There's a lot of good things about internet, but if you listened to the hype merchants, you'd think the revolution had already come! It hasn't. There's a lot of talk about internet being anarchistic - which it is in a certain sort of way. But anarchistic as it may be, it's not anarchy!
For a start, almost all the major computers on the net (as well as the communication links between them are owned by the government - and most of those are owned by the u.s. government. The government internet computers that aren't owned by the military are mainly owned by universities. Almost all of the remaining computers that make up the main backbone of the internet are owned by large companies. Hardly my idea of anarchy!
Then, hanging off the basic backbone (i'm not necessarily using this term in the true net sense) there are a whole lot of little internet computers. A significant number of these are owned and operated either by non-profit or community groups or individuals who have a genuine desire to provide a community service. It's at this level that you can find the real anarchistic nature of the internet. However, without the government-owned and funded infrastructure, it would all be pretty useless - at least in the form it is today.
Apart from this, there isn't the worldwide revolution taking place on internet that the hypesters would have you believe. Sure, there's an incredible communications revolution happening here... But that's all. And it's hardly global. Try telling the majority of the world's population - who have barely got enough food, let alone access to computers, there's a global revolution happening on the internet! Access to a computer for most people in the world is about as far fetched as a flight to the moon, and access to internet is even further removed.
At the moment, internet's in it's infancy. It's anarchistic in its organization, in the sense of the way the net's connected, rather than the way it's run. It could be said that it's run by a benevolent oligarchy - a small group of people who allow things to run themselves. This gives users the illusion of some kind of autonomy. However, this illusion could be quite dangerous, as there's nothing at all to stop the government taking full control of what goes on on internet and ruthlessly suppressing the generally radical politics that govern the way it currently operates. This will most likely happen by upping the cost of access to drive off all the scumbags and turn it into a commercial venture. It's very unlikely they'll leave it to run the way it runs now for very long - it's too much of a threat to their power and to the monopoly the media barons currently hold.
However, bearing all that in mind, there is still plenty of good reasons to take notice of the increased availability of access to this massive international network. The main one being the possibility of very cheap communication between those people lucky enough to be able to get onto the net. This is rapidly coming to mean, most people in australia, europe and north america, as well as a few other people scattered around the world. To say these people are able to get onto the net doesn't mean it's easy for them to do so, just that the possibility's there.
So even though this cheap form of international communication isn't likely to remain within our grasp for very long, it's certainly worth making use of it now, so we can build some international links that would otherwise be extremely difficult. Once these links are built, they can be maintained even if we lose access to this channel. What we can do on internet today, we'll still be able to do with batch-type networks tomorrow, it will just be harder to initially make the connections.
Generally speaking, anyone with access to internet will have an internet address. This is usually in the form: <username>@<domain> where <username> is one word with no spaces and can be a first name (e.g. paula), a composite name (e.g. sen.cheong), a group name (e.g. brisanarch), or anything else at all really. The <domain> part of the address identifies the particular computer that that user has an account on and could be something like murder.killnet.com.au - this type of address was explained briefly in chapter 8.
So anyone who has access to internet should be able to send mail to anyone else who has an internet address. No fucking around, just put their email address on the message and off it goes, automagically finding it's way to the right place. Email address means the type of address i talked about above. Email means electronic mail - that is, a message sent through a computer system or network.
Email is probably the most used service available to internet users. However, there are a couple more that are important to us: these are FTP and usenet newsgroups.
FTP stands for "file transfer protocol" and it allows you to get files from all round the world very easily. A large number of internet computers have public file areas and allow anyone to get copies of the files using ftp. The main types of file available, which are of interest to us, are software and text files.
If you've got access to ftp, you've got a massive international archive at your fingertips. Material on pretty well any subject you can imagine is there for the grabbing - finding where it is, of course, is another story altogether.
Usenet newsgroups are public, net-wide message areas. Each area has its own particular topic and other users won't appreciate you going too far off that topic. All messages on each newsgroup are available for anyone to read. And you can post your own messages there for others to read. These are basically the same as fido-type network echomail areas (described in chapter 8). There are thousands of usenet newsgroups (i don't know how many exactly) and how you find out which ones you're likely to be interested in, i'm fucked if i know! Spunk Archive contacts list includes a few of them which anarchists might find of interest.
Another internet service which will probably be of much less use to you, is called "telnet". Telnet allows you to log on to any computer on the net which you've got an account on, or which allows public access in this way. It's more or less the same as calling up that computer over the phone, but it goes through the net, so it only costs you a call to your internet provider. Because your input and the remote computer's responses may go through many other computers and over lots of cables on the way, it can be an extremely slow process. The main uses for this service are to connect with your usual internet computer when you're off travelling or something, and connecting with one of the internet services which you use through telnet (e.g. archie - see later for explanation of this). You're probably not likely to use this much.
It's not really possible to explain how to use and access these services, as there's a lot of different software kicking about which gives access to them and each internet computer's likely to be different. However you can find out this information from the people running the system, other people who use the same system or one of the many guides to internet that are appearing in vast numbers almost daily.
It's important to be aware, though, that there's usually lots of different bits of software which do the same thing on each public access system. If the one you're using to read and write mail, or access newsgroups etc, is a pain in the arse to use, it's pretty likely there's something better and easier to use available - you just have to know the command to use to get it happening. Ask system administrators for more information.
etext.org
and can be found in the directory:
/pub/Politics/Spunk
(note the capitals here! internet computers mainly use an operating system called "unix", which differentiates between upper case and lower case letters. Use the right ones or you'll come up against a blank wall!)
Note here, the address of the archive. Etext is the name of the computer it's actually on. This is (presumably) connected to a computer called archive which is at university of michigan (umich) and comes under the education domain (edu). In this type of address, there's nothing to indicate which country it's in. Often this means it's in the united states (of course! where else! it is the centre of the universe, after all!!!) but this isn't guaranteed.
