CD's and Portals: Back
to William's Archives.
In the publishing business, a great deal of research is necessary.
First to ensure the quality of the product, but also to guard
against legal actions caused by errors in facts. This is especially
important when covering for guys like Willie Gaffer.
One way to do research is to have information on CD's. A few months ago, I had 11 Cd's on my computer. 9 were in two CD changers and 2 were in separate drives. Still, I could not have all the information I needed available without switching CD's in and out. I have 2 medical encyclopedias, 5 other encyclopedias, 8 disks of phone directories in one set and 7 in another, 2 map disks, a Writers Market disk, and a Literary Market Place disk. This list does not include some of the software I have which requires a CD to be mounted before the program will run. It was a real pain.
Now I find, I don't really need any of those information CD's. After switching to a service provider that does not blow me off ever few minutes, I discovered that I can find all of that information on the internet. Here's the good part. So far, its been free. To top that, the information is current. This is never true with CD's, even if you buy every upgrade they pop out at you. It takes so much time to edit, burn, distribute, and market a CD, that it's obsolete before you buy it.
Of course, I did not throw all of the CD's away. I still use the Microsoft Bookshelf every day. It's not current, but it's just a bit faster than going on line. In addition, I still use Delorme's Map ‘N' Go and Street Atlas. I have found other mapping stuff on line, but nothing as convenient as Delorme's. For the rest of it, I have found the internet is better. It has evolved to a point where it is reliable and easy enough to search.
This really came home to me last week. So much so that it prompted this essay. Because of my recent disappointment with my previous employer, I was doing some legal research. I was looking for the text of the Supreme Court ruling on the educational doctrine of separate but equal. This is one case where Bookshelf did not reveal enough information. Of course, most of us know that the Supreme Court struck down this doctrine years ago. But, do we know when it happened or the name of the particular case? Do we know the name of the Justice who rendered the decision?
I do, and I will tell you. The case is listed under the name of, "Brown V. Board of Education of Topeka." The decision was reached in 1954 and the ruling was written by Mr. Chief Justice Warren. In it's simplest form, the ruling illuminates the fact that separate is, by definition, not equal. Isn't that just perfectly elegant? After recent political events, this historic landmark is one among the few things left to make us proud of our good old USA!
So, what do you need to do research on the internet? First,
without mentioning any names, you need a internet service provider
(ISP) which will let you stay on line long enough to do something
useful. Believe it or not, we are not all piddling our time away
in chat rooms and online games. I have found 2 providers which
I can say are very good. One, the one I currently use, is Mindspring.com.
The other is used by my very good friend, Mr. Charles P. Anonymous.
It is Concentric.net. Now a new service is becoming available
for folks who have cable access. I have no experience but my information
indicates that these connections are ‘always-on' and very,
very fast. Cable speed.
Now assuming we have a PC, what else is needed? Well, a printer,
of course. Other than that, you need to know about access points.
We used to call them search sites. Now we call them portals. In
fact, they are just web sites where we can begin a search. The
best of them give us a set of major categories leading into a
systematic focusing of attention. It's much like the game we played
as children called twenty questions. And, yes! Guessing is allowed.
It's part of the fun.
As an example, here is the trail I followed to "Brown V. Board." I started at one of my favorite portals, the Mindspring home page. There I found a list of major categories. I won't list it here. If you go to the page, you will see it on the right side at http://www.mindspring.com/. From there I found and clicked successively on "You and Yours", "Education", "Law", "Courts", and "Supreme Court".
At this depth, I had to get more specific, if I did not want to scan all of the decisions over three or four years. Fortunately, I knew Brown was involved with a Board of Education. After a few more clicks, I found what I wanted and sent the text to my printer. I could have copied it into my word processor if I had wanted. If my disappointment is not resolved soon, I may still have to do that and send it out with a letter.
Now, what about portals? You can find the ones I use on my
web links pages along with a bunch of other links. The ones I
like are Mindspring, Netscape, AltaVista and Looksmart. I have
also used 411 Locate, Netfind and Comfind. You will find them
under search sites, ISP's and Directories. Check them out and
use the ones you like. We all have different styles. The point
is, research and learning, of any kind, should be fun.
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