Copyright © 1995 Robert Seidman (robert@clark.net). All rights reserved. May be reproduced in any medium for non-commercial purposes.
In This Issue...
This week, AT&T announced their plans to introduce their "90 million business and consumer customers" to the wonders of the Internet. "We intend to take the Internet from the realm of the Cyberspace pioneers to the world of everyday use,"said Alex Mandl, executive vice president and CEO of AT&T's Communications Services Group.
AT&T announced a 3-tier strategy: AT&T WorldNet Services, Hosting and Transaction Services and a newly formed content services business.
They've joined forces with the likes of Netscape, McKinley Inc., Adobe and Verity to provide easy to use Internet based services. AT&T joins the fold late and many have been asking whether it is TOO late. As incredible as the last two years have been, we're still only at the beginning, so the answer is a resounding NO! However, if AT&T doesn't focus its efforts, they'll risk another failure. Even if that happens, don't count AT&T out-they're big enough to afford to fail once or twice before getting it right. They've failed once or twice already by buying disparate services that collectively don't leave them with much of a strategy.
I asked one of the founders of the Internet, Vinton G. Cerf, now a senior vice president at MCI's data services division, for his thoughts on AT&T's entry into the Internet market. Dr. Cerf couldn't really comment because he'd not seen much in the way of specifics.
"My incomplete impressions are that AT&T is playing 'catch up' after making an effort in a more proprietary direction, without realizing how quickly the Internet has grown into a critical infrastructure,"said Cerf.
I haven't seen much in the way of specifics either, but fire up your Web browser and check out: http://www.att.com/worldnet/ for more details but not many specifics.
Ironically, on the site you'll find 11 reasons why you should go with AT&T WorldNet Services. I can give you at least one reason why you shouldn't: it doesn't exist yet. In fact their campaign on the Web towards people who HAVE INTERNET ACCESS NOW is rather amusing.
While many analysts have predicted the demise of the commercial online services, I still don't believe its true. Even with the easiest to use Internet access available, AOL holds more appeal for consumers.
In the future, as the Web progresses, I may change my mind. But not yet. You don't have to take my word for it, but here's a situation where numbers tell the story: Netcom is considered the largest stand alone Internet service today. America Online, with its 3 million customers is 20 times bigger than Netcom.
Hopefully for AT&T their Internet efforts will be more focused than their proprietary efforts like Interchange, ImagiNation and Personal Link.
ImagiNation is a blip, and quite a curious one because so many people figured games would be online computing's killer application. GEnie also tried this route. It hasn't worked any better for them.
Technology may someday turn the tide for games, but the failure in the short run has allowed AOL to put together a games strategy -- AOL has a base of 3 million they can market games as well and that will make the producers of online games want to associate with AOL.
Interchange is another blip albeit a more sexy one. Interchange is relying on the premise of an excellent Interface and tons of content. Similar to Prodigy's "P2", Interchange demos real nice, but doesn't stand up in daily use. It's slow (though admittedly much, much faster than it used to be), the software is bug- infested , and for a service whose foundation is based on the belief that content is king, there ain't much content. To supplement their lack of content, Interchange announced that it will soon begin testing the integration of the Netscape Web browser and that this access will be commercially available in September.
What about AT&T's PersonaLink and Easylink services? To demonstrate the innocuous impact of these divisions note that in the entire life of this newsletter this is their first mention.
None of this probably matters. AT&T is AT&T. They will eventually find a winning formula. To do so may require them to scrap everything to date and begin again or simply buy another service. However, their eventual success is all but guaranteed.
From a technical standpoint, AT&T seems to be following MCI's lead of providing services on the Web. MCI chief executive Bert Roberts must be smiling that they've beaten AT&T to the punch on this point.
No exact dates or prices for AT&T's new services have been announced, though AT&T says they'll begin testing dial-up services within 60 days.
AT&T's strategy is to make Internet access as easy to use as the telephone. If they accomplish that, they'll earn praise. For now, I'll still order my pizzas via the keypad on my phone.
