Web Virtual NewsLetter

Published in the Cyberspace

No 2. November 1995.

HOT LINKS OF THE MONTH:

Quebec
Middle East
U.S. '96 Elections
Switzerland: a country completely wired
Just for Fun !
The Blacksburg Electronic Village
Cybernews

The first issue of the Web Virtual NewsLetter received a very positive response. In less than two weeks, two hundred people from five continents subscribed. And new subscriptions are coming everyday.

Many of you sent encouraging messages to pursue this experience. Apparently there was no real trouble to open the newsletter with a browser. Some encountered problems to read the name of the Web sites to activate because the color I used was not contr asted enough with the background. I hope this difficulty is now resolved.

The extremely high number of new sites created everyday on the Web (see below the Cybernews ) was the motivation to publish this newsletter. The goal is not to be exhaustive. It should offer to anybody interested by the news on the Web some selected sites with a short description and their easy access through the hyperlinks like from a regular Web page.

Within a couple of months I will create a permanent URL on the Web where you would be able to access the previous (but updated) issues of the Web Virtual NewsLetter. As this is very time-consuming, it will need some more delay. Please be patient!

Please don't hesitate to e-mail your remarks, criticism and comments. And don't forget:

This Web Virtual NewsLetter should be yours!

Send us your tips and your comments for the next issue. A short article on an Internet-related topic will be welcomed.

Make this Web Virtual NewsLetter a wider audience by forwarding it. Send us your e-mail if you did not receive it directly. You are part of it.

QUEBEC

The Gazette Online
The Montreal Gazette on-line. Latest informations updated daily. Profiles of the major players. (English) http://www.vir.com/Gazette/index.html

Canadian Press and Broadcast News
Home Page of the Canadian Press, a national news cooperative owned by Canada's daily newspapers. With news updated everyday (English and French) http://www.canpress.ca/canpress/Overview.html

The Future of Québec
Governmental page. Not very sexy ! But if you need to get the juridical texts of the referendum, this is the place. (English and French) http://www.gouv.qc.ca/gouv/anglais/premin/premin_comnat.html/

Quebec Referendum on the Web
Almost exhaustive list of the Web sites about the referendum. A good place to begin. http://www.synapse.net/~radio/refer.htm

The Quebec Referendum Links Page
Very useful list of the main Web sites about the referendum. (English only) http://www.cam.org/~andymon/

Canadiana -- The Canadian Resource Page
Helpful home page with a lot of links to all kind of Canadian sites. A special section is devoted to the referendum. (English and French) http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/user/clamen/misc/Canadiana/README.html

Camp du OUI
Home page of the separatists. A lot of informations about the history, the economy and the society of Quebec. Some speeches by the main partisans of the Oui at the next referendum. Of course, don't look for objectivity here, it is part of the g ame ! (English and French) http://www.quebec-oui.org/en/index.htm

Les jeunes Souverainistes
Page of the youth organisation for the sovereignity of Quebec. They claim 150,000 members. Informations about the unability of the canadian federalism and the reasons to vote Oui... (French only...) http://www.cam.org/~jsmm /oui.htm

Bienvenue/Welcome
Page of the federalists opposed to the Quebec sovereignity. This ink is often very busy. Does'it mean the Non will win ?... (English and French) http://www.comite-Non.qc.ca/
Jacques Chagnon
Personal home page of the Member of the National Assembly Jacques Chagnon. Views of the Liberal Party refuting the sovereignist arguments. (English and French) http://www.vir.com/Chagnon/index.html

MIDDLE-EAST

The Middle East-North Africa Internet Ressource Guide
Huge list of mailing-lists about all kind of Near and Middle East topics. In the Section 1.1 of the Part 1, there is a short list of Web sites in or about the Middle East. (English)
http://www.alquds.org/middle-east-guide/contents.html
Levant cultural multimedia servers
Hundreds of links to Middle East servers, gopher sites, newsgroups, photos, maps, etc. Especially about Lebanon but about neighbouring countries too. So many connections, it takes time to find what you need! (English) http://www.hiof.no/l udvigsen/webdoc/levant_servers.html

Egypt Interactive-Egyptian Internet Resources
Good list on Egyptian and Middle East resources on the Net. Focus on past history of Egypt but some other news-related sites too. (English) http://www.channel1.com/users/mansoorm/eir.html

The Jerusalem Post
The historical Jerusalem newspaper now on-line. Some people in Israel think its former name, Palestine Post, would be more apropriate regarding its political tendancy... In fact an excellent media that contribute to find a peaceful solution in the region. (English) http://www.jpost.co.il

