Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!image.soe.clarkson.edu!news From: nelson@sun.soe.clarkson.edu (Russ Nelson) Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip Subject: Re: Networks considered harmful Message-ID: Date: 19 Dec 89 14:40:11 GMT References: <8912190403.AA05387@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU> Sender: news@sun.soe.clarkson.edu Reply-To: nelson@clutx.clarkson.edu Organization: Clarkson University, Potsdam NY Lines: 39 In-reply-to: 702WFG@SCRVMSYS.BITNET's message of 18 Dec 89 16:02:01 GMT In article <8912190403.AA05387@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU> 702WFG@SCRVMSYS.BITNET (bill gunshannon) writes: But the truth is, FAX offers nothing that can't be done with the PC sitting on your desk. ... Agreed. So, someone please tell me "What is so great about FAX?" ... If I want to send someone a FAX message, I can take it down the my local supermarket, hand them my $3.50 and the piece of paper, and whooooosh, a similar piece of paper pops out of my recipient's machine. Or if I have enough FAX messages to send, I can buy my own FAX machine. I put the piece of paper in it, dial the phone number, and press the little green button. *In principle*, E-mail is just as easy. *In principle*, you can set up a machine with a modem and just tell people to call it. In practice, there is no standardization in E-mail packages. You can get one for free (Opus BBS), but it takes a good bit of tinkering to get it working. The way to market E-mail is to glom it onto a FAX machine. Make a little box that you plug in between your FAX machine and the phone line. Give it enough smarts so that it can distinguish between its carrier and the FAX machines, and automatically forward the call to the FAX machine. Put some RAM in it so it can hold incoming messages. Put a RS-232 (ugh) line on it so a computer can read its output. Write some software for the PC and Mac that downloads the messages from the little box. -- --russ (nelson@clutx [.bitnet | .clarkson.edu]) Russ.Nelson@$315.268.6667 Live up to the light thou hast, and more will be granted thee. A recession now appears more than 2 years away -- John D. Mathon, 4 Oct 1989. I think killing is value-neutral in and of itself. -- Gary Strand, 8 Nov 1989. Liberals run this country, by and large. -- Clayton Cramer, 20 Nov 1989. Shut up and mind your Canadian business, you meddlesome foreigner. -- TK, 23 N.