From a purely "editorial" standpoint, I'd steer you to this week's Walt Mossberg's Personal Technology column. You can find it at: http://ptech.wsj.com. Though the bundling issue still bothers me, I agree with everything he has to say.
It's been over 9 months since my first MSN review in this newsletter. As though this were a true pregnancy and we are now witnessing the birth, we must remember that MSN is a baby online service. Young and frail, it must crawl before it can walk.
Fact is this a one very ugly baby. But, it's a very ugly baby with rich parents, so there is hope.
The first person I showed MSN to was an America Online employee. "Look how easy this is to use," I exclaimed. "I think it looks boring," she replied. I argued with her at the time, but over the past months I found myself agreeing with her initial observation.
Nine months ago I noted, "If you know how to use Windows, MSN is a breeze" to use. That remains true. If you know how to use the "Explorer" (Win '95's "new and improved"file manager) you can surf MSN just as you would anything else on your desktop. If you don't know how to use the "Explorer"everything is as easy to use as opening a document or "clicking"on a folder to see the contents.
Microsoft's integration has it's highs and lows. On the plus side, it's easy to use. The minus is the blurry line between the online and the offline desktop which could unfortunately mislead people thus unintentionally invoking the MSN meter. In fairness, if you don't actually do anything on MSN for a few minutes, it will prompt you to ask whether you want to stay online.
Keep in mind that MSN still has some kinks and is about as snappy as New Prodigy. Translation: it's pretty darn slow and that's running on a 486 DX2-66 with 16MB of RAM and on a 486 DX4-75 with 20MB of RAM.
Despite the 5 day countdown there's still a major content gap. News and Weather aren't active (at least to the beta testers). In fact, there's NO content there today that I especially want to have or have-to-have. Maybe on Thursday we will be awed by some clandestine content bonanza.
The exchange e-mail client (MS-Mail's replacement) is intuitive and functional, but lacking high-end options such as easy e-mail filtering, a feature many Internet mail clients include.
The message forums, while easy to use, suffer from a cluttered presentation. The "chat" on MSN is functional, but while AOL and Prodigy could improve their chat function, they reign supreme compared MSN. It's hard to chat when you can't "find" someone online. Furthermore there doesn't seem to be a way to send instant messages either.
Realistically speaking, how good does MSN really have to be if they offer a service that makes accessing the Internet extremely easy? Apparently they are relying on this. In a recent radio interview on Log On U.S.A., U.S. News and World Report's Vic Sussman relayed a story about a conversation he had with Microsoft's Steve Ballmer. According to Sussman, Ballmer made it quite clear that he considered "online services to be dead" and that MSN's marketing and content strategy is to "package the Internet."
I installed the Plus Pack and connected with MSN via it's "Internet and MSN" option. While the high speed PPP connection (28.8Kbps) via UUNET does give snappy results for surfing the Internet, there is no perceptible speed improvement for MSN itself compared to a 14.4Kbps connection. I find that both odd, and frustrating.
I've only been able to connect via their PPP lines (courtesy of UUNET) a handful of times. Most times, I can't actually get logged on. When I have managed to get on, it makes connecting a breeze. The high speed connections work well and I can use my existing Internet applications just fine, including Netscape.
The "Microsoft Internet Explorer" a version of Spyglass' Mosaic browser has some nice features, but it's no Netscape and lacks some basic features such as a STOP button.
If you want to test the "Internet" connection via MSN, you'll either need to buy the Plus Pack, or download the new software via MSN directly. At an MSRP of around $45, the Plus Pack with it's added tools may be worth it. It includes desktop "themes"that range from hideously ugly to hysterically funny, an excellent 3-D pinball game from Maxis, an agent that performs disk maintenance tasks in the background and an Internet-ready version of MSN. However, if all you want is the Internet access, download it from MSN directly.
On Thursday, August 24, Windows 95 and the Plus Pack will be available in retail stores (with some opening at 12:01am). While the software may be on the shelves, the online service is not a primetime player. I must question their readiness if 5 days prior to launch I can't access their "Internet" connection consistently.
