Here I am, (a close facsimile anyway) adding to my home page. Like my "mouse" hmmm?! The wire is a bit frayed. Of course flossing my teeth with it hasn't helped much.!
This Page is in Stereo !
A Newspaper on the net? Sure!
My home town paper has a new site. For all of you in the New England Area, the information will be of particular use. The "Globe" covers local, national and international events ("World Wide Events"). This site is actually part of "Boston.Com." Even if you have already read your home town paper, the site has plenty of things to check out about the city of Boston...!!!
Planning on visiting Boston? Need to know the good places to dine out or what entertainment is available ? Boston Online has the answer ! This site has all you need to know for great dining (with reviews), menus, and first hand critiques of restaurants all over the city. What Plays or Shows are in town; Where and When and How much. A great site for Visitors and "Bostonians" alike !! Coming to town soon ?? The Resources for Tourists section will take you to Boston Online's listings for The Arts, Entertainment, Hotels, Public Transportation, Schedule of events etc. If you have a question, this spot will lead you to the answer...!
Hey! A real honest to goodness Computer Channel that combines a web site and real time video to compliment the cable/satellite channel! Ziff Davis (the publishing firm) has come up with an excellent channel called ZDTV This was an experiment that turned into a success. Ziff Davis started the channel in spite of a considerable amount of criticism. Many critics did not think a "computer channel" would be popular...Wrong !
ZDTV has 7 million viewers at last count! (For those with DSS ch# is 273). From Forums discussing the latest industry moves such as Silicon Spin to "How to" shows such as "Call for Help" this is an excellent source of entertainment and information. You will need "Real Player" (available for free) to view the channel in real time online ! This is a first rate site...and a great way to get the same info via the Internet that others are getting on cable or satellite tv !.
Ok, so you want a page that has every Net tool, right? Strouds Consummate Windows Apps is a "One Stop Shop" for everything related to the Web and Utilities needed for the Web. This Award winning site is a net surfers "toolbox" for both Windows and Windows 95. From A to Z, simply put this site either has what you want or a link to it.!!
Pointcast is another great automated download program. If you want the News, Weather, Stock Reports, the daily lottery number, your horoscope and much more but don't have the time to go looking for it...Don't ! Let Pointcast do it for you....automatically! This is one of the finest programs you will find on the Web for news retrieval. It uses Reuters and API for the latest in international news and satellite images and weather forecasting for all major cities. The L.A. Times and the Boston Globe are posted also. The program is completely configurable to fit the needs of just about anyone. Have it dial every hour or once a day, it's up to you. With an interactive screen saver that shuttles each report at one minute intervals and a scrolling ticker at the bottom of the page, one needn't even start the program to see what the headlines are. Pointcast has won many awards and deserves all of them...This is a "must get" program !! "C|NET Central Online" has come a long way ! Now, rated the NUMBER ONE Web Site. It is the "Superstore" of the Internet. With it's cable show to highlight what is happening on the Web, this is not a site to be missed ! For those of us who have Netscape 3.0, (**click on "Netscape Now" at top of page**) or Microsoft's Internet Explorer 3.0, C|NET has an entire section devoted to "JAVA" and "VRML" and other multimedia technologies for the Internet. They have plenty of great links, the best search engine on the Web (by user vote) and the most interesting and useful downloads you can find (via "shareware.com"). This site will keep your modem working overtime !.Introduced by "C|NET" is "Shareware.com" An all around site for utilities, information, games etc. The name says it all. If it isn't on Shareware.com, it is going to be hard to find anywhere...try it.Another C|NET spin off is "The Web" This is a great site for "all around" information about what's happening on the Web. The site compliments the TV show (seen on cable). If you saw something on TV and forgot what is was you wanted you can run to this site to refresh your memory. If you don't have cable, here is the next best thing !
