Cruzio/The Internet Store Newsletter - Number 38, September 28, 2000
1) New Web e-mail program for Cruzio mail!
2) The Small Business Internet and Technology Fair
3) How to appear at the Small Business Fair October 12th...
4) DSL status report
5) Neither Snow, Nor Rain, Nor Heat, Nor Gloom of Night
6) Price for new domain names: just $15.99 per year!
7) October classes: Using the Internet and Publishing on the Internet
8) Alert reader Jordan Hall notices error in newsletter!
9) How to avoid (some) spam
10) Cruzio's large mailbox size
11) About This Newsletter
12) How to Reach Cruzio (dial-in or tech support)
1) New Web e-mail program for Cruzio mail!
When you are traveling, it's great to be able to view your e-mail through
Cruzio's Web mail program. Now the mailer is even better. Simply go to
your Cruzio Admin Control Panel (see instructions down in item 12 of this
newsletter) and click on "check your mailbox". If you are concerned
about privacy for your e-mail, choose to view it securely. Otherwise,
it's faster to view it un-securely. Cruzio's older Web mailer was
functional, but now we've added more features. You'll be able to send
and see attachments, for example. Let us know what you think!
2) The Small Business Internet and Technology Fair
The purpose of the Small Business Internet and Technology Fair on Thursday,
October 12th is to introduce local small businesses to helpful vendors
and to each other. The Web site has been re-designed, please have a look:
http://www.smallbusinessfair.com
(Very nice, isn't it? Thanks to our artist Mott and Web designer John).
Many local companies who specialize in small business services are
involved, and not just high-tech stuff. There will be some fascinating
discussions:
- Santa Cruz Mayor Keith Sugar and Santa Cruz Chamber of Commerce
CEO Michael Schmidt discuss "Small Businesses' Role in the
Community"
- Executive Director of the Downtown Association of Santa Cruz,
Pete Eberle, and Cruzio Marketing Director Kathy Bisbee talk
about "Virtual Downtowns" -- can our community be both local
and online?
Plus useful workshops:
- 10 Secrets of Successful Online Businesses - Brant Smith, Imagesmith
- Financing a Small Business - David Heald, VP of Coast Commercial Bank
- E-Business Plans/E-commerce Challenges - Panel
- Power Searching on the Internet - Topsy Smalley, Cabrillo College
- Setting up your Network - Peter Huemer, User Friendly Computing
- Sustainable Business Practices - Santa Cruz Chamber of Commerce
If you'd like to get involved with the Fair, you can place a $99 listing
in the Small Business Resource Guide (see next item, below) or simply come
to the Fair and see what's happening. Fair admission is just $5, which
includes a donation to Barrios Unidos' Computer Center. If you have
questions, please see
http://www.smallbusinessfair.com
Cruzio is one of the organizers and will have a booth at the Fair. We'd
love to see current and potential customers and answer questions about our
business services. See you at the Fair!
3) How to appear at the Small Business Fair October 12th...
Many businesses in the Santa Cruz area are looking for Web designers,
computer consultants, and other services. That's why the upcoming
Small Business Fair is set up to introduce small businesses to
local vendors. Although booth space is now filled, if you would like
to make a presentation at the Fair, you may place a listing in the
Small Business Resource Guide, which will be distributed to Fair
attendees and the 37,500 readers of Metro Santa Cruz. With the listing
comes a chance to appear at the Fair's Brown Bag, where many local
small business specialists will be introducing themselves. All for
just $99. Find details at:
http://www.smallbusinessfair.com
4) DSL status report
The good news: DSL is a new technology. It's a fantastic technology. This
writer is sending in a dispatch via DSL right now, enjoying the excellent
Internet speed of 1.2 megabits per second. Such a connection would have
cost hundreds of dollars a month prior to DSL. Now it's under $50 per
month.
The bad news: DSL is a new technology. It involves a heavy re-tooling of
central office telephone equipment and new order-tracking systems to be
installed by very large, bureaucratic companies who have been monopolies
for many, many years and do not necessarily snap to attention when customers
need help. The system is rife with errors and slow when correction is needed.
Internet Service Providers, such as Cruzio, and customers must work with
this slow-moving, error-prone system in order to get the fine DSL Internet
connections.
Lately, installations have been going more smoothly. There are still
missed appointments, but fewer of them (for a time, over 50% of
appointments were missed by the technicians; now it is under 20%). In
the last week, equipment was installed in the Santa Cruz Main telephone
office and the Scotts Valley telephone office, so many customers in these
areas who'd been waiting for a long time have had installation dates set.
Many thanks to Cruzio reps Hilary, Barbara and Brittany, who pushed
orders through every day until the ports finally opened up. There are
still customers awaiting installations, and Cruzio continues to call
on their behalf; their number is steadily dwindling, which is happy news,
but we won't be satisfied until all the connections are operational.
The billing snafus, in which a customer orders at one price and is
surprised to find it billed by the telephone company at another price,
still occur sometimes. Cruzio is in constant contact with the telephone
company about such problems.
But at long last, Cruzio can say: it seems reasonably dependable to order
DSL now. It is a fine service, and you may want to order it. For more
information, please see our DSL Web page at
http://gate.cruzio.com/support/dsl.html
5) Neither Snow, Nor Rain, Nor Heat, Nor Gloom of Night
Prescient technical support staffer Tim reminded us that wet weather
looms ahead, and wet weather brings phone line problems, and line
problems often result in modem disconnects. He was very right
to bring this up, as it rained the day after his e-mail. So we are
reminding Cruzio members, please be aware that your Internet connection
may tend to get a little shaky in the wet weather, particularly
during and after a big storm. If you'd like to know more, check our
Web page on the subject at:
http://www.cruzio.com/support/info/06.html
Remember also that Cruzio anticipates power outages in wet weather, and
we have backup generators for all our equipment to take us through such
troubles. Even when Santa Cruz is experiencing an outage, our Web servers
are up and humming, serving our customers' pages to people elsewhere in
the world who still have electricity. Cruzio considers reliability to be
the highest priority of our service to you, and we are dedicated to
providing communication services via the Internet through snow, and rain,
and heat, and fog and gloom of night. We won't lose your e-mail.