The bottom line is that I'm far more impressed with Win 95 than I am with MSN. However, once MSN's Blackbird tool for developing content online is available, the outlook may dramatically change.
For now, take a look at the integrated versions of Encarta and Bookshelf (select the Education and Reference Category, then select Reference). While reference materials are certainly not mainstays of online content, and Encarta and Bookshelf on MSN are really just on MSN as a marketing tool to sell the CD's, it gives you an idea of how content online can be presented as an entire application rather than just a series of boring forms.
Long term, I suspect that most of MSN's content will be "application based". For now though, Mr. Mossberg is right, "MSN ranks dead last among major services in both appearance and content, behind America Online, CompuServe and even Prodigy..." Speaking of Prodigy...
Kudos to Prodigy president Ed Bennett for writing an open letter to Prodigy subscribers, a la Steve Case. In his letter, Bennett addresses the complaints regarding the sluggishness of the New Prodigy.
While Bennett blames the speed issue on a variety of factors, he does concede that it IS a concern and something they are working on.
New Prodigy does look better than old Prodigy, but they'll have to do more than talk about speed increases-they'll have to actually make them work. They'll also have to step up their HTML to make for better presentation. Prodigy has pretty icons and normal hypertext links, but their presentation of these links is BORING. Prodigy members who question what I'm speaking of can check out the "News Now" headlines provided by Reuters on Time Inc's PATHFINDER Web site (http://www.pathfinder.com ) to see what I mean. Compare this to Prodigy's links on their "main menu."
Of course, that sort of implementation might only slow Prodigy down further...
CompuServe may be the odd man out. AOL remains the interface king, Prodigy is phasing in their new look and CompuServe is at least several months away from its new and improved 3.0 (though an interim 2.0 release is currently in beta) interface.
But CompuServe is hard at work while their new interface is in development. They're not resting during the waiting period, but instead leveraging the phenomenal interest in the Internet, especially the Web. They have created a program to brand Internet services via the Web. We should see a big example of this in action soon.
Five months ago, CompuServe purchased Spry Inc. for a cool hundred million. Led by entrepreneur, and executive vice president David Pool, the company formerly known as Spry is scrambling to line up Internet deals to stave off the Microsoft Network. "The Internet is bigger than Microsoft," said CompuServe VP, Dave Pool in a telephone interview.
Like many others, Pool believes in a level playing field. He'd sure like to see CompuServe bundled with Win 95, but as a software applications developer, he's not sure that's even enough. Since Microsoft develops both the operating system and the applications for their operating systems, Pool believes the playing field is uneven not only in terms of providing one button access but in terms of creating software applications that leverage the benefits of Win '95.
"Where's the API so that I can design my software to take advantage of the PPP networking in Win '95? They tell me I'll have the API in September," Pool said, adding that it wasn't fair that he couldn't have software available to take advantage of the PPP networking as soon as Win '95 launched.
Pool is in the shop that compares the environment to the pre- divestiture long distance environment. Though he can market and distribute disks, he feels that being on the desktop puts Microsoft at an unfair advantage. "It's like having to dial 14 extra numbers to make a long distance call," Pool commented.
This week CompuServe and Time Inc. announced a strategic partnership to provide access to Time's PATHFINDER service on the web. Customers will get a disk with Internet access software (poly-bagged, no doubt), with registration and network access provided by CompuServe. The customer won't necessarily know this because it because the whole thing will be folded into the Time Inc. or the PATHFINDER brand name and presumably with an e-mail domain like pathfinder.com . And of course the Web browser will point to the PATHFINDER name.
CompuServe and Time Inc. will share the revenue generated via the access fees. No pricing was announced, but the typical access fees for the new program services provided by CompuServe are $9.95/7 hours of Net Access or $20 for 20 hours. Additional hours run $1.95/hr.
Spry has gone from Internet-In-A-Box to "Internet-Service-Provider-In-A-Box." They've made it quite easy. Can Seidman's Online Service be too far away? Just kidding, but it is a great way for Time Inc., to get into the online business in a bigger way. Speaking of PATHFINDER...
