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Is the Net in your locker room?
Privacy abuses abound on the Internet -- but so far, the government doesn't appear to care.
By Maura Kelly
[11/02/99]

Technology: View from the top
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By Andrew Leonard
[11/01/99]

Talking 'bout a computer revolution
Speech recognition technology promises to transform how we interact with computers -- or turn us all into mindless gibbering automatons.
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[10/29/99]

Cannibal games
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By David Wilson
[10/28/99]

Cartoon for coders
"User Friendly" taps the open-source movement's collective funny bone.
By Janelle Brown
[10/27/99]

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This time, think "Our Town" as directed by Fellini. Sporting matching black polo shirts emblazoned with the company logo, the guides took turns staffing expo booths to hawk their intangible wares with bits of tangible free stuff. In the span of 20 minutes, I sampled sugared pecans from the Columbia, S.C., tourism guide, talked jump serves with Olympian Erik Sullivan (an associate of the volleyball guide), sipped virgin Bloody Marys courtesy of the cocktails guide, then digested it all in my brand-new journal, compliments of the journals guide. Oh, yeah -- and I also got some Web-searching tips from About.com's Web search guide. Confined to the bowels of the Luxor Hotel, the Red Ball suggested that maybe, just maybe, the Internet could achieve all its global-village potential.

But then I returned home, booted up my office computer, logged onto About.com and spent my usual 20-odd minutes wading around, lost. So much for Las Vegas-style glamour -- there still isn't much of a correspondence between marketing budgets and Web site usefulness. And unfortunately, that's the key way that these search engines haven't changed since their nascent days. The Internet can still be an inspiring place when you're just searching around, seeing where the Web leads you, but it's also still a huge source of information superhighway road rage when you're looking for something specific.

AltaVista's excess provided possibly the best example of this axiom. A top-10 Internet search engine heretofore known mostly for being, well, a top-10 Internet search engine, AltaVista wants more. In the words of AltaVista president and CEO Rod Schrock on Monday, "We aspire to be far more than the sixth-largest Internet company in the world." In the spirit of the dog-and-pony show mounted at the Hammerstein, AltaVista is positioning itself as the portal where everyone's Zen-meets-Pollyanna enthusiasm for the Web's wide-open possibilities gets fulfilled.

But both of these brass rings are being lunged at with a few relatively minor design and function tweaks that, in the brick-and-mortar business world, would equal a nice paint job. Stock quotes, sports scores and weather and news updates can be streamed onto your computer screen instantaneously thanks to new AltaVista satellites and news-wire partnerships. Great stuff, to be sure, but smartly beautiful, or beautifully smart, or whatever? More like just plain old boring progress.

AltaVista's pitch reminded me of yet another search engine launch. Back in September, Looksmart.com didn't try to woo me with giveaway goodies at its kickoff bash; they just plied me with liquor and let me get my picture taken with Cookie Monster. Looksmart's hook is to be the search engine for women -- the centerpiece of the bash was a preview of two television advertisements that could sell scented panty liners as easily as Web sites: myriad slo-mo shots of women jogging, goofing off with their boyfriends and driving convertibles. The message -- our search site will help you be cool.

And smart, don't forget smart. AltaVista has its own TV spots featuring a woman in a convertible -- she talks her way out of speeding tickets by quoting obscure legal cases and noting the specifics of radar gun mechanics. True, the woman is quite beautiful, and she does look smart talking down a stoic street cop with such sass. But doesn't it insult our intelligence to make even a joking claim that a revamped search engine will get the cops off your back? At the AltaVista event, Schrock proclaimed that thanks to the Net, we can now all make like Matt Damon in "Good Will Hunting," who wooed the gorgeous Minnie Driver by demonstrating just how intelligent he was. Think, willfully idiotic.

At the AltaVista relaunch, there was one final, guerrilla-tinged marketing assault: the day hires who'd just portrayed "the crowd" onstage so convincingly moved outside and gridlocked the sidewalk, hoisting placards advocating knowledge and enlightenment and once again reminding us couple of hundred journalists and schoolkids (whose schools were the recipients of 500 computers donated by the company -- an act of charity that somehow merited the cameo appearance of hip-hop princess Lauryn Hill), as we played the scabs and crossed the picket line to leave, that "smart is beautiful."

OK, so maybe smart is the new sexy. But now that the search engines are chanting that mantra with such devout, marketing-induced mindlessness, what, pray tell, is going to be the new smart?
salon.com | Nov. 3, 1999

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