Subject: What I learned at the Revolution From: elawyer@interport.net (Enrique Gili) Date: Mon, 26 Aug 1996 20:00:24 -0400 (EDT)

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It's pleasant to believe that this new medium  will provide a free
flow of information and opinion. The digerati makes plenty of
egalitarian claims -- but the emerging reality is something  else.
The online world is Darwinian, developers are fighting tooth and nail
to capture brainwidth.  Having recently emerged from producing a
supersite, I did pick up a few  survival skills which I have distilled
into the essay  below.


Principles of Web survival:

No application stands alone. The Web is cool but text is ubiquitous.
Prior to the advent of the Web, there were and still are thriving
electronic communities.  Email, usenet groups and mailings list still
account for 80% percent of the traffic on the Net.

Web developers seem to regard these groups with some distaste as
though entering a text based environment were some form of slumming.
Text is not sexy, but it where  online environments evolve into virtual
worlds. People matter more than the technology.

Although the number of mailing list subscribers may be statistically
insignificant many inveterate propeller heads belong to these cyber salons.
It's in these quieter byways that longer term relationships between group
members actually develop.


A Web site is not the only way to distribute quality content. The Net
has had a long history of producing digests and zines for special
interest groups. Currently, Intertext is published in three formats ASCII,
HTML and PDF files. Slate seems to taking a similar approach.
Distributing content in three formats gives the reader flexibility
in terms of when and how they choose to digest information.
Producers should be concerned with getting the content into consumers
hands by whatever- means- neccessary and stop  obsessing about the
platforms.


E Pluribous Internet.




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