May I emphasize that the Net is far, far more than a mental health clinic? It’s a place, too, for political activists, boaters, golfers, motorcyclists, gun owners, gourmets, football fans, baseball enthusiasts, parents and teachers, writers and readers of many genres, pilots, airline passengers, amateur radio operators, and reggae lovers. All have their own niches, which is just what you’d expect with more than 12,000 newsgroups. While the clueless are arguing over whether the Net has value, people like John Schwartz already know it does. Recently he wondered about lyrics by a singer and songwriter named Liz Phair. Just how did they go? Some of the biggest fun came from his hunt online. He tracked down at least five different Web areas—“digital fan magazines”—devoted to Phair. “Some had photos, some had biographical information, and a couple had song lyrics.” And yes, he found the lyrics he wanted, and in their full, unprintable glory. “Useless? Probably. Satisfying? You bet.” And Schwartz went on: “Think of all the stuff that you’d find in your public library if you pulled something off the shelf. A lot of it would be ‘useless’ for your own needs—tons of mediocre fiction, outdated information, and silly things. But would anybody say that it proves that libraries are worthless?”[1.6] Other Net activities also suggest that _Snake Oil_ is self-descriptive. A Michigan couple has started a virtual toy store complete with pictures of their staffers as children and service of the kind you’d expect from L. L. Bean; their first order came from Brazil (see chapter 2: Business on the Net: From White Rabbit Toys to “Intel Inside”). Out in California two young techies are giving hundreds of young musicians a break through a much-needed project called the Internet Underground Music Archives (chapter 3: EntertaiNet: A Few Musings on Net.Rock, Leonardo da Vinci and Bill Gates, Bianca’s Smut Shack, and David Letterman in Cyberspace). Just throw $100 their way and, for a year, you can post a sample of your music on the Net and perhaps stir up sales of old cassettes and CDs. At the same time that Stoll grouses that the Internet is unedited, scores of dailies and weeklies are on the Net to one extent or another (chapter 4: Pulped Wood versus Electrons: Can the Print World Learn to Love the Net?). So’s _Time_ magazine. Random House, Macmillan, and Time Warner are there, too, posting samples from various books, and soon people at home will be able to send credit card numbers securely over the Net and dial up the complete texts of bestsellers and other books. Even now you just might be reading _NetWorld!_ off a screen rather than from pulped wood. Meanwhile, a digitized cadaver on the Internet may help revolutionize the study of anatomy (chapter 5: Wired Knowledge: When They Let a Murderer Loose on the Internet), and in Canada, leather-jacketed teenagers are using the Net to develop their reading and writing skills. A Mini Jargon Guide