<B> Web Cites</B>
By Laurie Berger
<B><FONT SIZE="+2">Sites Worth Bookmarking</B>
<a name="1"><B>You've Got Mail</B>
Want to network with industry peers on your own time? Join an Internet mailing list. These electronic forums are much like newsgroups, except that you must subscribe (for free, of course) and messages are exchanged via e-mail. At Reference.com (www.reference.com), you can find the largest directory of mailing lists--more than 100,000--on the Internet. Just searching on the word "travel" uncovered 514 related lists, including such industry favorites as Infotec-Travel and State Department Advisories. The site is a bit tricky to navigate (be sure to click on the new user button for an overview and free registration), but worth the visit. You'll receive a short description of the list as well as instructions on how to subscribe. If you're trying to locate a specific author, you can search messages by name, view author profiles and read their archived postings. Reference.com subscribes to a select group of lists, making it possible to read archived messages without ever signing up. The site has another neat feature: active queries. If, for example, you're trying to monitor mailing lists for discussions of internet fare deals, you can set up a "robot" to automatically search specific lists each day. It will then store the results on a server and send you an e-mail, alerting that results await. Tile.net (http://tile.net), another mailing list search engine, saves sign-up time by providing direct e-mail links to each list.
<a name="2"><B>Travel Searches Made Easy</B>
Hunting for online travel information just got easier. The Destination Meta-Guide (www.infotec-travel.com/ FRAMES1.HTM), a new feature from Infotec-Travel, will search for online travel and tourism resources across multiple search engines. Select the country and the database (Web, newsgroups, mailing lists, books or domain names) to be searched. The Meta-Guide automatically enters the proper keywords and returns a list of results. Although Meta-Guide isn't the perfect travel search engine, it's the best thing out there for organizing and navigating an avalanche of online data.
<a name="3"><B>PIMS On The Web</B>
Now you can keep track of appointments on the road, with a Web-based personal information manager. Webcal (www.webcal.com), one of the first of this new breed, lets you enter, edit and access schedule, appointments and calls from any Web browser, on any PC. It also will synchronize with a Palm Pilot or Microsoft Outlook program. No need to download and configure software. Just by registering at the site, you'll receive your own customizable little black book. As a Webcal user, you also can access and search EventCal (www.eventcal.com), a robust database of world events. Pick a city, and EventCal will produce a graphical calendar showing events taking place, week by week, with links to additional detail on each event.
Trying to find a hotel room in always-sold-out San Francisco? EventCal is a valuable planning tool, showing you the event-heavy days to avoid. And here's another handy gizmo: You can add a recurring event, like a weekly meeting, to your PIM, and ask Webcal to remind you of it by e-mail at a specified time.
<a name="4"><B>Travel Health Central</B>
Need help handling your travelers' questions about health risks overseas? The Center for Disease Control Travel Information site (www.cdc.gov/travel/travel.htm#reference) provides a wealth of answers on disease outbreaks, food and water precautions, health care providers and general health risks. Search CDC's Yellow Book, a database of international travel health advisories, for free. Or check the Green Sheet for twice-monthly reports of cruise ship sanitation inspections, including ships not meeting requirements and inspection scores by ship. You also can search for advisories by geographic areas.