[10726] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Re: Internet vs Minitel : a futuristic view of the network evolution ?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Marty Salo)
Mon Mar 7 03:49:46 1994
Date: Sun, 6 Mar 1994 22:39:18 +22311151 (EST)
From: Marty Salo <msalo@garnet.acns.fsu.edu>
To: Doug Humphrey <digex@ss1.digex.net>
Cc: Miles R Fidelman <fidelman@civicnet.org>, com-priv@psi.com
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.89.9403061515.A13216-0100000@ss1.digex.net>
Doug, I must disagree here.
The Internet (or Net) has information retrieval down rather well. The Net
is not centralized, admitted, but the lack of centralization means that
more people can produce more types of information on more sorts of things.
My knowledge of Minitel is lacking, but I doubt that Minitel has a
distributed network of servers similar to gopher which could provide a
roughly equivalent amount of data.
That statement may be unfair for me to make. The Net is a world-wide
entity, while Minitel is a system within France. Perhaps Minitel could be
thought of as a low-end gopher server? I don't know.
But the Net does not stop there in its search capabilities. There is also
Archie, Veronica and Jughead. Putting forward as a good interface for
these, I recommend the World-Wide Web. It allows a variety of formats for
information to be repesented, through a variety of means of access.
Shameless Self-aggrandizing Plug: If you have access to the web,
(G)oto [http://www.fsu.edu/~cogs/index.html] for a pointer to:
[http://garnet.acns.fsu.edu/~msalo/index.html] _Marty's Home Page_
Marty Salo msalo@garnet.acns.fse.edu
"The future belongs to neither the conduit or content players, but
those who control the filtering, searching and sense-making tools
we will rely on to navigate through the expanses of cyberspace."
- Paul Saffo, (_Wired_: March,1994)
[Quote borrowed from Peterd@bunyip.com]
