[WEB4LIB] Re: Northern Light To Stop Free Publicly Available Search Service

[Dan Lester]

Wednesday, January 09, 2002, 2:28:21 PM, you wrote:
RW> On Wed, 09 January 2002, Dan Lester wrote:
>> I rarely disagree with Rich, but....
RW> ..
RW> You are wise beyond your years. :-)

Well, that must be VERY wise, as I have so many more years under my
hat than Rich does.

RW> Yes, we most certainly are customers.  It was a banner ad supported
RW> service, and/or a "free" service offered as a tease to get people
RW> to buy from the Special Collection.  Maybe they didn't make much
RW> money on the free service, but a service marketed to people with
RW> no charge to end users is still a service.

Yes, a service.  But since I never once clicked on their banners, they
didn't get any income from me.  (Yes, I know that is the problem they
have, and all banner supported outfits have)  The rest of our
difference of opinion on this is semantics, so I'll let it go.

RW> I really can't believe you accept that it is just fine for NL to
RW> offer this service for years, advertise it, talk about it at library
RW> conferences, tout it in press releases, and then shut it down
RW> with no notice on the most obvious place to warn users: the portal itself.

I don't know if it is "just fine" or not, but it certainly isn't
surprising, either on the net or in the physical world.  We've
certainly seen plenty of websites, including information resources as
well as those with a physical product to sell,  just disappear
without so much as a press release.  I know my local pizza place
"just closed" one day.  In fact, I got a mailer from them after they'd
already shut down.  No notice in the paper or anything else but the
"out of business" sign on the door.

I guess the difference is that I'm much more cynical and much less
easily surprised.  Perhaps because of all those extra years???  Wisdom
may not come with age, but experience sure does.

cheers

dan

-- 
Dan Lester, Data Wrangler  dan at RiverOfData.com 208-283-7711
3577 East Pecan, Boise, Idaho  83716-7115 USA
www.riverofdata.com  www.gailndan.com  Stop Global Whining!