types of bingo games played on the dates in question, etc., etc. If you choose to air this dispute in your publication, we ask only that you give us ample time/space/consideration to respond.
Steven Kane - President, nineCo, Inc.
So who do you believe? - LN
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Thanks for providing good information. Did you know that Internet Link Exchange is placing non-expiring cookies in your cookie file? They do it just by using their banner cgi. Read your cookie file if you don't believe me! The data they leave there encodes which Link Exchange sites you've visited. They can attach a consumer profile to your e-mail address that way. Don't seem to mention it in their description of their "service"....
cooler
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I really enjoyed your letters to the editors section of Netsurfer Digest. In particular, I found the letter from Ed Lee (the EE guy who worked for Burroughs in the '50s) to be interesting.
In general I find it quite interesting to talk with people who used, built, programmed computers back in the early days. Do you know of any forums (on the Internet) where this might be possible?
Joe Miller
You caught me on a good day. But, no, I don't know of any. Try a search at Yahoo or Alta Vista. - LN
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"Apple and its turnaround plan"
I just realized. That's an Apple Turnover.
Tom Berry
Wish I'd thought of that. - LN
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Hi, my name is Pete. Are you looking for people to write stories for Netsurfer Digest? If so, I would LOVE to! I saw your Web page and your publication on "Life on the Internet" on WMHT. I am going into 9th grade and have served on a school newspaper as a reporter and desktop publisher for two years and am planning to serve more in my high school's newspaper next school year. I am also good with computer graphics. PLEASE consider my offer!
Pete Kolts
Wow! Go get 'em, cub reporter! Unfortunately, we already have more writers than we need. This isn't a cop-out - I am rather intrigued by the idea of a ninth-grader on our staff. If we ever need writers, you and every one else can be sure we'll ask our readers first. - LN
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Subject: SF for the Masses, 7/18
Sci-Fi Entertainment Magazine is actually part of "The Dominion", the Sci-Fi Channel website. I, "Ed Flixman," am the editor of the print edition of that magazine, from which the Web content is drawn.
My own site, Ed Flixman's Hollywood, previews work that I do for the print magazine - but the presentation is rather crude, as I am not a trained designer.
Your praise for the presentation, then, largely belongs to the in-house computer staff at the Sci-Fi Channel (the features that you mention, including my own interview with Dean Devlin, are all part of their site). The noted difficulty of navigating back to "Ed Flixman's Hollywood" - my own site - is no greater than the difficulty of linking back from any off-site link.
I understand the confusion since, given the framed interface, only the frame's URL appears while navigating SFE from my site. But I can't accept praise for the work done by the Dominion staff.
Hits are way up, though; thanks!
Ed Flixman
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"Quick, what's the largest prime number? Anybody who gets the answer (2 to the 859,433th power minus 1)...."
Nope. This is noise, not signal.
This is the largest KNOWN prime number. Early on in first semester Number Theory it is proven that there is NO largest prime number.
Assume p is the largest prime number. p! + 1 is not divisible by any prime number less than or equal to p (the remainder is 1). Therefore, p! + 1 is either divisible by a prime number larger than p, or is itself prime. In either case, we have contradicted the assumption that p is the largest prime.
Fairly straightforward, actually.
By the way, I like your e-zine. In general, it has lots of signal.
Keith Kornfeld
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Uh... that's the largest *known* prime! (Prime Time NSD 02.23)
Thanks.... Great link....
Doug Stickney
I have one word for that little boo-boo: AAAAARRRRGGGHHHHH. I should know better. - LN
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I am not an Apple fanatic, although I do like them when they are in season, but I am glad that you unmangled the name Tesler. As you might be able to tell, I have a vested interest in it.
Alex Tesler
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As I obtain such great pleasure from your wonderful mag, it would give me great joy to make a gift of it to my son. Would you kindly subscribe him? He has a Mac.
Thank you for brightening the days of a retired doctor.
J. Kaplan - South Africa
I included this letter because it struck a chord with me. A retired gentleman in South Africa writes me to subscribe his son in Australia, which I do. All this happens in an hour or so, for tenths of pennies. Isn't that what this Internet thing is, in a nutshell, all about? - LN
Address your letters to
editor@netsurf.com.
Letters and signatures edited for clarity and brevity.