Well, I'm back. Did ya miss me? Due to a recent move and my attendance at a conference, I had to surrender the tightly held reins of NSD for a bit. Having returned, I meant to deal with this backlog of reader mail.
No sooner had I started, I was swamped with e-mail discussing an article NSD published about Quebec's approach to commercial Web sites. I don't want to bloat this file, so I'll put off dealing with that question till next issue. It should be fun.
LN
Just went through my first NSD. Interesting. Some of it was a little off-the-wall for me, but I'm not everyone either.
R. Vic Falkner
It's always a pleasure to get the latest NSD! I've been receiving your HTML e-mails for a while now and have enjoyed surfing with everyone of them. Just wanted to say thanks again to let you know someone out here appreciates your efforts. Keep up the good work.
Ron
Just a brief, though must-send note. Many thanks for starting my subscription to NSD. I am only sending this 'coz it took all of ten seconds to get your response. Deeply impressed with your mail server. If only everthing else on the Net was as quick then all the hype surrounding, the Net as whole would be justified.
Nice publication - it reminds me about all those things that I should be getting around to.
Yours in awe,
Rahid
Awe? - LN
Just a quick note to say thanks for bringing interesting articles to me. I use the Net daily for work purposes, and for trying to occupy my mind while I'm waiting for my other computers to finish crunching numbers. Your digest always gives me somewhere worthwhile to start surfing.
Incidentally, I recall reading somewhere amongst your initial posts to me that you'd be incorporating advertising of some description to support your operation; I have seen none. After the pages of ads that accompany tipworld.com's meagre "tip" posts, to get such a worthwhile source of information posted to me with no noise whatsoever is highly refreshing. Thanks again - please keep up the good work.
Howard Matthews
We have some advertising, just not entirely of the sort we predescribe. Most of our ads have recently been of the banner ad variety. - LN
A good friend of mine, who has e-mail but no Net access, told me today that she has just signed up with a provider. In re-reading my reply to her, it occurred to me that perhaps it's about time I thanked you people for the service you've provided me for the past several months. What follows is the excerpt from that reply which pertains to you:
Let me know when you've started, I'll send you a list of some of the better Web sites I've visited, and a copy of Netsurfer Digest. I highly recommend it, they've turned me on to most of the best sites I've found, and they only send me a copy maybe every other week. They said when I first subscribed that they would send me advertisements every once in a while, as that's how they support the magazine, but in the several months I've been a subscriber, I've only gotten one. The e-zine itself contains no advertising, just reviews of Web sites. A very non-invasive, low-key, useful publication.
I'm sure you're quite busy, there's no need for you to reply to this.
Bob Newman - Anthony, New Mexico
PS: You really *can* send me advertisements more frequently than once or twice a year, I would not be in the least offended. :-)
Busy? Me? We hate to make a liar of you, but we're including ads in NSD now.... C'est la vie. Seriously, thanks for the kind words. - LN
I am not often impressed. Thank you for a very good, well laid out e-mag. Your contents is bril and I cant wait for my next digest. Well Done.
Neil Simpson
Good show.
R. Vic Falkner
I subscribe to a number of Web info pages, and yours is the very best of the group. I just thought I'd let you know my opinion.
Don Erker
My site was mentioned in your June 30 issue. Besides saying "thank you" for the gracious review, I wanted to let you know what a dramatic impact that citation had on my hits that week. Thousands more visitors came to my site as a result of the mention in your excellent newsletter - as no new features debuted on my site that week, nor any other special awards or promotions occurred, I have to believe the big uptick was due to Netsurfer Digest. Consider this a testimonial to your influence. Thanks from loyal reader...
Pamela O'Connell - Your Mining Co. Guide to Personal Web Pages
I have been reading NSD for a while now, and have discovered many wonderful sites because of it. I like the descriptions and the format. Very well done, and worthwhile. I use it as an example and a tool in my Web class!
Debby Young
Just a quick note to say thank you for including our Net-Announce newsletter in your publication! I couldn't believe it when I saw it and you made my day. I'd be happy to include an article about Netsurfer Digest if you ever want to send me one. Thanks again!
Alicia Polk - Moderator, Net-Announce
I'm not sure I'd be comfortable with sending an article, but you - or anyone - is free to write up your own. I give good interview. - LN
I once sent a very demeaning note to you about the quality of your Web site being only for teenyboppers (see Letters, 3.18). I must apologize. You are still up to your usual standards. I have been receiving NSD for about two years and still find you are one of the most interesting sites on the Internet. I look forward to your weekly download. Please keep up the good work.
