*** ANSWERMAN INTERNET EXTRA *** Sunday, April 28, 1996 Welcome! This is a weekly newsletter for the community of new Internet users on America Online. It is brought to you by AnswerMan, AOL's area for those learning to use the Internet. Come see what's new at keyword ANSWERMAN. ||| IN THIS ISSUE || | Purple's Picks Purple ponders places to find the perfect mailing list Upcoming AnswerMan Chats Answers of the Week What is Usenet? What are newsgroups? How is Usenet organized? How does Usenet work? The End ||| PURPLE'S PICKS || Three sites to help you find the perfect mailing list | by CJ Purple Welcome to the first edition of this newsletter and this column. The purpose of Purple's Picks will be to do quick reviews of a few useful and informative Internet sites each week. Hopefully they'll be ones that will help you be a more efficient and more productive user of the World Wide Web and the Internet. In that vein, I'd like to talk to you this week about three sites that all provide information on Internet Mailing Lists. If you don't yet know about this fun way to discuss topics of interest to you and to fill up your e-mail inbox :->, you can find out more at Keyword: AnswerMan > Accessing the Internet via AOL > Mailing Lists. Mailing lists are a great way to discuss just about any topic -- but since there are thousands of mailing lists, it can seem like a daunting task to find ones covering the topics you are interested in. With that in mind...these three sites all contain databases that you can search to find the Mailing List that you want to join. (By the way, AOL also has such a database, at Keyword: Mailing Lists > Search the Database.) The first site is "Publicly Accessible Mailing Lists" (http://www.neosoft.com/internet/paml). This is a very popular site--it contains about 1500 lists in its database. The information contained in this site is also posted to Usenet (more on how to search Usenet another time) in news.answers and news.lists. You can search the list in one of two ways: by name, or by subject. However, unlike the other databases we'll talk about soon, you can't enter your own search term, but rather have to pick on of the approximately 250 subject categories (eg. psychology, business, etc.) Some topics only have one list mentioned under them, others have quite a few more. Information about each mailing list includes a short description of the list, as well as information on how to subscribe. The second site is "CataList--The Catalog of Listserv Lists" (http://www.lsoft.com/lists/listref.html). This site is run by LSoft, the makers of the Listserv mailing list software, so the only Mailing Lists listed here are those that run using the Listserv program--which as of today topped 8,300 lists! This site is updated automatically and frequently, so you can trust the information to be pretty up-to-date. You can browse the lists, or search for Mailing Lists of interest. An interesting side benefit to this site is that you can also see the number of subscribers to each list (In case you felt a need to know that there are 3,524 subscribers to the "Human Molecular Genetics" mailing list. :-) The final site is "Liszt - Directory of E-Mail Discussion Groups" (at http://www.liszt.com/) This site is by far the most comprehensive of the three, cataloging 35,158 (!) Mailing Lists from around the Internet. The site offers powerful search capabilities. It offers descriptions of many--but not all--of the lists. Descriptions ranges from simply a copy of the list's "headers" to a short description and subscription information. I hope this helps some of you who were looking for information on Mailing Lists. If you have any ideas for types of sites you'd like to see reviewed in this column in the future, please e-mail me, CJ Purple. Until next time! ||| UPCOMING ANSWERMAN CHATS || Chat live with AnswerMan in these hour-long sessions | Pick an interesting topic & bring your questions | Keyword: AM CHAT Wednesday, May 1, 9PM EST "Graphics on the Internet" This hour, AnswerMan will explore the world of graphics on the Internet. He'll show you how to find pictures, clip art and other graphics on the Web, Usenet and with FTP. He'll also explain what you need to view those graphics on your computer, and point you to free software for viewing graphics offline. Thursday, May 2, 9PM EST "10 things YOU can do with e-mail." Maybe you think electronic mail is just for business, or for sending love notes to your sweetheart. Maybe you don't think e-mail can be very useful to you. This session, AnswerMan will show you ten things you might not know that you can do with e-mail -- like send a free fax, play games, and get free technical support for your computer software. If you think e-mail is ho-hum, this session might change your mind. Friday, May 3, 9PM EST "Best and Worst of the Web." There are more than five million pages on the Internet's World Wide Web. As you might expect, a few are great, many are mediocre, and some are downright horrible. During this hour, the AnswerMan will point you to sites that select the "best" and the "worst" of the Web. If you're interested in finding material of the highest (or lowest!) quality, this is the session for you. Sunday, May 5, 6PM EST "Using Internet Search Tools" The