ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, October 17, 1996 TAG: 9610170023
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: C-8 BUSINESS EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: Computer Bits
SOURCE: STAFF REPORT
THIS SITE ON THE WEB can steer you toward anything the candidates have said during their televised exchanges.
Political junkies and policy wonks should check out "Issues '96," an interactive World Wide Web site operated jointly by The New York Times and National Public Radio. The site allows visitors to conduct searches and join in on-line discussions of the most compelling issues of the current election season.
And what a great place to visit, too, for the high school senior working on that research project for government class.
If you missed the presidential debates and are wondering where the candidates stand on the issues, the site contains the complete transcripts of both debates, broken down by question and topic.
The issues forum covers five key policy areas: money, community, world, rights and safety. The on-line forums examine issues such as health care, welfare, terrorism, and immigration.
For example, Claudio Sanchez, NPR's education reporter, moderates the on-line discussion on education. Other forum hosts include Marvin Kalb of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard and Margaret Steinfels, editor of Commonweal.
The site also provides a point-by-point comparison of the Republican and Democratic platforms and background reports from NPR and the New York Times, including transcripts and photos.
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If your interests run more to business than politics or if you're thinking about starting your own business, you may want to look in on a couple of sites that offer free business advice, articles and tutorials. One is run by the non-profit American Success Institute Inc. of Natick, Mass., and the other by the New England Business Service in Groton, Mass.
The ASI site is the better source for free information. A visitor there will find courses and questions and answers on small business, real estate, the stock market and motivation. Many of the offerings are in French and Spanish as well as English.
The site includes a 30-lesson course in entrepreneurship and a 10-lesson course in how to invest in real estate. Also available are more than 100 articles on buying, managing and paying for all types of real estate, covering everything from fundamentals to what the experts do.
ASI encourages teachers and other non-profits to download lessons and articles from its site. Spanish and French offerings may be of particular interest to language teachers.
NEBS is a 44-year-old provider of business forms, software and related products. Consequently much of its site is commercial in nature and requires visitors to buy products.
However, the site does have a resource center and on-line library that contain tips to help small business owners manage different parts of their businesses. A current feature topic is "Collection Systems that Work Wonders." Other articles include tips on securing financing, managing workers and paying bills.
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The Roanoke metropolitan area and parts of Botetourt, Bedford, and Franklin counties have a total of 111,714 workers, of which all but about 7,000 take a car, truck or van to work. The travel time for more than 53,000 of them runs between 15 and 29 minutes. Fewer than 19,000 have a commute of more than 30 minutes.
That is the kind of information you can find for free in the new Web site of Easy Analytic Software Inc. of Fresh Meadows, N.Y. Called "The Right Site for the Web," the site offers 476 demographic variables from the U.S. Census, which can be useful in business analysis.
Access to the site is free but it has premium areas where registered users pay fees for additional information.
Users can look at geographic areas arranged, among other ways, by: ZIP Codes, city and county boundaries, metro areas, economic areas, television markets, area codes, states, and regions. Free reports are available on 11 different areas including educational attainment, quality of life, employment and industry, owner and renter households and detailed income.
Did you know that probability of an earthquake in Roanoke is 0.08; the average high temperature is 68 degrees and the average low temperature is 46 degrees; the number of clear days Roanokers can expect out of a year are 101 and the number of days of rain is 116?
Look it up.
ISSUES '96 http://www.nytimes.com/issues
ASI
http://www.success.org
NEBS
http://www.nebs.com
DEMOGRAPHICS http://www.easidemographics.com
You can contribute to this column or just comment by sending an E-mail to biznews@roanoke.infi.net or by calling 981-3393 or 981-3237 in the Roanoke Valley, or (800) 346-1234, ext. 393, outside the Roanoke area.
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