anonymous remailers, network computer, singles sites, etc.

["Vladimir Z. Nuri" <vznuri@netcom.com>]

well, nobody has commented on this a whole
lot here from what I can tell, 
but the net is now *plastered* with
anonymous remailers in various forms. it's
definitely not going away.

we now have mail.yahoo.com which can create
an alias in a few minutes. also, www.hotmail.com
and there are others.

one could argue the Net PC (NC) is already here!!
web TV allows much software to be run on it
(btw, does anyone know if it runs java? if so,
I'd say that's definitely a NC). the point is
that sites such as games.yahoo.com etc. are
essentially sites in which a web site is
indistinguishable from software. "the network
is the computer". larry ellison went home
with his tail between his legs on the NC idea,
but what he doesn't realize is that it is
actually here en masse. (just not so much
in the corporate arena as he envisioned)

an interesting subset of anonymity is being
used very intensely with online personals!!
here's a sophisticated example

http://personals.swoon.com/e_personals/static/help.html#e-mail

they have a lot of info on how their site
acts as a remailer for email messages.
this is a very "slick" online magazine clearly showing
huge amount of production cash which I personally
haven't heard too much about. a bit risque for
some peoples tastes, but very intriguing application
of cyberspace one never would have dreamt up just a 
few moons ago.

incidentally, there are bazillions of singles sites
out there on the internet. its another application of
the net one wouldn't necesarily have foreseen, but
it really makes sense. hooking up people with people.
a strange "killer app" of the net judging by how many
there are.  there's less "romantic" types of this thing too, for
just hooking up people with similar interests, such
as www.icq.com and www.cyberfriends.com

one tasteful/decent place to start for singles sites is

http://www.zdnet.com/yil/content/mag/9803/gurlsites.html

ultimately the internet population is starting to discover that
the key thing it does is related to *communities*....