Logan Daily News

Net Watch
by Bob Green

A multiple thousand dollar computer. An investment in you and your family's future. A machine to make you more efficient, to multiply your efforts, educate the kids, streamline your life, etc., etc., etc. These are the arguments that in most cases the husband brings to the wife to justify the expense of a computer. Mama's suspicions are beginning to rise as she slips into the den late at night. She finds her hubby sitting in the darkened room bathed in the oscillating glow of the computer monitor. There he sits with a slack-jawed idiot stare as he relentlessly toasts unsuspecting aliens. Night after night he keeps up the vigilant pursuit of saving the world, but no, not just the world, the entire universe, from one threat after another. Hey, it's a tough job, but somebody's gotta do it. Computer games. I believe computer games are probably the closest thing a human being can have to a computer virus. These insidious programs can eat up more time than the machine can ever save. About the time the user starts becoming bored with his favorite release from reality, a programmer develops a new game that will eat the next two months of his spare time. To be perfectly honest, the games are incredibly fun and wonderful stress busters as well.

Last summer, I was involved in one of my favorite pastimes away from the computer. I love to travel around Hocking County and go yard sailing. We have some of the best yard sales for antiques and odd ball items of any area in the country I'd venture to guess. Well, anyway, I saw a little cardboard sign and nosed my car up the driveway into a grassy area where tracks of other cars had been. Card tables and benches held the treasures of a bygone era. A bowling ball, clothing, unused wedding presents, some lamps, an old remington electric razor, and there in a box on the ground was an odd looking electronic type of device that somehow seemed familiar. It got my attention, and I went over and picked it up. I was trying to figure out what it was when I noticed the name . . . Atari. It was one of the old ping pong type computer games that hooked up to the TV. It was probably fifteen years ago or so that I had purchased one of those devices and I remembered how enthralled the family had become in playing with that gadget. I kind of chuckled to myself noticing the $3.00 price tag on it. That's probably how much my current computer will be worth in fifteen years.

It's amazing how fast technology changes. I forget how much was paid for that old Atari system when it was new, but today a person can go into the Internet and get games that can be downloaded for free that are light-years ahead of those old games. Actually, a person can get hundreds and even thousands of programs of games, business programs, recipe programs, etc., etc. absolutely free to try. This revolutionary way for programmers to market their products allows you to use the product for typically a thirty-day trial basis and it's called shareware. If you like the program and plan to continue to use it, it becomes a matter of honor for you to send that programmer his asking fee. After the fee is sent, you will generally receive a user's manual and any new upgrades for the program. The amount and variety of shareware programs are nearly unimaginable. To get a glimpse of what I'm saying, go to (http://www.shareware.com/) in the Internet. This one library has more than 210,000 shareware programs to choose from. Download to your heart's content. One game that my family is particularly fond of is very similar to the popular "Sonic the Hedgehog" game by Sega. The game is called "Jazz Jackrabbit". It's very fast paced and the graphics are incredible. You can download for free at the site mentioned and the name of the file is jjxmas95.zip. Be prepared for a wait, though. It will take up to an hour to download the game due to its size.

I just remembered promising to put some zucchini recipes into my columns, so I slipped over to the Net and typed in Zucchini and pulled down the following recipe. It was posted in England and I'm not familiar with some of the ingredients. I suppose you could always substitute something else. Actually, I don't care too much for zucchini but a promise is a promise. If you do decide to try it and it turns out great, let me know (mdpine@brutus.bright.net).

"Zucchini chutney"
Ingredients:
Zucchini............2?3
Onions..............1
Hing................½ tsp.
Tamcon..............½ tsp.
Green chillies......2?3

Preparation:
[1] Fry cut zucchini, onions, and green chillies.
[2] Add turmeric, salt, cook on low flame for 5 ? 10 minutes.
[3] Boil tamcon, add to mix above.
[4] Pulverize the whole thing in blender.
[5] Seasoning: Thalshi Kottify with mustar seeds, urad daal.

One day, I was in a friend's office talking about the Internet and somebody asked if we could find a recipe for Cajun cooking. We ran a search and somehow landed in a home page area of a family that lived deep in the heart of Louisiana and got a recipe for alligator stew. Yummy (yech!). Whatever you want I'm sure you'll find. Keep me posted and let us all know if you come up with something fantastic (mdpine@brutus.bright.net).

Another promise made for the past several weeks has been to give business people some good pointers to locations that might help them. There is one that I just recently learned about that will come in very handy for businesses. Many business people overlook this in their search for markets and customers, but one of the first places I contact is any association that might be related to the target market. Quite often a friendly call from yourself to the association secretary is all that's needed to gather strategic information about the particular marketplace. I've even had some to send me packages of information which included member lists. Now there is a location to go to on the Net that has a list of more than 10,000 Business and Professional associations. Type in a word and it will be checked with all of those associations. You might find some whole new business areas you never even thought about. Check it out and happy hunting. (http://www.newmarket?forum.com/). If it works out and you feel guilty about the fact that the service is free, I am willing to accept stocks, cash, new automobiles and/or cruises.

Another piece of marketing advice that I'd like to pass along is to start collecting the E-mail addresses of customers. Even if you don't have a computer today, take my advice on this one. If you begin now, by the time you're ready to start using the Internet as a sales channel, you should have a good base of customers to work with. We'll take a closer look at how to use those E-mail addresses in some of the upcoming columns. It appears that my space is used up, so until next week, happy surfing.