James D. Jones
Good, I'm glad you're still aboard. Now, where did I put my pompoms.... - LN
Kudos. You do me a service. I don't have a lot of time to surf the Net. Lot of neat stuff. Keep it up. I look forward to getting NSD.
R. Vic Falkner
OK, Vic, you can stop now. - LN
I'm sure you are not short of compliments. However, I cannot help but to add mine from Argentina. Not only do yo have valuable info, but also a top sense of humor. Its a pleasure to read your comments and to visit the sites you recommend. You are outstanding among the guys making the Internet worthwhile.
Enrique du Mortier
Beyond a doubt the best e-mail I get. Thank you all.
Christopher Fennell
Great.
Sarah Bt. Abdullah
By the way, we use your publication at our once monthly Internet training for librarians here at our library. It is invaluable teaching aid. Thanks!
Dan Fleming- Z.J. Loussac Library, Anchorage, Alaska
At least some librarians still like us - LN
I read about your appearance in a DULL pages review, and I thought "I hope they don't change". I really enjoy receiving your review by e-mail. I cut and past into a file called Newsites which I then have in my bookmarks.
I would like to know exactly how to switch off Java applets etc., as you always say this after a security scare.
Geoff
I'm now using Netscape Communicator 4.01 for Macintosh. In the Preferences box under "Advanced" there are clickable boxes which disable Java and JavaScript. - LN
Please keep the "dull interface". I like fancy graphics as much as anyone but if I want 'em, I know where to get 'em. Your functional interface is very appropriate for the purpose of NSD. Keep up the good work.
Jerry Bundy
Several times you use the word "pockets" when I believe your intent is to use the work "packets". It seems that you're the victim of an overzealous spell checker.
Richard Herrell
PS: This seems like a good a time as any to shamelessly ask for NSD-branded merchandise like a T-shirt.
NSD is less the victim of an overzealous spell-bot than an overtired editor. As far as T-shirts go, we're thinking about it. - LN
Before I relate the little nitpicky comment I have about your fantastic publication I suppose I should get in a few gratuitous compliments: yours is the only mailing list to which I have been subscribed for well over a year. I look forward to receiving each week's issue and frequently scan your Web site for an "advance copy" when my patience wears thin. My girlfriend loves to embarrass me among my friends by imitating my "I-can't-wait-to-read-it" finger wrangling and my overjoyed exclamation "NETSURFER DIGEST!" when a new issue graces my in-box. Your consistently high quality and a tell-it-like-it-is attitude has made me into an addict.
Now for the criticism you've been waiting for: I wonder if it would be possible to include the URLs you publish on one complete line in your text version of NSD. I use Eudora Pro, which lets you click on the Web site directly from the e-mail, and having it on two lines confuses the whole thing and requires some cutting and pasting to the clipboard. That's it. Thank you again for providing well over a year of Web-based entertainment.
Matt Squires
Thanks! Always nice to hear from fans. The URL splitting only happens with looooong URL's, obviously created by clueless webmasters who have no consideration for the rigidly enforced requirements of the Digest.
Actually we try to truncate the text version to 80 characters to fit it through some e-mail gateways. The formatter we use automatically breaks lines over 80 at dashes, underscores, etc. The real solution to your problem is to subscribe to the HTML version, where this is never an issue.
By the way, we may discontinue offering the text version in the near future, at least to new subscribers. Most modern e-mail clients can deal with HTML and it gives us many more interesting formatting capabilities. - AB
Your banner ad, "JEW need a date?", sounds offensive and features what looks like barbed wire on the ad. Poor taste, bad copy. Less noise, please!
Sanders
First off, the ads we just put in NSD are generated randomly. Each time you load the issue, a different ad will be displayed, selected from a pool of ads. Next, that's not barbed wire. That's the Hebrew word "chai" which means, literally, life. It's also used as a symbol of good luck. You see it on necklaces. A Jewish matchmaking service placed the ad, and they obviously don't find it offensive. Neither do I. - LN
Every URL I have ever seen contains a period, as in "netsurf.com". When the screen isn't very large, when a laptop is used, when a URL is written by hand, when a URL is reproduced, and when a URL is sent via facsimile, the dot can disappear, or be confused with a comma.
When the powers that make decisions about the Internet get together, might it be possible for them to consider phasing out the period?
Your summaries are useful and interesting. My only problem is learning how to read them and discard them, rather than keeping them around.
