************************************************************** * * * CYBERSPACE * * A biweekly column on net culture appearing * * in the Toronto Sunday Sun * * * * Copyright 1999 Karl Mamer * * Free for online distribution * * All Rights Reserved * * Direct comments and questions to: * * * * * ************************************************************** I Am Cyberman. Hear Me Roar. I'm not one of these head-in-the-clouds types that believes the Internet is a Libertarian paradise. The Internet is a fun place to kill a couple hours a day for less than the cost of a cup of coffee. The net is more intellectually challenging than watching an hour of David Letterman but on the karma scale probably falls short of watching a half hour of Absolutely Fabulous. If it's some kind of agent of social change -- capable of toppling governments, multi-national corporations, the scientific establishment, and the Saucer People From Beyond -- I've seen little evidence. Sometimes the net surprises me, though. Toronto-area fans of a sci fi show called Babylon 5 noticed that CFTO (Baton Broadcasting Service's Channel 9) had moved it from Sunday 5 pm to a timeslot that fluctuated between 1 am and 3 am on Friday night (or Saturday morning depending on how you parse your day). Babylon 5 is a cross between Star Trek and a soap opera with an ongoing story line that you follow religiously. A large number of fans also follow a USENET group on the net called rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5. Area fans passed around a few email addresses they got from CFTO's home page (www.baton.com) and quickly mounted an email campaign to get the show moved to a time period that didn't require chugging a 2 litre of Jolt cola or grinding away three hours of video tape to catch a one hour show. To everyone's surprise and to CFTO's credit, they made a switch to Saturday 5 pm. Janice Reith, Baton's Program Manager, even emailed everyone that mailed in informing them of the new time slot. Wow. The net helped make a difference. Now I know how flower- power generation felt. Playing Catch-up People who have only recently become acquainted with Babylon 5 have two years of history and plot twists to catch up on. Fortunately, there's more Babylon 5 information on the net than what's on the ephemeral and sometimes random world of USENET. There's a half-dozen fan-supported web sites with loads of information for beginners and even veterans who suffered through the show's less-than-stellar two-hour pilot. The Babylon 5 FAQ www.cis.ohio-state.edu/hypertext/faq/bngusenet/alt/tv/babylon- 5/top.html If you're going to hang out in rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5, there are a few ground rules. The most important is "don't post story ideas!" The producer hangs around the group and chats with fans. His lawyers would smash his modem if they thought he was at risk of being sued by someone for stealing a storyline. The Lurker's Guide to Babylon 5 www.hyperion.com/lurk/ The Lurker's Guide to Babylon 5 has very detailed plot synopses of every episode aired. If you miss a show, The Lurker's Guide is a great way of being brought up to date. Cobra Bay One travel1.travel-net.com/~starfury/cobraone.html Cobra Bay One is a good first stop for recent converts. A good explanation of what the heck the show is all about can be found here as well as a collection of Babylon 5 related humor that may amuse you. The Unofficial Babylon 5 Encyclopedia web.uml.edu/Babylon-Enc/enc.html The Unofficial Babylon 5 Encyclopedia is an alphabetized, cross-referenced lexicon of terms and characters. Descriptions are short but helpful if you are incapable of keeping two years of show material in your head. Agamemnon's Babylon 5 Sound Site ftp://archive.egr.msu.edu/pub/babylon5/ If you're tired of Windows' simple dinging and chirping sounds, you can get some pretty nifty Babylon 5 sound files in the ubiquitous .wav format. Cyberspace Karl Mamer