How To Use the Internet Effectively

E-Mail

E-mail, also called electronic mail, is the foundation of the Internet. When the Internet was originally conceived by the U.S. Department of Defense, one of its primary purposes was to develop a communications system which could withstand nuclear attack. Well, the Department of Defense was very successful. Unfortunately, nobody was able to foresee the advent of junk e-mail, commonly known as "spam", which has become a very troublesome reality of life on the Internet. Nevertheless, e-mail is the lifeblood of the Internet and is extremely important to newbies who want to use the Internet effectively.

For many years, e-mail was sent by e-mail clients which used Unix based systems and commands. Some of these programs, such as ELM, are still in use today especially at universities which have not updated their systems to allow their users to be able to use more efficient e-mail clients. Having started our Internet life on a Unix based e-mail system, we are quite happy that e-mail has evolved in the last few years to give us clients (programs) which are easier to use and have more functionality. There are several e-mail programs currently available which are quite good. 

Eudora is considered by many to be the finest e-mail program available today. The program comes in two versions: one is freeware,(a program which exists in the public domain and is freely available to be copied and used by anyone as long as they do not try to profit from it) and the other is commercial (you have to pay for a license to use it). Many Internet Service Providers include the freeware version of Eudora in the suite of programs which they include in their sign up package. Because the program is so widely used, there is a wealth of FAQ (frequently asked questions) documents available in various Usenet groups, which is a huge advantage for newbies. For newbies, the freeware version is sufficient to learn how to use an e-mail client. As you progress, you might want to consider Eudora Pro which is a very fine program with many useful features.

E-Mail Connection is another excellent e-mail client.(program) For newbies, this program is especially nice because it is extremely easy to use. Its graphical interface makes sending e-mail a snap and also is very helpful in organizing received mail. Its address book function is superb. This program also has a freeware and a commercial version. The commercial version has some very interesting features which are very different from Eudora and might appeal to certain users depending upon their computer and network configurations. 

Microsoft Outlook is a very good e-mail client and is also used by many as a newsreader. We prefer Free Agent as a newsreader, but we are beginning to warm up to Outlook for e-mail. It is free and it is very well supported by Microsoft's online knowledge base. It has wonderful drag and drop features for managing e-mail addresses and makes file attachment a snap.

***Note---These are the programs which we use. We do not endorse one over the other. They are both different and each has its own special advantages. However, we think that they offer the new user some distinct advantages over other programs which we have seen.***

E-mail is used primarily to communicate with another person or entity. However, e-mail can also be used to subscribe to e-mail discussion groups or to join other Internet organizations or forums. You can make inquiries for information with numerous interesting organizations, engage a famous person in an interesting discussion or debate, contact old friends and meet new friends or find global trade leads. Because an e-mail address is published on a WWW site or in a newsgroup, does not always mean that your inquiry will be greeted with enthusiasm. It is considered bad manners to send unsolicited e-mail. Such practice is called spamming and people on the Internet just love to beat up on newbies who inadvertently cross what many consider "the line". Polite inquiries are not considered spam generally speaking. Advertising or soliciting for anything is considered spam and newbies will be rudely introduced to the "flame", a nasty message urging the user to do things which would not be discussed in polite surroundings. Please do not send spam to people as it is very irritating.

E-mail Discussion Groups

E-mail discussion groups are very much like the bbs bulletin board forum. Once joined, a person can send an e-mail message which is then "posted" to the entire group. Basically, there are two types of group: moderated and un-moderated. A moderated e-mail discussion group has a moderator to which all potential postings are sent for review before being sent to the entire group. Usually, the moderator will be trying to make certain that postings are within the scope of the group and are relevant to the particular point being discussed. An un-moderated group has no moderator, so that anybody can post anything, whether it is relevant or not.

When we first visited the Internet, e-mail discussion groups and their cousins, Usenet groups, were highly touted as being "the thing". While there is less of this hyperbole today, many still consider these public forums to be a good source of information. We think that they are a mixed bag for anybody and can be confusing to newbies. Quite frankly, we strongly believe that some offer much more than they can deliver. Our advice is quite simple, if you think that an e-mail discussion group can offer you some interesting information, join and just listen or read the postings for several months before contributing anything of your own. One unpopular posting in an e-mail discussion group can result in some very nasty e-mail for quite some time afterwards. Believe us, it's not worth the hassle.

The following discussion groups should be very useful for newbies to international business:

Note:  At one time, there were at least three or four lists posted here, but over a period of years, many of these lists have disappeared. When the Internet was originally founded by the U.S. Department of Defense, many of the e-mail lists were moderated by college professors who had graduate students and funding to run them. During the 1990's especially, it became very difficult to run these lists because of the time involved in moderating responses and making sure that the list software was functioning properly. Unfortunately, many of the Internet's newcomers were unwilling to observe some simple rules and therefore e-mail discussion groups have all but disappeared as a useful forum for exchanging ideas and learning about complex subject matter.

GINLIST This list is moderated by Tunga Kiyak. It is an excellent resource  for newbie and veteran alike. It is sponsored by CIBER, an organization with which you will become very familiar; Center for International Business Education & Research. This list has survived the turmoil of the Internet and is a legitimate Internet information resource about international business.