Karl C. Johnson
Next time me and the other powers that be get together for tea, I'll ask them. - LN
I think you're missing the boat on your call on WebTV (NSD 3.20). I find it amusing when the Silicon Valley elite talk about the wonderful democratizing effects of the Internet yet scoff at anyone who might get their access over a device which they already own and are comfortable with. Let's see, I can surf the Net, send e-mail and generally be connected by purchasing a $250 box or I can spend ten times that for MMX Pentium with a 512 kB pipeline burst cache and a 4 MB EDO video card and hundreds of other doo-dads that will be obsolete as soon as I open the box. Which sounds sillier? Granted, a WebTV box is limited in what it can do, but for huge chunks of the population, it's all they need.
Erik Budde
A suggestion for a suggestion: Please tell the readers not to try to copy down the URLs for the various articles from the e-mail; or to print the e-mail, then copy some URLs, then visit the URLs for the various stories and sites.
Instead, there is this wonderful, marvelous, magic technique: visit http://www.netsurf.com. There you will find NSD in HTML (much easier to use).
Do not assume that the readers know that they can or should do this. I didn't, until today.
Thomas L. Jones, Ph.D. (Computer Science)
There's a number of ways to read NSD. Most people, I think, read it in their browser's e-mail client, so the URLs become active links. Same think happens with Eudora light. Failing that, I send these instructions:
1) Save the incoming html Digest as a text file with a suffix of ".htm" or ".html", such as "NSD22.htm" (NOT "NSD22.txt.htm" though; one dot only per file name).
2) Open a text processor (your e-mail program may work, too) and the text file you saved in step 1, and delete the e-mail header (everything before but not including the first line). This is an optional step to make it look nicer. Save the file.
3) Open your Web browser. In the "File" menu there should be a command like "Open File". Use this to find the saved digest on your hard drive and open it.
Any way works; everyone uses what he or she finds convenient. - LN
I noted with some interest the link you made to my Web site. I would like to point out, however, that my name is simply Owsley Stanley. A. O. was my grandfather, and since I never felt that I was the third anything, I had the name shorted in 1967. Most people just call me Bear.
Bear
The New York Times Web site charges $35 a year for subscribers who live outside the US. You said it was free to North Americans. Not so for us Canadians. I am surprised you would provide inaccurate information about the NYT Book Review service.
Phil Menger
Sorry, my mistake. I thought I'd managed to access the NYT site while in Montreal, and I thought I had succeeded. Maybe not, or maybe because I had already registered with a US account. Maybe it was Klingon intervention.... - LN
Greetings from the Klingon Imperial Embassy,
It has come to our attention through our Intelligence Operatives that NSD was kind enough to do a small review on our award-winning Web site "Klingon Imperial Diplomatic Corps" in NSD 3.17.
This subspace transmission is to notify you that we have downloaded your Netsurfer icon and will be creating a link to your site from your review which will be included on our "Awards and Sponsors/Reviews" section of our site as soon as we have a bit of free time to do the appropriate update.
We thank you once again and would suggest in future that you may want to drop a brief note to those sites that you review so that they can possibly create a link back to your site and therefore generate more awareness of your excellent review e-zine. You could possibly even create a "Reviewed by Netsurfer.com" logo or icon for that express purpose as many smart webmasters (such as myself) are beginning to create an awards/review section specifically to showcase these and link back to them. Hope you find the suggestion useful and worth serious consideration.
Death Before Dishonour!
Ambassador Lady K'Zin Epetai Kasara - Klingon Imperial Embassy, Montreal Sector
I have just been examining some of the Web sites included in NSD 3.18 and it has been both a rewarding and frustrating experience. Many of the sites want to set cookies, which I always refuse.
The cookie business has gotten totally out of hand. Almost every site I visited this evening has wanted to set cookies and several make the request two, three, or four times. Isn't once enough? I suggest that you consider mentioning it in you reviews if a site is overly persistant with the cookie request.
Martha Gifford
I actually never see cookie messages, because I don't have the cookie alert selected in Netscape. Click it (for me on my Mac, in the Network Preferences, under Protocols) and you'll never see one again either. Of course, that means that you essentially give in to the cookie request, but so what? A cookie is only a file the Web site creates on your own computer to record preferences and other info. If you don't want it, just delete it when you're done.
Cookies are not you giving info to the Web site, they are the Web site storing info with you. - LN
Not only do you put ads on your -email edition (I can deal with that) but ads that insist on placing a cookie! Ever try to click and drag an e-mail to another folder with Netscape`s "cookie alert" turned on? Instant freeze up. I think I`ll be unsubscribing.