Inside Media reported this week that Walter Isaacson, editor of New Media at Time Inc. said PATHFINDER would begin charging sometime this spring. Interestingly enough, the story said that in random surveys of PATHFINDER users, Time Inc. found little to no resistance to the idea of charging access to the site. C'mon! Who's he kidding? I think they must be counting their surveys with the same voodoo they use to state the number of folks that visit them. The Inside Media story cites Isaacson proclaiming that PATHFINDER is accessed 7,000,000 times per week. That's HITS-which are file accesses, not PEOPLE accesses or even page accesses.
Folks, I don't care what they tell you. They don't get 7 million people, they don't get one million people, in fact, I doubt they get a half a million people per week. If I'm wrong, Isaacson and Bruce Judson (who is the GM for New Media at Time Inc.) are welcome to provide their numbers.
And famed MecklerWeb visionary Chris Locke ought to be feeling pretty smug as Isaacson also disclosed plans for a new service called "Netly News" which, according to the Cowles/SIMBA Media Daily will cover Internet events "penned by Generation X writers who will spin the stories with attitude."
According to the story, Isaacson said Netly News would be "somewhere between SIMBA and HotWired." This sounds a lot like the Net Editors section available at http://www.internetmci.com , which Chris Locke was responsible for during his brief stint at MCI. Now Chris is at IBM. It's a small world after all!
Unlike Net Editors, which ran weekly, Netly News will run stories on a daily basis.
Since yours truly's newsletter is carried on PATHFINDER, we'll have to see if Judson and Isaacson can live with my attitude because my attitude is this: Tell me how many users you have or shut up about hits. If you're going to talk in terms of accesses, at least give us HTML page accesses so we can know how many pages were accessed instead of files. It won't give us unique users, but it will give us a lot better insight than the 7 million hits stuff.
No, HotWired didn't pay me to say that, and neither did SIMBA. Speaking of HotWired and SIMBA...
Two week's ago, Folio: First Day (brought to you by the same folks that bring you SIMBA) reported that HotWired was going to drop mandatory registration. I could've scooped them, but I was too busy whining about a level playing field. The Folio: First Day story led me to contact HotWired CEO, Andrew Anker for some clarification.
Essentially, HotWired dropped the registration requirement for access to some content, but if you want bulletin boards or personalized services, you have to register (from a technology standpoint in order to provide such services, they have to have a way of uniquely identifying users). In the past, I've praised HotWired for its emphasis on personalizing their Web space. They get praise for opening their pages up-now everyone who has a problem with registering for access can read "Ned Brainard's" FLUX column. ( http://www.hotwired.com/flux/ ).
The Folio: First Day gang keeps trying to put the spin that HotWired dropped registration so that they can raise their advertising rates. HotWired denies that is the case and I would expect them to continue to do so. I doubt you'll see any advertising increases for a while.
Look, I'm not consciously criticizing anyone. Everyone's entitled to make money in this game and some are having more success than others. It could be that we won't get to the real truth until the Web really is so mainstream that the numbers are really there. Someday, HotWired might get 235,000 regular users per week (they have about that many registered users now, but that doesn't weed out duplicate registrations for those forgetting their password). Someday PATHFINDER might actually get 7 million USERS per week. But not today.
Considering that HotWired recently began conducting access audits and the fact that they are providing these numbers to their advertisers... Well, when you're selling advertising space, the more eyes on the ads, the better.
Clearly, HotWired opened up their content because they wanted more users and I can understand why Folio: First Day might have thought this move was designed to increase advertising revenues. But I'd ask the gang at Folio: First Day to examine another angle. Maybe, just maybe, HotWired needed to open up their gates to justify the rates already in existence. Who cares, everyone can now read Ned, and that's a good thing.
Perhaps it's a breach of journalistic ethics to plug a friend's book in my newsletter, but did you know that in 38 states it was unethical to even write a FREE newsletter? Seriously though, anyone interested in shopping on the Net or the major online services should check out Jaclyn Easton's "$hopping on the Internet and Beyond!: Your Guide to the Biggest Bargains and Best Places to Shop Online."
