EFF's Guide to the Internet, v. 3.20

(formerly The Big Dummy's Guide to the Internet)

Adam Gaffin

December 11, 1996

Copyright 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996 Electronic Frontier Foundation.

All rights reserved.

DISTRIBUTION:

This guide is available free of charge from the EFF online archives at
ftp.eff.org, gopher.eff.org, http://www.eff.org/, CIS EFFSIG forum, and
elsewhere.

This guide may be freely reproduced & distributed electronically or in
hardcopy, provided the following conditions are met:

1) Please do not qualitatively modify the guide, and leave all copyright,
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granted for translation to other languages and conversion to other formats.

Please see :
http://www.eff.org/pub/Net_info/EFF_Net_Guide/README.making_new_versions
for information on the applicable restrictions, or ask mech@eff.org for a
copy of this README document.

2) EFF has signed a contract with MIT Press to publish a hardcopy book
version of the guide, entitled _Everybody's_Guide_to_the_Internet_.
All other for-profit distribution of printed versions of the guide
is forbidden, unless permitted in writing. More non-English hardcopy editions
may appear in the future (Japanese and Hungarian are currently available).
However, you may print out copies and recoup the cost of printing and
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3) Any for-profit non-paper distribution (such as shareware vendor
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Internet: ask@eff.org

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Foreword by Mitchell Kapor, co-founder, Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Preface by Adam Gaffin, senior writer, Network World.

Chapter 1: Setting up and jacking in
1.1 Ready, set ...

1.2 Go!

1.3 Public-access Internet providers

1.4 North American providers

1.5 European and other providers

1.6 If your town has no direct access

1.7 Net origins

1.8 How it works

1.9 When things go wrong

1.10 FYI

Chapter 2: E-mail

2.1 The basics

2.2 Elm -- a better way

2.3 Pine -- an even better way

2.4 Smileys

2.5 Sending e-mail to other networks

2.6 Seven Unix commands you can't live without

2.7 When things go wrong

Chapter 3: Usenet I

3.1 The global watering hole

3.2 Navigating Usenet with nn

3.3 nn commands

3.4 Using rn

3.5 rn commands

3.6 Essential newsgroups

3.7 Speaking up

3.8 Cross-posting

Chapter 4: Usenet II

4.1 Flame, blather and spew

4.2 Killfiles: The cure for what ails you

4.3 Downloading messages

4.4 Some Usenet hints

4.5 The Brain-Tumor Boy, the modem tax and the FCC

4.6 Big Sig

4.7 The First Amendment as local ordinance

4.8 Usenet history

4.9 When things go wrong

4.10 FYI

Chapter 5: Mailing lists and Bitnet

5.1 Internet mailing lists

5.2 Bitnet

Chapter 6: Telnet

6.1 Mining the Net

6.2 Library catalogs

6.3 Some interesting telnet sites

6.4 Telnet bulletin-board systems

6.5 Putting the finger on someone

6.6 Finding someone on the Net

6.7 When things go wrong

6.8 FYI

Chapter 7: FTP

7.1 Tons of files

7.2 Your friend archie

7.3 Getting the files

7.4 Odd letters -- decoding file endings

7.5 The keyboard cabal

7.6 Some interesting ftp sites

7.7 ncftp -- now you tell me!

7.8 Project Gutenberg -- electronic books

7.9 When things go wrong

7.10 FYI

Chapter 8: Gophers and WAISs

8.1 Gophers

8.2 Burrowing deeper

8.3 Gopher commands

8.4 Some interesting gophers

8.5 Wide-Area Information Servers

8.6 When things go wrong

8.7 FYI

Chapter 9: The World-Wide Web

9.1 Getting snared in the Web

9.2 Alright, already, let's go!

9.3 Addressing a problem

9.4 Imagine that -- downloading pictures

9.5 Lynx, meet Gopher

9.6 Finding things on the Web

9.7 SLIP: But I want to use my mouse!

9.8 More on SLIP

9.9 HTML: Building your own

9.10 Some interesting WWW servers

9.11 Lynx commands

9.12 When things go wrong

9.13 FYI

Chapter 10: Advanced E-mail

10.1 The file's in the mail

10.2 Receiving files

10.3 Sending files to non-Internet sites

10.4 Getting ftp files via e-mail

10.5 Mining for info on Usenet via e-mail

10.6 Just the fax, ma'am

10.7 The all knowing Oracle

10.8 When things go wrong

10.9 FYI

Chapter 11: News of the world

11.1 Clarinet: Associated Press, Miss Manners and Dilbert

11.2 Still more news on the Net

11.3 The world today, FROM Belarus to Brazil

11.4 FYI

Chapter 12: IRC, MUDs and other things that are more fun than they sound

12.1 Talk

12.2 Internet Relay Chat

12.3 IRC commands

12.4 IRC in times of crisis

12.5 MUDs

12.6 Go, go, go (and chess, too)!

12.7 The other side of the coin

12.8 FYI

Chapter 13: Education and the Net

13.1 The Net in the Classroom

13.2 Some specific resources for students and teachers

13.3 Usenet and Bitnet in the classroom

Chapter 14: Business on the Net

14.1 Setting up shop

14.2 Online storefronts

14.3 The check is in the (e)-mail

14.4 The good, the bad and the ugly

14.5 FYI

Chapter 15: The end?

Appendix A: The Lingo

Appendix B: Electronic Frontier Foundation Information

Foreword
By Mitchell Kapor,
Co-founder, Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Welcome to the World of the Internet.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is proud to have sponsored the
production of EFF's Guide to the Internet. EFF is a nonprofit
organization based in Washington, D.C., dedicated to ensuring that
everyone has access to the newly emerging communications technologies
vital to active participation in the events of our world. As more and
more information is available online, new doors open up for those who
have access to that information. Unfortunately, unless access is broadly
encouraged, individuals can be disenfranchised and doors can close, as
well. EFF's Guide to the Internet was written to help open some doors to
the vast amounts of information available on the world's largest network,
the Internet.

