NETROPOLITAN has found that the best way to convince confirmed cybersceptics of the usefulness of the Net is to find them some juicy information on a subject of their choice. You might think that since all of the text on the Net is in digital form, you could simply type in a few keywords and a sufficiently powerful computer or set of computers could find anything. If only it was always so simple.
Alta Vista () is the latest and best attempt to apply massive computing power to search the Net. It uses five powerful machines 鈥� one of them the most powerful computer ever built by Digital. It has indexed over 16 million Web pages 鈥� some 30 gigabytes of data.
And if you need to refine your search, its database software is more effective than any of its rivals. But like all search engines, it鈥檚 almost useless if you don鈥檛 have something specific to look for.
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For example, it can easily find our Web site if you know it鈥檚 called New 杏吧原创 Planet Science (). But if you didn鈥檛 know we existed and you wanted to find sites with science news on them, you鈥檇 get a list of around 4000, with Planet Science buried somewhere within it.
This is why Planet Science recently launched a 鈥渉andmade鈥� guide to science sites, and why Netropolitan is not likely to be replaced by a computer in the foreseeable future.
IF you鈥檙e searching for a missing friend or relative there are loads of sites that seek to oblige. Some of them are not very successful, with few missing people listed and few visitors passing through. But some of them are not too bad. Lost and Found International鈥檚 Lost Friends Center at has loads of entries and gets a fair amount of traffic passing through.
Continuing the theme of tracking down particular people, the University of Texas holds a list of collections of personal pages worldwide at . It includes collections from universities, non-profit organisations and commercial sites.
If you鈥檙e as interested in being found as finding someone, you might try submitting an entry to WHO鈥檚 On-line at , which describes itself as a 鈥淗YPERbiographical database鈥�. You don鈥檛 have to be a head of state or a member of your national academy of science. Anyone can submit an entry.
YOU can contact Netropolitan at edit@news.newsci.ipc.co.uk. Put 鈥淣etropolitan鈥� in the subject list.