Jeff Towery
Oh well. Maybe try them with milk? - LN
I'm truly disappointed. One of the things I LOVED about NSD was that there were no cookies to spoil my appetite. It's a problem when I have to edit HTML newsletters before I open them in my browser. Please, keep your integrity. I'll even pay for my e-mail subscription if you promise no cookies! (Hey - now there's an idea!)
Dan Metivier
Why not include more "TOP" links in your publication? Perhaps one after each article in the pub's body. I'd read more of it if it involved less scrolling.
Cliff
We include them, in the HTML edition, in each section. It would look too cluttered if we had one after every article. - LN
The links in NSD have "greater than" and "less than" signs at either end. When I click on them, nothing happens. I have to copy the link, open up another window in Internet Explorer, paste in the URL and delete the signs. I am using MS Inbox to read and save the mail. It has been like this for a while. I don't know if anyone else suffers from this problem, but I used to be able to just click on the links. Apart from this problem the digest is a great publication.
Matt King
It is disconcerting to click on the URL for a site in your newsletter only to find that it does not work, as is the case with the Internet Cafe Guide. Perhaps you can check these sites more closely before yoou actually list them.
David Isenberg
I personally check each URL a day or so before we begin mailing it out. (Sometimes I forget and leave one out, but that's another story....). The Intenet Cafe Guide worked the day before we started mailing, and was last updated on that same day. Maybe it was down for maintenance when you knocked on the door? - LN
I have recently subscribed to Netsurfer Digest. I found several or the sites that you reviewed interesting and tried to reach them to no avail. I am new to the Web and must admit that some of the markings in the addresses you give have me stumped. For example, after one address in the Digest came this: "><". Is this part of the address? I tried both ways and still couldn't connect to this or several other sites.
And my husband was one of those one or two in a million people interested in http://www.antiquelures.com/.
CardyK
The symbols you describe are part of the formatting. It has become standard to place URLs between greater than and less than symbols. Ignore them and just use what's between them.
The sites you mentioned worked for me. Sometimes my ISP has a domain name server outage, and nothing, or few things, can be reached. You're with AOL, so problems are not unheard of. Try again tomorrow - the sites are there.
Cool about your husband. Now I need to find the other one. - LN
My compliments on a great magazine. There is one improvement I would like to suggest. In spite of bookmarking many URLs, there is always something I want to get back to a few issues later. But I can't recall which issue the information was found in.
Are there any plans to do a comprehensive index of just the one liners that point to the URLs in each issue (yearly or bi-annually would be great)?
Pete Danan
Sure, we give you a search engine and now you want the moon. Jeepers. Seriously, we're incrementally making NSD more user and editor friendly. We'll take a look at your idea again when it comes to the top of the pile. - LN
I've had too much wine and I have just started to peruse your latest digest. I got into about two topics in and had to write. Thank you so much for your great smorgasbords.
Alan Anderson
I hope the wine was fine.... - LN
>From NSD 3.23: "Until October 15, you have another chance to hack a Mac server and claim a SEK 100,000 prize. Every Mac attack contest so far has ended without a winner. You'd think that by now the point would be made."
Uh oh, you touched the third rail. Obviously the dark side pursues (almost daily) another patch to their servers to keep them "secure". And they're still NOT, and nary a word from you erudite snobs. The fact is that ANY non-Mac server is costing you and me money (ask a guy who makes a living off of keeping them breathing).
The point will never be made until the masses realize that they're getting hosed (including you); either you enjoy cold KY, or you're just bad journalists - oh-what-a-surprise.... The hump goes on.
Alan
Why am I getting hosed? I use a PM 7200/90. In fact, I take great glee in pointing out security patches for Windows machines. - LN
Ooo, morning came early. :-/
I have to put a sign on my computer that says NO WINE BEFORE USING. I am one of the diehard Mac owners and when I perceive a dinger against Mac I usually over react like I did last night. Now I find out you drive a Mac too. Geez, you really know how to hurt a guy. Apologies if I offended you.
The truth is that I find your digests just short of terrific; OK just long of it then, and I think the writing is excellent and witty.
>Why am I getting hosed? I use a PM 7200/90. In fact, I take great glee >in pointing out security patches for Windows machines.
This does need pointing out, mostly by Apple. Every company that uses PCs spends more money to support them. Those costs must be added to the cost of doing business, i.e. added to the cost of every product or service produced. You and I pay for that inefficiency in two ways, at the register and in the economy at large in terms of productivity.