Internet is vast--so vast that there is almost sure to be something of related to topic you can name. The Internet is also home to more than a dozen excellent "search engines" -- tools that will help you find information. Which search engine should you use? Which one is best? Well, that depends on what you're looking for. This hour, AnswerMan will show you how to use the right tool to find what you're after. ||| ANSWERS OF THE WEEK || This Week: Usenet Newsgroups | Every day, AnswerMan answers a question about the Internet in the Answer of the Day. (You can get this daily dose of Internet info by going to keyword ANSWERMAN and pressing the "Answer of the Day" button.) This column features some of the most popular Q&A from the previous week. This week, AnswerMan delves into the innards of Usenet newsgroups. *** Q: What is Usenet? What are newsgroups? If you've spent any time on the Internet, you can't help but hear about all these fantastic netnews groups that are part of something called the Usenet. Usenet is the Internet's "bulletin board." Newsgroup discussions are among the most fascinating and diverse sources of content on the Internet. Newsgroups offer America Online members the unique opportunity to participate in discussions on a wide range of subjects with millions of people around the world. Newsgroups are similar in concept to the message boards that you find throughout America Online. The major difference is that -- since these newsgroups are distributed through the Internet -- you'll find many more topics (and millions of people!) in these discussions. Not a network in the common sense of the word (that is, a bunch of wires connecting machines together), the Usenet acts like more of an intellectual connection system, where you can become involved in any of thousands of specialized groups discussing topics ranging from growing Bonsai to Pakistani culture to modem protocols, C++ programming, hang-gliding, or upcoming Grateful Dead concerts. The Usenet is simply the largest, most active, and most varied discussion forum in the world. Imagine a bulletin board on the wall. Imagine that as people pass it, they glance at what's there, and if they have something to add, they stick their note up, too. Now imagine that there are thousands of bulletin boards in this building, and that there are actually tens of thousands of buildings throughout the world, each with its own identical copy of the bulletin boards. Got it? That's Usenet. Usenet was created in 1979 when two graduate students at Duke University, Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis, hooked their computer to another at the University of North Carolina. In 1980, there were two sites with Usenet. At the end of 1993, there were an estimated 120,000 sites on Usenet, representing over 4.2 million participants. A true experiment in free speech and barely controlled anarchy, the Usenet's range of discussions, called newsgroups, is astonishing, all the way from computer modem protocols (on comp.dcom.modem) to Macintosh programming (on comp.sys.mac.programmer) to topics of relevance to single men and women (on soc.singles) abortion (on talk.abortion) and even the wonderful TV show Mystery Science Theater 3000 (on alt.tv.mst3k). What subjects are available in newsgroups? Just about any subject you can think of! You'll notice that each newsgroup has a name. Names are words separated by dots (.). For instance, rec.arts.cooking or alt.internet.services. Recreational topics are in "rec.", science are in "sci.", computer topics are in "comp." and so on. Usenet also has many, many "local" newsgroups intended for people who live in a certain geographic area. Although outsiders can sometimes read the messages there. For instance, fr. newsgroups are from France, and ba.newsgroups are from the San Francisco bay area. Each newsgroup contains messages from the people who participate in them. At the top of each message is the name of the author of the message, a subject, the date and time the message was posted, the name of the originating computer system (remember, most of these people won't be America Online members,) and the body of the message itself. Some of the messages will be new, others will be responses to previous postings. *** Q: How is Usenet organized? Usenet newsgroups are divided into broad categories, where sets of groups are organized by major topic: all computer-related discussion fell into the comp. hierarchy, recreational activities were put in the rec. hierarchy, and so on. There are over 300 different top-level newsgroup domains (domain is a fancy, but common, way of talking about the top level names for each group. Some are organized by topic (for example, comp. is the domain of the computer-related discussion groups,) many others are organized by the geographic areas that they serve (for instance, ba. newsgroups are about events in the California Bay Area.) There are eight major Usenet domains: comp, misc, news, rec, soc, sci, talk, and alt. Each of these domains is organized into groups and subgroups according to topic. rec. groups are oriented towards the arts, hobbies, and recreational activities. Examples are rec.arts.comics.strips, rec.arts.sf.starwars, rec.autos.antique, rec.radio.amateur.policy, and