Under the subdirectory Spunk there are a lot more subdirectories with all the text files in them. It's relatively easy to move around directories with ftp, using the command:
cd <dirname>
where <dirname>'s the name of the directory you want to go to.
An example of an ftp session to get the Spunk Archive catalogue follows:
First, you type:
ftp
to get the ftp program running. Then type:
open etext.org
which gets ftp to connect you to that computer. Then, once you've got a response back from the etext computer which indicates you're connected (this will almost certainly be followed by whatever prompt the ftp program uses when it's waiting for a command), you type:
cd pub/Politics/Spunk
when ftp indicates this is done (sometimes it takes a long time to get these responses back - they often have to travel many thousands of miles) you could then type:
dir
this will eventually display a listing of all the files in the directory /Spunk This will help you to get an idea of what subdirectories there are, etc.
Next you'd type:
cd contents
then:
dir
this will show you what's in that directory, but you don't *have* to do it. Then type:
get Catalog.txt
ftp will then transfer a copy of the catalogue to your home directory on the computer you're getting internet access through. You could then type:
quit
to end your ftp session.
Now, you could have done this in a couple of other ways. For example, if you'd started up ftp with the command:
ftp ftp:// etext.org /pub/Politics/Spunk/contents
you would have gone straight into the directory you wanted. Then you could have simply entered the "get" command straight away. The problem with this method is that long string of characters that makes up the command above is quite difficult to type in all in one go without making a mistake. And if you make one mistake in the whole thing you'll be back where you started! I usually go through it in stages, like i've explained above.
ftp:// etext.org /pub/Politics/Spunk/contents
is known as a URL. URL stands for uniform resource locator, and is an internet address with a particular format.
The first bit: ftp:// shows it's the address of an ftp file or directory. The other type of url you're likely to come across is: http:// this type is a world wide web address (more on this later). I'm afraid i haven't got a clue whether or not there are any other types of url.
Urls are a standard way to refer to files and directories on any computer on internet.
Archie is a service provided by a few computers scattered throughout the internet. All public access ftp sites (also known as anonymous ftp sites - because you can access them anonymously (that is you don't need an account on that particular computer)) regularly send lists of all their files to the archie servers. You can get archie to search through these lists and tell you if it finds the file you're interested in or something similar.
To use this, you have to telnet to your nearest archie site. The one in australia is:
archie.au
but there are other ones around the world - you'll have to find out yourself where your nearest one is. The command (for the australian server - and please don't use this if there's another one nearer you, the cross-pacific link is clogged enough as it is) is:
telnet archie.au
then you follow the instructions you're given once you're connected.
To get archie to do what you want, there's a number of commands available. But the most important one is:
prog <string>
where <string> is the file name, or part of it, that you want to find. It takes a while for archie to search through the list, but eventually you'll get a (possibly quite long) list of sites where you can find what you're looking for.
You can also access archie by email. Send a message to archie@archie.whatever.your.local.one.is with "help" in the message body and you'll get an email message back with a list of the commands available.
Pretty much the same applies to getting interactive access to internet as it does to getting a uucp feed (see chapter 8). By interactive access, i mean you (probably) use a computer and a modem at home to dial up a public access site - the internet equivalent of a bbs, which you can get access to the net through. Another common way of getting internet access is through university, if you're a student or lecturer, in which case, you might use a computer terminal in the university itself.
Finding a public access site is obviously going to depend on where you live. In australia, apana (australian public access network association) run a non-profit public access network. There are a number of public access sites connected to this net, mainly in the capital cities on the east coast. For more information on apana, write to:
reply paid 7
propaganda dept
apana inc
p.o. box 145
keilor
vic 3036
or send email to: <propaganda@apana.org.au>
include a daytime phone number so they can ring you.
Also, if you're outside of the main population centres in australia, probably the best source of internet connection is pegasus. They're expensive, but you do all your connection for the cost of a local call. I'm afraid i don't have their address handy.
However, i can offer no help to people in other countries. You'll just have to ask around. Don't necessarily go for the first one you come across - there's often an amazing difference in costs from one service provider to another.
It's sometimes hard for people to grasp what's actually happening on their computer, what's happening on the internet access computer and what's happening on other computers they might be using (for instance through ftp).
When you use ftp, you're opening a communication channel from the internet access computer to the ftp computer (where the file you want is). The ftp computer responds to commands you give it through the access computer (and via your computer!!!) It then sends the file you want to the access computer, where it ends up in you're home directory. Your home directory is an area of the computer's disk space which you can use to keep files and mail etc. Once the file you want is in your home directory, then you've got to get it down the phone line to your computer at home (or, hopefully, in your local infoshop or community centre).
To transfer files between your computer and the internet access computer, you usually use facilities provided by the communications software you're running (for example, zmodem). So once you've got the ftp file in your home directory on the access computer, you then have to download it to your computer. This is probably done with the command:
sz <filename> [<filename>] [<filename>] ....
Anyway, that's something else you'll have to work out yourself, as there's lots of differences between different setups.
One last point: your internet access computer may have user-friendly menus (like a bbs), but it might not. It's quite likely you'll just be thrown into a totally unhelpful, fairly blank screen. If you've used DOS, you'll probably have a fair idea how this sort of thing works - if you haven't you'll probably be quite lost.
Most internet computers use an operating system called "unix" or another one which is very similar, called "linux". These are similar to dos in general approach, but have a lot of different commands. It's a good idea to try and find a book about internet in your local library which will explain a bit about this stuff. It's also a good idea to learn a bit about dos. It will come in very handy. Windows is very pretty, but it doesn't help you learn how to deal with other environments.
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