Usenet Groups

There are over 30,000 Usenet Groups in existence currently and more are being created each day. Usenet Groups are found on your ISP news server and are also called newsgroups. Some ISP's do not carry all of the Usenet Groups which are available for various reasons. In order to read the Usenet Groups postings, a news reader is required. For the PC, Free Agent is considered by many to be the standard. Mac and Apple users can fetch Newswatcher at John Nostad's Programs.

You should use search engines to search the Usenet Groups or read the postings first before posting anything to a Usenet Group. Why? One reason is spam. Once you post to a Usenet Group, your e-mail address can be extracted by a multitude of extractor programs used by spammers to develop their mailing lists. Once added to these lists, your e-mail will increase so much that it will be difficult to manage it, which is why Internet people hate spam and spammers. The biggest advantage of the Usenet Groups is that you do not have to join to read the posts. You can read without anybody knowing that you've read (this is called lurking). Subscribing to a Usenet Group is a misnomer. Actually, what you are doing is alerting your news reader that you want to single this and perhaps others out, so that you can access them more easily.

Usenet Groups represent the best and worst of the Internet. Every hate group and fringe group is here. Racial epithets and homophobic behavior are commonplace. However, there is a tremendous wealth of information available on any conceivable subject known to humankind. If you don't know it, somebody else is likely to know it. If it is a problem for you, then somebody else has probably encountered it. This is the value of the Usenet Group. However, you should never give out any personal information other than an e-mail address in a Usenet Group. NEVER!!

For the Going Global newbie, Usenet Groups offer one feature which is very important. Many unmoderated Usenet Groups allow users to post messages which are actually advertisements, usually promoting a World Wide Web site, a virtual network or an e-mail publication. This is a great opportunity for you to promote your online activities and to attract customers for your product. Before posting to any newsgroup, carefully read its postings to get a sense of what type of postings are generally acceptable in the particular Usenet Group. This is important. Please be considerate of others. Posting the same message in several newsgroups whose topics are unrelated to the content of the posting is called "cross posting" and is considered to be spamming.

Yahoo

Yahoo is the Internet's Directory of Directories and also a primary search engine as well. At one time, if it was not listed in Yahoo, one would normally question its voracity. While that is still true to some extent today, the company itself will tell you that the recent influx of new WWW sites and other relevant information has made its job of categorizing and listing information much more difficult. Nonetheless, Yahoo is extremely important to any newbie to the Internet.

Yahoo lists and categorizes information resources available on the WWW, Usenet Groups, e-mail discussion groups, gopher and some telnet sites. Of these, the WWW and the Usenet Groups are commonly considered most important. What makes Yahoo so useful is its ability to categorize information on different levels. This really makes the information more valuable because it gives you a notion of how it compares with similar information on the same level. Yahoo also cross references sites which one would not normally associate with a particular topic, giving you a wider breadth of how the topic is inter-related.

As a newbie, you must learn how to use Yahoo because it will be your most valuable information resource. The other search engines are very good, but Yahoo, for many things, is better. Become comfortable with this Internet legend. We still use it frequently. And we've discovered something else, the other search engines use it as well. Do not be surprised when another search engine directs you to Yahoo!
***Note---There are several lists that are useful to newbies. We are going to list those which we think are important for you to know about. One thing which you will find out rather quickly is that many WWW sites about a given topic will basically have many of the same hyperlinks. Therefore, a newbie visits all of these different sites expecting to get new or additional information and can become disappointed. This is part of the learning process. Gradually you will choose those lists and sites which are regularly updated and offer you the best information for your needs.***

A Final Word

For newbies to the Internet, the biggest frustration is the fact that one feels immediately overwhelmed and somewhat intimidated by the Internet. This is quite normal. You are not going to become Internet savvy in just one online session. If we had to give a time period, we would frankly say that it requires about six months of regularly visiting the Internet before this frustration disappears. In order to jump up onto the Internet learning curve, two things are very important: 1) please do not abandon your spouse and/or children or other significant family members and friends and 2) be willing to let go of yourself and have fun.

Those of us who are experienced at using the Internet know some of its pitfalls. For newbies, the biggest pitfall of all is that the Internet becomes a substitute for human interaction. This is not something which people just decide to do one day. It occurs as a result of the fixation which the Internet causes. You can not just go into your room and spend endless hours on the Internet when your spouse wants to talk or your kids have a problem. The Internet is addictive and you have to learn how to use self-control or it will cause you severe personal problems. If you ever visit irc, you will encounter people there who spend a significant portion of their lives online. If you question them, they will tell you that they know that they are addicted but that they remain helpless to fight it. That is truly sad. Be smart and remember that the Internet is just one great big library. Would you become obsessed about your local library?

One of the reasons why people become addicted and obsessed about the Internet is because of a need to be in control of it. We are not psychiatrists and we are unable to offer you any good advice for any personal problems which you might have. However, we do know that many people are being forced to learn about the Internet in order to be more effective at performing their jobs. The desire to quickly master the Internet is understandable but not very realistic. Even if your company sends you to a class or seminar, it takes much quality time to learn about the Internet. If you are spending quality time on the Internet which belongs to your spouse or children, then you're in conflict. If you try to hurry the learning process, you will defeat your own best efforts. In order to truly enjoy the Internet, you have to let go of yourself and any plans which you have for learning. You have to log on and then just get lost, drifting and drifting to faraway places. This is how to learn how to use the Internet effectively. You have to have fun!! If it isn't fun, then log off and come back at another time.