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From: chuq@plaid.Sun.COM (Chuq Von Rospach)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.drwho,comp.sys.mac,rec.arts.comics
Subject: Re: Best Information Service?
Message-ID: <63737@sun.uucp>
Date: 10 Aug 88 18:32:26 GMT
References: <5817@pucc.Princeton.EDU> <7926@cup.portal.com>
Sender: news@sun.uucp
Reply-To: chuq@sun.UUCP (Chuq Von Rospach)
Organization: Fictional Reality
Lines: 94

>   The best computer info service???  Good question.

Yeah. Frank Catalano and I wrote on it a few months ago in Macintosh
Horizons. Mazazine has also written about it. There's been at least one
other magazine article about it, but I don't remember who did it offhand
(MacWorld? Publish?)

>I'll keep it with only CI$
>and GEnie.   Both have pros and cons.

I'll chime in a bit about Delphi, also. 

A LOT of it depends on what you want. I use four different timesharing
services: CIS, Delphi, USENET and GENie, with the amount of time spent on
each being in about that order (CIS and Delphi are about the same. I'm
currently co-running a writer's workshop on CompuServe in the Sci-Fi SIG,
and that takes up a fair amount of time). 

What do I use them for? Here's a quick list:

	CIS:	Sci-Fi SIG
		Litforum (writers/editors SIG)
		Appdev (CE Software & Acius/4D support)
		Aldus SIG (Freehand support)
		Ashton-Tate SIG (Fullwrite support)
	
	Delphi: Science Fiction group
		Writer's group
		Icontact (Macintosh Support)
	
	USENET: Macintosh Support
		SF-Lovers
		rec.arts.comics

	GENie:	Red Ryder 'support' (big quotes on that one...)
		Letraset support (Ready, Set, Go!)
		Macintosh libraries

For macintosh stuff, my preference is USENET (it's the only thing on 
USENET I think still, generally, works. That and the comics group). If it
didn't exist, I'd be on Delphi for it. The best/cheapest libraries are
definitely on GENie, but I find the mac group on GENie disappointing, and
the RoundTable software sucks, so I avoid using GENie as much as possible
except for downloading. I've completely given up on the CIS Macintosh stuff
except for a few specific vendor support groups because it's too large, too
noisy, and has an even worse signal-to-noise ratio than USENET does. 

For comics, I use USENET. I probably ought to hook up over on CIS, too -- it
DOES have a good group. The comics groups on GENie and Delphi are
essentially non-existant.

Dr Who: Pretty good on CompuServe. Non-existant on Delphi. I don't know
about GENie, but their entire SF SIG is pretty boring, and I gave up on it
weeks ago. I don't see that it would change for Dr. Who related stuff.

GENie's main advantage is it's cheap. The software is horrible. It uses
half duplex on the modem lines, doesn't allow type-ahead and drives me
crazy. I wrote better BBS software than that on a Cyber in college years
ago. The only reason to use GENie is if you can't afford a real timesharing
service (and for the Macintosh libraries, where the interface isn't around
enough to bother you).

Delphi's advantage is that it's as cheap (or cheaper) than GENie. it's
disadvantage is that it isn't as well known, so it's smaller and less
complete -- which becomes a real advantage if what you want to do is sit
down and talk with folks and get to know them. Amongst the SF folks on
Delphi are myself, jack chalker, pat cadigan, dean r. lambe, joel rosenberg,
joel davis, susan casper, mike banks (the sysop) and a number I'm sure will
be mad at me for forgetting them. On an irregular basis, you'll see folks
like Orson Scott Card and Frank Catalano on it. 

CompuServe is the big brother of all of this. It's also more expensive, but
with things like Navigator and some judicious topic pruning, you can usually
keep the bills under control. Regulars in the SF Sig include Mel. White,
David Gerrold, Mike Resnick, Ray Feist, John Stith and a host of others.

If I had to limit myself to a single service, it would be a tossup between
Delphi and Compuserve. If I was budget limited, it'd be Delphi. I may well
drop my GENie account soon -- I'm just not getting anything out of it except
the Letraset support, which I don't really need. The Red Ryder 'support' is
ludicrous, and I'm beginning to think that 'upgrading' to Red Ryder was a
mistake -- so if/when that program goes, so will GENie. 

Notes: I'm involved with the SF SIG's on both CompuServe and Delphi, and the
	Mac SIG on Delphi, so I'm not completely an impartial observer. But
	the limit of my involvement is that they don't make me pay for the
	time I spend in those SIGs, so the time savings aren't enough to
	make me sell my soul or anything. Honest.


-- 
Chuq Von Rospach			chuq@sun.COM		Delphi: CHUQ

I don't work for no 'Toon!