And if that isn't enough, along comes the year 2000 fiasco. I can't remember the latest estimate for "correcting" that, but it's huge. And, once again, you and I will pay for it. Bummer.
Alan
In NSD 3.20, you wrote: "Believe us when we say we can't wait for this danged coffee metaphor to meet its altogether-too-tardy demise." One man may know when this will happen: Mr. Bean (although he may think that JavaBeans are relatives living in Indonesia :-) ). You don't know who Mr. Bean is? Well, look on the WWW; there are sites about him all over the Web.
Just kidding.... Regards to you and all the people of NSD and keep on the (very) good work!
Matt Houben - Maastricht, The Netherlands
If you mean the Rowan Atkinson character, I'm a big fan. - LN
I'm from Portugal, and I would like to give you, Mr.Lawrence Nyveen, congratulations and support for the creation of this great service by mail of the NSD. The subjects are very good and text very ease to read and understand.
As a stundent of International Relations, and a lover of the Web I see the NSD as a easy way to get good informations about the web and media by mail. I just would like to ask if you can give me some informations about other mail services as NETSURFER DIGEST related with news, more precisely, international news.
Marco Almas
The only news service I use via e-mail is the Daily Brief, which is like a little collection of newspaper clippings. They have an OK section of international news, at least by American standards.
You might also want to search the Net search engines, with keywords like "international", "news", "e-mail", or others. - LN
We are lucky enough here in the UK to get some Internet programs such as CNET and PCTV on cable and unlucky enough to get them well out of date. The one thing that has struck me is that they have never shown any operating system besides Windows 95.
Why does every program from the USA think that we have constant phone connections to the Internet?
I among thousands of others have given up on Windows 95 and have gone back to my old system where I am in charge. It's just as well as Garbo has stopped taking Win 95 shareware uploads permanently! They must know something I don't.
Paul Simpson
As far as Windows 95 goes, I see Macs in demos rather often - no surprise, since a Mac is so much more predictable.
The open-line assumption derives from Silicon Valley culture. It is almost unheard of for computer tech companies not to offer Net access at work, usually on a T1 line. Just about the entire computer industry is online whenever thay are at work, which is a lot of the time.
What's Garbo, by the way? - LN
Garbo is a software repository for non-commercial software authors. It used to accept uploads of DOS, Windows 3.11 and Win 95 software but now is only accepting DOS uploads and has scrapped Win95 altogether. The reason I'm telling you this is that I was fed up of hearing about DOS and Win 3.11 being out of date, obsolete, or worse. The facts speak for themselves: it is Win95 that is being rejected and yet everywhere you turn it is rammed down your neck.
A fair crack of the whip is called for for other users besides Win 95 users please.
Paul Simpson
I found your e-mag very interesting and useful, and I wonder why there is not a French version of NSD? Is it because there is no audience for such a version?
A. Yazid
There probably is, but we don't have the resources to do the translation ourselves. There are some organizations already translating NSD into Magyar and Bulgarian (I think). If someone volunteers to do French, I don't see why the NSD chiefs wouldn't let them. - LN
I just noticed that your latest issue of Netsurfer Digest says "Monday, July 21, 1997 - Volume 03, Issue 20" but we're now in the end of June 1997. I guess it's a misprint.
No big deal. Netsurfer Digest is great.
Eric Schechter
Why does your latest issue say 7/21/97? Summer doesn't last long enough as it is in Michigan - please don't push it.
Mary David
We didn't want to say anything, but it involves NASA, a wormhole, and a bottle of tequila. - LN
I received the latest NSD with this in the header: "Monday, July 21, 1997 - Volume 03, Issue 20"
You are truly an operation ahead of your time. (About a month....)
Paul Heffner
Well we try. :)
Thanks for the tips. Bad clock drift correction on our server time warped us into the future. All is well now and spacetime has returned to its usual curvature. - AB
In NSD 3.20 (Monday, June 21, 1997), an article entitled "Netspeak Uncoded" suggested using Netdictionary <>) to find definitions of terms such as "Java beans" and "magic cookies." Neither of these were in the dictionary. Inaccurate reporting can damage credibility.
Wally Opyd
At least you didn't notice we also screwed up the date.... - LN
Not much for me this time.
R. Vic Falkner
Three out of four ain't bad. - LN
Address your letters to
editor@netsurf.com.
Letters and signatures edited for clarity and brevity.