The "cool site of the day," is getting very popular. If you don't know what you really want to look at but still feel that urge to "Surf the Net," let someone else pick what it is your going to look at !!! " The Sci-Fi Channel.";This channel is both educational and entertaining. Great for "Sci Fi" buffs and "late nighters" as they re run the shows again in the late evening and early a.m."The Discovery Channel"; is one of my favorites because it is so "High Technology Oriented." The History Channel ! For those of us who enjoy History and Historical Events. The cable show is great and I have found the site to be loaded with information that is as informative as the show. The Arts and Entertainment Channel Site . Want access to more than just one type of entertainment on a cable channel ? This may be what your looking for. A beautifully done site, (if you run in high color you will appreciate it even more). It offers the same access to a variety of entertainment sources as it's cable channel. From Science, History, to "Columbo" this site has it.Worried about getting hit by a virus ? Keep ahead of the people who would love to see it happen. Use a virus scan utility regularly, here is a great site to get info and many different virus scanning programs, such as McAfee's "Vscan," (now with a Windows 95 version) or the European "F-Prot" and "F-Prot Pro," (now Microsoft's official choice) virus scanner. .The Popular Mechanics Site is the site for all you "Do it Yourself" types. Want to know the best time to plant new grass or drain the oil from your car? Here is the place for you.! The Public Broadcasting System (aka "PBS") site is nothing short of fantastic. This is a site that educates and fascinates. Very well laid out and designed, this site will lead you to the depths of the Amazon and its people or the summit of Mount Everest and how high altitude affects climbers. A superb site.
"And Snip goes the credit card !!! " I got a call this morning, it was from my VISA bank. The call went something like this..." Hello, have you recently purchased an airline ticket with your credit card ?" "No", I respond...I KNEW what was coming next. "Have you made a purchase in the last 24 hours ?" Again, "No." "Well it seems that someone has forged your card and is trying to use it to by airline tickets and make long distance phone calls" (Probably wanted his family to know he was coming home on his "lottery winnings.") What's the point of my story? Watch Internet security !!! Although there could have been other ways the thief (aspiring thief in my case) got the number to my card, the Internet is about as secure as a bent nail on a barn door. Don't ever, ever, ever, give out your credit card number unless you are sure the vendor is legitimate. When on the web, try for a "secure" site. Those of us with Netscape can watch the "security key" halves in the lower left corner come together. I was lucky, the thief got nowhere. Apparently when the phony card is "swiped" through the reader there is some code that randomizes and can't be duplicated without the actual card...but...if it was a phone in purchase, the thief may have gotten away with it ! I am inconvenienced because I had to destroy the legitimate cards while the bank generates new ones.We are all inconvenienced by the "theft offsets" the banks charge in inflated interest.
NOW... For those of you that worry about installing plug ins...don't...installation is a snap !
What? You got Crescendo and it isn't working ?? Note: If you recently upgraded to Netscape 3.0 or Netscape 4.0 (Communicator) and you still get music but the "Crescendo" Logo bar has been replaced by a simpler looking control panel, that is Netscape's built in midi player. Internet Explorer users won't get this problem. If you prefer to keep Crescendo as the default MIDI player (the better of both Netscape's and I.E.'s built in players) you need to change a file in the "plugins" directory. It's easy to do. Other small problems have cropped up but all are easily dealt with. If you upgraded and get no music at all or added a plug in and Crescendo stopped working, Click here for instructions on how to fix Crescendo "bugs".
NOTE !: (this problem applies to early versions of Crescendo) If you are having a problem with Crescendo and just recently added the "TOOLVOX" plug in, there is a compatibility problem that causes "Toolvox" to intercept the midi music's,"Mime Type" and try to use it for it's own ends. If you want to have the best of both worlds, instead of Toolvox, try Echo Speech. It works just as well, with just a slight loss in compression spec's as compared to Toolvox. If you want to keep Voxkit, Click Here for a work around fix.
Recently, this page received the distinguished award of a "Best Tours Page" from Excite ! (I am pretty "excited" about it !)
Hey Folks ! This page has been awarded the "Cool Site of the Day" from "Live Update" and "Pick of the Week" from Jim Net ! 
Please feel free to make any suggestions or comments about new additions to this page...!!
Send my email to... steve@stevebassett.com
If you're interested (Well, I am !) you make visitor number
Thanks for dropping by and have a GREAT (ok, reasonable) day... STEVE