Israel Information Service
Israel information server by the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Official site with a search page by key-word. (English, French, Spanish) http://www.israel.org/

The World Wide Web Server for Israel
Excellent list where to start browsing about Israeli anf Jewish issues. A lot about Israeli culture and business in Israel. (English and Hebrew) http://www.il/

Arutz7
Right wing, so called Torah-oriented radio station. Arutz 7, in trouble with Israeli laws, must broadcast from a ship outside of territorial waters. Not very friendly with the PLO leader but has updated daily news. (English) http://www.jer1.co.il/media/arutz7/index.html

Jerusalem One
Very well done home page with a lot of informations about Israel and the diaspora. Mostly right wing. Don't expect too much objectivity ! (English) http://www.jer1.co.il/

Palestine Information Home Page
Page under construction. Mostly historical documents. Including the old stuff about Zionism equals racism. A future page will be called Peace (it sounds better...). (English) http://www.alquds.org/

The Palestinian "test" Home page
Page under construction made in Germany. Documents of the peace process (some accessible only by FTP), list of the Palestinian authorities in Gaza and Jericho. Unfortunately not updated very frequently. (English) http://www.cs.TU-Berlin. DE/~ishaq/pal/palestine/palestine.html

Peace in Pictures
Nice site with children's pictures about the peace. Hope for the future of this region. Sometimes the site is difficult to access. (English) http://www.macom.co.il/peace/

U.S. '96 ELECTIONS

One year away from the presidential elections, new Web pages show up almost every week. They are not too difficult to find with the usual search tools like Yahoo (http://www.c omite-Non.qc.ca/) but here you have the most important at a glimpse.

Welcome to PoliticsUSA
Excellent site about American politics in general and the upcoming elections in particular. Comparison of the different candidates' programs about some selected issues: abortion, gun control, etc. With articles updated daily. http://www.p oliticsusa.com/

Campaign Central Homepage
Comprehensive Web site about the '96 elections. Helpful technical informations. Nationwide coverage and daily updated political news related to the campaign. Some funny humor pages too. http://www.clark.net/ccentral/

1996 Presidential Candidates
Helpful list of the real and virtual candidates, not only of the two big parties but the other too: libertarians, etc. But where is General Powell ?...

Official Dole for President WWW Site
Bob Dole on the Web. He was one of the last to have his own page but this is a great one (independently of your '96 vote !): his program, biography, audio and video clips. You can order a free bumper sticker and the best (or the worst, according to yo ur side...), you can download a Dole screen saver for your computer... http://www.dole96.com/dole96/main.html

Bob Dole for President
On this site I clicked on Family value and I got ...Marilyn Monroe ! This is a funny parody Web page. At least here politics are not too serious. What does Senator Dole think about ?... http://www.dole96.org/

The Unofficial Bob Dole Home Page
This "unofficial" page is nice although it looks actually very official ! Biography, articles about Dole and his program listed by issue. Links to other less relevant Bob Dole sites. http://www.seas.upenn.edu/~lapple/bobdole.nscape.html

Bob Dole for President
Another "unofficial" home page for the Kansan candidate. He has definitely a lot of friends taking care of him on the Web... Some sections like: On the road to '96, Where he stands. http://homepage.seas.upenn.edu/~lapple/dole/bob.h tml

Phil Gramm for President
Official site for the candidacy of Phil Gramm. Biographical and background material, speeches, archives, etc. List of other links to some Gramm fans' sites on the Web. http://www.gramm96.org/

Phil Gramm for President Home Page
Classical "unofficial" home page with the usual stuff about a candidate. http://sba_server.sba.oakland.edu/staff/djsussma/wpg/wpghome.htm

Cyber-Republicans for Phil Gramm
Not very attractive unofficial page for Phil Gramm. http://www.rpi.edu/~scotta/gramm.html

Alexander for President - Come on Along!
To restore America's sense of confidence ! Home page of Lamar Alexander. http://www.Nashville.Net/~lamar/

Powell for President!
Will he run, will he not run ? At least he is runing on the Web... General Powell's home page. And soon a clickable map to be in touch with his local chapters. http://faraday.ee.unf.edu/~jperez/politics/powell/

SWITZERLAND: A COUNTRY COMPLETELY WIRED

This is a section dedicated to Swiss sites, non only because the author of these lines is a Swiss TV-journalist (as many subscribers are) but Switzerland is one of the countries in the world with the highest rate of Internet connections per inhabitant . Tradition of new technologies, high value of the Swiss Franc making the purchase of a personal computer easier than in other countries are some of the reasons for the Swiss high interest toward the Cyberspace. Of course you have to take in considerati on the presence of the CERN (European Laboratory for Particle Physics) (http://www.cern.ch/) in Geneva, on the borderline with France. It is the birth-place of the Web and its experts maintain updated informations about the Web and Internet. (English with some pages in French too).

