Whoops! at abcnews.com

Computer Life column for November 7, 1998
by
Richard Gordon

Election Day morning, I went to the ABC News Web site (www.abcnews.com). On the home page was a note from the Web site editors:

Last night, during testing of the site, we inadvertently posted results and erroneous predictions on the outcomes of political races. There was no bias intended by what we posted, and the predictions do not reflect the reporting or news judgment of ABC News. We sincerely apologize to all of our readers for any confusion. We are taking steps to ensure similar mistakes do not happen in the future.

Their note reminded me of the flurry of press in the early days of home satellite dishes because some home viewers had caught one of the networks "testing" its election night coverage on an open channel. That network had to lead off its election day evening news by apologizing, indicating that they were only testing things, that of course they weren't predicting that the President had won re-election in a landslide.

Several years ago, as I was preparing a presentation for a group of state treasurers and assistant state treasurers about financial resources on the Web, I found an open Web site from a securities dealer in Texas.

We had a very pleasant chat on the telephone in which he told me about his "exploring the feasibility" of selling securities over the Web. Then something dawned on him. "Hey, I'm not licensed to sell securities in Delaware," he suddenly said. "You're not supposed to see my site."

Within an hour, he had taken his information off the Web.

The moral of these tales is pretty clear: The Web, like TV or radio, is a public broadcast medium. If you want to keep something secure and private, don't put it up on "the satellite," and don't put it on your Web site without some kind of encryption or password protection.

ABC News is just the latest organization to learn this lesson publicly.

Shopping Season

Don't wait until "Black Friday." Halloween is over; therefore the holiday shopping season is under way.

One of my sisters e-mailed me about holiday gifts this week. Christmas lights are for sale at some of the stores already. I even saw some on a house on November 4.

One colleague even e-mailed me about her holiday shopping woes before Halloween. As she shopped for the exact piece of Barbie paraphernalia that her 4-year-old covets, she noticed that the toy stores of the world haven't yet cottoned on to the benefits of electronic commerce. "Office suppliers offer nearly all their stuff on-line, why not the toy stores?"

As you shop for the holidays, drop me an e-mail message about your favorite on-line toy stores and how they stack up against fighting the crowds at Zany Brainy and Toys R Us.

Tip of the week

Many Windows and Mac users know about cutting or copying text from one part of a document and pasting it to another part of that same document.

But copying and pasting can be useful going from one application to another--for example, if you want to craft a careful e-mail message and don't want to tie up your telephone line.

1. Compose your message in the word processor of your choice.
2. With your word-processed message open, fire up your modem and open your e-mail program.
3. Begin a new mail message, filling in the address fields.
4. Back in the word processor, use your mouse to highlight the text you want to copy into your mail message.
5. Select "Copy" from the pull-down Edit menu.
6. Click in the message area of your e-mail program, then select "Paste" from the mail program's pull-down Edit menu.

You could just send the word-processed document as an attachment; however, what if the recipient doesn't use compatible e-mail or word processing programs? Pasting the text into the mail program makes sure that your recipient can read the message--with almost any e-mail software.

Copyright © 1998, The News Journal Company

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