taylor@hplabsc.UUCP (06/19/87)
The FREENET project was initiated as an attempt to pull together the e-mail and bbs users in the Cleveland area and provide for them a sort of electronic shopping mall (patterned somewhat after CompuServe) of conferences. They have the usual PC-DOS conferences, etc. that you would expect to see on many BBS's, but they also have a conference that they call (I think) the TOWN HALL. Within it, you can enter sub-conferences that were specific to an individual such as the mayor or governor (They had Gov. Celeste represented by his teenage son, who monitored the conference and submitted questions back and forth between the e-mail audience and the governor). They also have a POST OFFICE (message area) and a few other community related areas dealing with law, medicine, etc. Unfortunately, a few of these areas are represented by no more than empty shells at the moment (eg. If we had news about *****, it would be here). Since I'm not connected with the project itself - in fact, I help represent friendly competition since PC-OHIO is also a multi-node BBS - I can't really claim a success or failure rate beyond what I see as an occassional user. For anyone interested in calling, they're running at 1200,7,1,E comm. settings and at (216) 368-3888. I believe that they have funded this project with the help of AT&T. -Dave Chatfield