Here are some Swiss sites interesting for an international public too, with of course some language limitations because many pages are in French or German only.

Switzerland - Home
Nice site, kind of Swiss home page, with a lot of informations about culture, economy and research in Switzerland. Clickable map for Switzerland and neighbouring regions. Useful list of Swiss sites. Made by the Geneva's Graduate Institute of Internati onal Studies. (English) http://heiwww.unige.ch/switzerland/

The Internet Telecom Observer
Created for the daily coverage of the last October Telecom 95, world's largest convention about telecommunications in Geneva-Switzerland. But the site itself will develop the interaction within the Cyberspace among the media, industry, science. Intere sting section called Cyberevolution with several articles from Swiss, French and British journalists. (English and French) http://www.telobs.com/

Geneva International
Gateway to hundreds of international institutions based in Geneva with incredible resources of informations. Not only the United Nations sytem but a lot of Non Governmental Organisations too. (English) http://geneva.intl.ch/geneva-intl/< /FONT>

Confoederatio Helvetica - Swiss Confederation
Official home page of the Swiss Confederation (government). A little boring, as Swiss politics are, but useful informations about the Swiss political system. (German, French, Italian, Romansh, some articles in English) http://www.admin.ch /

Whebdo - Page d'accueil
Excellent on-line version of the Lausanne weekly magazine L'Hebdo. A lot of detailed Swiss and International informations. Special section about the Swiss parliamentary elections. List of news-related Web sites (a competitor of this NewsLetter. ..) and impressive worldwide list of electronic newspapers. (French only) http://www.hebdo.ch/bienvenue.html

Xjournal by Xmedia
New electronic daily newspaper about Swiss and International news in a Swiss and Europen perspective. Well done, with a lot of different sections easy to use. (German only but looking for partners to create an English version) http://www. xjournal.ch/info/index.htp

Chroniques de Cybérie
Interesting electronic Swiss weekly about the Web and the Cyberspace, focusing on French language sites. (French only) http://iconode.ca/cyberie/index.html

JUST FOR FUN

The Comics Hotlist (Sarjakuvasivu)
Finnish site with daily and weekly comics. Some cartoons are political other just funny or ugly ! They come from American and European newspapers or are linked with other Web sites. A good way to relax between two news-related Web pages... (English) < FONT SIZE=2>http://www.uta.fi/yhteydet/sarjikset.html

WebMuseum: The WebMuseum Network
Great virtual museum created in France with access to five million documents. Temporary exhibitions: Cézane, Art of the 20th Century, Medieval Art, etc. A permanent Web Museum paintings collection. The site receives 1000,000 visitors eve ry week. Mirror sites in Europe, North and South America, Asia. (English) http://mistral.enst.fr/wm/net/

The Blacksburg Electronic Village

Exactly two years ago, a little town in Southern Virginia proclaimed itself the Blacksburg Electronic Village (http://www.bev.net) and joined the independant state of Cyberspace. Sixty two percent of the inhabitants are connected to the Net by a local and cheap ($ 8.95 a month) provider for most of them or by on-line services.

New apartments are automatically built with a very fast Ethernet connection. But what is probably the most interesting is the local network created for the average Mr. or Mrs. John Smith. Set up by a joint venture among the Virginia Tech faculty of en gineers, the private telephone company Bell Atlantic and the Town of Blacksburg, the local network is aimed at creating a global and actually not only virtual community. The senior citizen group is one of the most active on the network and its members mee t once a month to talk about computers and Cyberspace. There are groceries where you can order on-line and even the Cyberbar Bogen's (http://www.bnt.com/~bogens/),where the customers can chec k their e-mail or access a Web page for free on a computer located in the bar. The Blacksburg Electronic Village is a very interesting experience that could give an idea of the global vi! llage at the grass-roots level.

Cybernews

In May 1993 there were only around 130 Web sites in the world. Now they should be near 50,000. The number is doubling approximately every hundred days! You can find some figures, unfortunately not updated very frequently, about the Web on the site Growth of the World Wide Web. http://www.netgen.com/info/growth.html

The Web Virtual NewsLetter is published by Yves Magat (potomac@cis.compuserve.com).

Back to the top:

Web Virtual NewsLetter

Published in the Cyberspace

This Web Virtual NewsLetter should be yours!

QUEBEC

MIDDLE-EAST

U.S. '96 ELECTIONS

SWITZERLAND: A COUNTRY COMPLETELY WIRED

JUST FOR FUN