rec.sport.baseball.college. comp groups are topics in computer science and information on hardware and software systems. Groups are of interest to hobbyists as well as computer professionals. Examples are comp.apps.spreadsheets, comp.binaries.atari.st, comp.databases.object, and comp.lang.scheme. sci groups are discussions marked by special, and usually practical knowledge, relating to research in or application of the established sciences. Examples are sci.bio.technology, sci.physics.research, and sci.skeptic. soc groups address social issues and socializing. Examples are: soc.culture.african.american, soc.religion.quaker, and soc.rights.human. talk groups are largely debate-oriented and tend to feature long discussions without resolution and without appreciable amounts of generally useful information. For example: talk.politics.guns, talk.rape, and talk.rumors. news groups are concerned with the Usenet news network and associated software. Examples are news.announce.newusers, news.software.readers, and news.groups. misc groups address themes that are not easily classified under any of the other headings or which incorporate themes from multiple categories. Examples are misc.jobs.offered, misc.invest, and misc.books.technical. alt. groups are an anarchic alternative to mainstream Usenet groups. Although alt. stands for alternative, note that some of the best stuff on Usenet is part of the alt. hierarchy. (alt. groups are an alternative to the "big seven" news domains and not necessarily discussions of an alternative nature.) Because the creation of alt. groups is less formal than standard groups, you are likely to find some funky topics here. Examples are alt.alien.visitors, alt.internet.services, alt.architecture.alternative, alt.banjo, and alt.barney.dinosaur.die.die.die The alt. groups are the most anarchic arm of the Usenet. Although some controls have been placed on the creation of new newsgroups in the "big seven" Usenet hierarchies, there are no such restrictions for alt. groups. In the interest of letting the Usenet sprawl and evolve without too many constraints, the alt. domain is the one space where newsgroups can be created without a consensus from the masses. The results of this are, predictably, some weird groups that sometimes have no discussion within and are attempts at humor, sarcasm, or something similar. If you've ever seen the Muppet Show you might remember Jim Henson's Swedish Chef who was often caught chopping madly and saying, "bork bork bork." Someone created a newsgroup called alt.swedish.chef.bork.bork.bork--and somehow that hit a popular note on the Net. Now there are a variety of newsgroups in the alt. domain that have similar names. Examples: alt.adjective.noun.verb.verb.verb, alt.american.automobile.breakdown.breakdown.breakdown, alt.american.olympians.choke.choke.choke, and so on. Notice that no topics are off-limits here and people often create groups that are of interest for a few weeks, or days, and then vanish. Another interesting space within the alt. domain is a set of groups that are for fans of specific individuals. The list of people is extensive (over 100) and range from people such as Dan Quayle, Rush Limbaugh, Gene Scott, and Clarence Thomas; to authors such as Tom Robbins, Dave Barry, Douglas Adams, and Piers Anthony; to musicians and music groups such as Madonna, Run DMC, Spinal Tap, Wang Chung, Devo, and Laurie Anderson. If you like a person or group, chances are someone else does too! There are other Usenet domains worth mentioning... biz groups are for business-related postings. Here you'll find company press releases, product information and other commercial traffic. Examples are biz.comp.telebit.netblazer and biz.zeos.announce. k12 groups are carried at some sites. Their content is aimed at kindergarten, elementary and secondary teachers, and students. Examples are k12.chat.elementary, k12.ed.art, and k12.ed.life-skills. *** Q: How does Usenet work? To understand what Usenet is, you need some idea of how it works. First, there is no central Usenet authority -- all systems participating in the Usenet act like super copying machines, in that an article that you send to Usenet (this is commonly known as a posting) is saved on AOL's computer, and an exact duplicate is sent to a group of other machines that AOL's system "talks" to directly. Each of these machines keeps its copy and forwards duplicates to the machines that they talk with, and so on, until your words might well have been duplicated tens of thousands of times! The great thing about this strategy for distributing postings is that at any given time your local system will have all the relevant postings in the groups that you're interested in reading, with more coming in hourly (if not more frequently!) Because they're all on your local computer, you can usually read the group or groups that interest you quickly, certainly without any lag as a central system doles out individual items. ||| THE END || | That about wraps it up for this week. Please send any comments or suggestions about the AnswerMan Internet Extra to "Savetz" (from AOL,) or "savetz@aol.com" (from the Internet.) This newsletter copyright 1996 by America Online and Kevin Savetz. All rights reserved. Made from 100% recycled electrons.