By the way, found this in Compton's online encyclopedia:
"`Neither snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night stays these
couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.` Often
thought to be the official motto of the United States Postal Service,
the statement was actually written in about 430 BC by the Greek
historian Herodotus. He was describing the perseverance of the
mounted messenger service used by Xerxes, king of Persia." So there
it is: Cruzio joins a grand tradition. Fog is not mentioned in the
original, but seems appropriate here in Santa Cruz.
6) Price for new domain names: just $15.99 per year!
If you've been thinking of getting that domain name for your business
("mycompany.com") or your family ("thesomethingfamily.org") or any reason
whatever, you'll be pleased with Cruzio's new prices. We've switched
providers for new domain registration and can offer considerable savings
for the same good service: the price is now just $15.99 per year. As
always Cruzio has a Web page for further information:
http://cruzio/support/web/io.html
7) October classes: Using the Internet and Publishing on the Internet
In October and November, Cruzio will be offering:
Tuesdays, 6:30-9pm: "Using the Internet", packed with tips and
tricks for speedy, fun Internet usage. Taught by the
knowledgeable, engaging Brittany.
Wednesdays, 6:30-9pm: "Publishing on the Internet I", Scintillating
instructors John, Kathy, and Priya guide students through
the process of creating Web sites for their family, hobbies
or businesses. Our most popular series.
Please check our classes Web page for the above information and more:
http://www.cruzio.com/classes/
8) Alert reader Jordan Hall notices error in newsletter!
It is a well-known fact that Cruzio members are smarter than average.
And here is proof. Alert reader Jordan Hall has suggested a correction
that will benefit many people, noticing that our e-mail addresses for
support and other questions were not functional as written; they had
dots immediately following them. Since the whole point of listing
Cruzio's telephone numbers and e-mail addresses is to encourage people
to write and call us, we are grateful to Jordan for pointing out the
error and have corrected it. Thanks!
9) How to avoid (some) spam
As promised, Cruzio has completed instructions on how to use e-mail
filters to avoid spam (a common name for unsolicited e-mail) where
possible. We have written about how to work with filters on Macintosh
computers or PC's, and in Netscape or Outlook Express. Please see this
information and other helpful hints at Cruzio's anti-spam Web site:
http://gate.cruzio.com/support/email/spaminfo.html
10) Cruzio's large mailbox size
In conducting the Small Business Fair, we've have had to gather and
distribute display logos for the many companies involved. We
discovered that those with accounts on Cruzio could easily receive
several graphics at a time, but that colleagues who were on other
systems sometimes had such small mailbox limits that they could only
receive one or two pieces before their mailboxes filled up. Sometimes we
forget to notice all the little extras that Cruzio provides! Cruzio
customers get 30 megabytes as standard issue for their main mailbox.
11) About This Newsletter
Cruzio doesn't like to waste bandwidth with extra email, but we sometimes
have events and announcements that users need to know about. This seems
like the most efficient way to let people know what's happening. Hope
it's helpful. Please email support@cruzio.com with any comments or questions.
By the way, we would love to have a regular, predictable schedule
for this newsletter...but we simply do not send it unless there is real
news enclosed. Thus the haphazard datelines.
12) How to Reach Cruzio (dial-in or tech support)
To reach the Cruzio Information Center, for online technical and
sales information:
http://www.cruzio.com/support
To dial in to Cruzio, set your software to dial one of the numbers
below (note: we've expanded and joined modem pools, so you may be
using another number. If so, don't worry, it still works just fine).
56k: 459-9408
33.6 kbps and under: 459-6230
To call Cruzio:
459-6301............Use this number to check Cruzio's system status,
pay your Cruzio bill, find out more about our hours and location,
or to reach someone in customer service and technical support.
To send email to Cruzio, use one of these addresses:
support@cruzio.com ......for technical support
office@cruzio.com .......for billing and ordering information
webmaster@cruzio.com ....for questions about Cruzio's World Wide
Web service
To get to your Cruzio Control Panel (also known as Admin Page):
If your email address looks like "someone@cruzio.com",
go to http://members.cruzio.com/admin and type in your
login and password.
If your email address looks like "someone@mydomain.com"
--in other words, you have a custom domain name -- go to
http://www.mydomain.com/admin and have your admin login
and password ready. Note that you need to substitute your
custom domain name for "mydomain" in this example.
Thanks very much from Cruzio:
Chris, Peggy, John, Julianne, Patton, Kathy, Mark, Martin,
Georgette, Tapati, Hilary, Brittany, Alec, Rachael, Barbara,
Raelani, Priya, Stephen, Paul, Tim, Gershom, Myesha, Kelly,
Allyson, Laura, and Sam (welcome back Sam!) (the grownups);
Jake, Annika, and Carly (the kids)
Can you guess what this means?
Jake, age 8, said "I put water in an empty shampoo bottle. Then I put
the bottle in the freezer. After it became isolated, I took it out and
squeezed the bottle really hard and the top shot off and then the couch
became isolated too."
(Answer: couch was soaked with freezing water.)