The spark for EFF's Guide to the Internet, and its companion MIT Press
book version, Everybody's Guide to the Internet, was ignited in a few
informal conversations that included myself and Steve Cisler of Apple
Computer, Inc., in June of 1991. With the support of Apple Computer, EFF
engaged Adam Gaffin to write the book and actually took on the project in
September of 1991. The guide was originally published electronically in
July of 1993 as the Big Dummy's Guide to the Internet.

The idea was to write a guide to the Internet for people who had little
or no experience with network communications. We intended to post this
guide to the net in ASCII and other formats and to give it away on disk,
as well as have a print edition available. We have more than realized
our goal. Individuals from as geographically far away as Germany, Italy,
Canada, South Africa, Japan, Scotland, Norway and Antarctica have all
sent electronic mail to say that they downloaded the guide. EFF's Guide
to the Internet is now available in a wide array of formats, including
ASCII text, Windows Help, World-Wide Web, PostScript, and AmigaGuide.
And the guide is finally available in a printed format, as well.

You can find the electronic version of Everybody's Guide to the Internet
by using anonymous ftp to ftp.eff.org and accessing
/pub/Net_info/Guidebooks/EFF_Net_Guide/netguide.eff. Or send an e-mail
message to info@eff.org. The electronic version is updated on a regular
basis with a newletter (/pub/Net_info/Guidebooks/EFF_Net_Guide/Updates/),
and occasional new versions of the guide itself.

EFF would like to thank author Adam Gaffin for doing a terrific job of
explaining the net in such a non-threatening way. We'd also like to thank
the folks at Apple, especially Steve Cisler of the Apple Library, for
their support of our efforts to bring this guide to you. Finally, we'd
like to thank our publishers at MIT Press, especially Bob Prior, for
working out an arrangement with us where we can continue to distribute
the text in electronic format and forego our royalties in order to keep
the price of the book low.

We invite you to join with EFF in our fight to ensure that equal access
to the networks and free speech are protected in newly emerging
technologies. We are a membership organization, and through donations
like yours, we can continue to sponsor important projects to make
communications easier. Information about the Electronic Frontier
Foundation and some of the work that we do can be found at the end of
this book.

We hope that EFF's Guide to the Internet helps you learn about whole new
worlds, where new friends and experiences are sure to be yours. Enjoy!

Mitchell Kapor
Chairman of the Board
Electronic Frontier Foundation
mkapor@eff.org

QUERIES: Please send all queries regarding EFF, and availability and
distribution of the guide to ask@eff.org, or one of the other EFF addresses
above. Please send all updates, corrections, and queries regarding the
content of the guide to the author, Adam Gaffin, at adamg@world.std.com.

Preface
By Adam Gaffin,
Senior Writer, Network World, Framingham, Mass.

Welcome to the Internet! You're about to start a journey through a unique
land without frontiers, a place that is everywhere at once -- even though
it exists physically only as a series of electrical impulses. You'll be
joining a growing community of millions of people around the world who
use this global resource on a daily basis.

With this book, you will be able to use the Internet to:

= Stay in touch with friends, relatives and colleagues around the
world, at a fraction of the cost of phone calls or even air
mail.

= Discuss everything from archaeology to zoology with people in
several different languages.

= Tap into thousands of information databases and libraries
worldwide.

= Retrieve any of thousands of documents, journals, books and
computer programs.

= Stay up to date with wire-service news and sports and
with official weather reports.

= Play live, "real time" games with dozens of other people at once.

Connecting to "the Net" today, takes something of a sense of adventure, a
willingness to learn and an ability to take a deep breath every once in
awhile. Visiting the Net today is a lot like journeying to a foreign
country. There are so many things to see and do, but everything at first
will seem so, well, foreign.

When you first arrive, you won't be able to read the street signs.
You'll get lost. If you're unlucky, you may even run into some locals
who'd just as soon you went back to where you came from. If this weren't
enough, the entire country is constantly under construction; every day,
it seems like there's something new for you to figure out.

Fortunately, most of the locals are actually friendly. In fact, the Net
actually has a rich tradition of helping out visitors and newcomers.
Until very recently, there were few written guides for ordinary people,
and the Net grew largely through an "oral" tradition in which the old-
timers helped the newcomers.

So when you connect, don't be afraid to ask for help. You'll be
surprised at how many people will lend a hand!

Without such folks, in fact, this guide would not be possible. My thanks
to all the people who have written with suggestion, additions and
corrections since the Big Dummy's Guide first appeared on the Internet in
1993.

Special thanks go to my loving wife Nancy. I would also like to thank
the following people, who, whether they know it or not, provided
particular help.

Adam Atkinson, Rhonda Chapman, Jim Cocks, Tom Czarnik, Christopher Davis,
David DeSimone, Jeanne deVoto, Phil Eschallier, Nico Garcia, Joe
Granrose, Joerg Heitkoetter, Joe Ilacqua, Jonathan Kamens, Peter
Kaminski, Thomas A. Kreeger, Stanton McCandlish, Leanne Phillips, Nancy
Reynolds, Helen Trillian Rose, Barry Shein, Jennifer "Moira" Smith,
Gerard van der Leun and Scott Yanoff.

If you have any suggestions or comments on how to make this guide
better, I'd love to hear them. You can reach me via e-mail at
adamg@world.std.com.

Boston, Mass., February, 1995.