Easton is a weekly contributor to the Los Angeles Times and host of the radio show "Log On USA" (http://www.logonusa.com/logonusa ) She's researched over 5,000 sites and put the best 1,000 in her book along with $3,000 in discounts via "Exclusive Deals" made with online retailers and redeemable by the book buyers only.
I'll be honest-shopping doesn't thrill me, as anyone who read my down comforter saga knows. I like the premise of this book and think it is a great concept for people who actually like to shop. Frankly, I didn't think I'd ever use it. I was wrong, and you know how difficult that is for me to admit!
Back in July, Brock Meeks wrote a very compelling version of the events involving one Martin Rimm (of pornography study fame) for his CyberWire Dispatch (http://cyberwerks.com:70/0h/cyberwire/ ). I'll leave that tale for Meeks, but his story was such an excellent read, I told him that I was going to find a way to send him a bottle of Jack Daniels (if you read the story, you'll understand why).
The problem is that I'm in NY and Brock is in DC-I couldn't find a liquor store in DC to deliver the bottle and Brock didn't know of one either. The answer? "$hopping on the Internet and Beyond!" Seriously, I had no idea you could be in NY, contact a web-based liquor store in Chicago and have booze shipped to DC. What a country! If not for Easton's book, I might never have known (or saved an extra 5%). Meeks, you should be getting your JD soon, and you can credit Jaclyn Easton with an assist.
If a bottle of JD would make me half the writer that Meeks is, I'd send one to myself. I may just do it anyway-thanks, Jaclyn!
Michael Jackson held his cyberspace debut this week hosting a simulchat on America Online, CompuServe, Prodigy and IRC. Reports were that immediately prior to the conference, the Sony IRC server went down. America Online also got off to a slow start-several questions appeared on CompuServe before AOL had run a single question. Do you care? I don't care, at least not about MJ, but it was interesting to see just how many would turn up for the event.
According to inside industry sources the combined capacity for the event on the big 3 online services totaled 15,000. A report from the Los Angeles Times stated that the chat reached a total viewer base of 13,000. AOL with was near capacity with 5,000 users but dropped to a low of 3000 towards the end of the chat.
13,000 out of 15,000 isn't bad, but if Michael Jackson can't get a sell out crowd in cyberspace...
This Last 52 52
Week's Week's Week Week
Company Ticker Close Close High Low
------- ------ ------ ------ ------- -------
America Online AMER $71.38 $62.38 $73.00 $14.94
Apple AAPL $44.88 $43.06 $50.94 $32.50
AT&T T $52.13 $51.50 $55.88 $47.25
Bolt,Beranek & Newman BBN $34.88 $35.75 $39.38 $12.63
FTP Software FTPS $25.13 $23.00 $35.50 $14.88
General Elec. GE $57.25 $57.75 $60.50 $45.38
H&R Block HRB $37.00 $37.13 $47.63 $33.00
IBM IBM $111.38 $109.25 $114.62 $63.75
MCI MCIC $23.44 $23.25 $25.88 $17.25
Mecklermedia Corp. MECK $40.75 $39.25 $44.00 $ 4.25
Microsoft MSFT $97.25 $96.50 $110.25 $53.88
Netcom NETC $32.75 $34.75 $39.50 $16.75
Netscape Comm. Corp NSCP $52.62 $52.00 $75.00 $48.75
NetManage NETM $20.00 $17.75 $22.50 $ 8.25
News Corp. NWS $23.75 $23.63 $25.13 $14.38
Performance Syst. Intl PSIX $21.62 $19.25 $25.50 $12.00
Sears S $34.75 $34.00 $35.13 $21.50
Spyglass Inc. SPYG $44.00 $43.75 $54.00 $26.50
UUNET Technologies UUNT $48.25 $43.25 $51.75 $21.75
See you next week.
I began writing this newsletter in September 1994, at the time I was working for a technology company that is now owned by MCI. In March, I began working for International Business Machines Corporation. As of July, my management has agreed to allow me to do some work on the newsletter during business hours (probably about 6-8 hours a week). I speak for myself exclusively and not my employer.
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