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Once again, the newsletter is designed to give you a quick injection of information to benefit your working day. Something of a global theme has emerged this month, possibly prompted by the work our
programmers did for the Australian High Commission recently. As ever, if you have anything you’d like to share, please feel free to get in touch with me at jonathan.bowers@ukfast.net
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September at UKFast
Across the hall, the new UKFast server design has encouraged the technical team to build servers like never before, smashing monthly records again. Needless to say, our account handlers have been busier than ever. So…such industry has spurred me on to extreme action! I’m looking to try and get as many clients as possible involved in a series of Innovation Focus Groups. The project is a way of conjuring up inspiring ideas that lead to well thought out news stories with topical content and expert comment. To start, I’m setting up 8 over the next 6 months inviting a number of clients to each session. Subjects include community sites, travel, e-tail, Internet security, Arts sites, Youth Online and High Street Online. The sessions will last no more than 2 hours at UKFast’s Manchester office. Perhaps you could factor it into your schedule in terms of publicity and PR? The aim is to come out of each session with at least 3 Press Releases that I develop to promote both yourselves and UKFast. All you do is show for the group session and then let me do the rest. Why not respond now if you’re interested in getting involved. jonathan.bowers@ukfast.net.
 Welcome to the Cheat Sheets. CSS lets you define the look of a site in one file, and change the whole site by changing just the one file. We love CSS at UKFast and have put together a cheat sheet, which gives you some very speedy ways to know the language. The CSS Cheat sheet heralds the start of a new wave of documents designed to help programmers gen up on new languages, whilst allowing Website managers to gain some new and valuable skills. In addition to the Techies Tip in future Newsletters, we’ll be providing a cheat sheet each month as an added extra. Vote for UKFast - Once again we are challenging for the Web Host Award and our Linux boys are confident of beating the Windows team. So vote for us and keep your ISP on top.
Many Businesses leap into e-marketing without pausing to consider the effect of their emails. 75% of all email is spam. Spam is bulk email received without request and is characterised by consent not content. The technique is ineffective and often illegal. Building a legitimate mailing list can be a very difficult task. But in the long run, it’s much more profitable than sending unsolicited mail. So, here are a few ideas for getting people to 'opt in' to receiving your email. 1. Companies with a walk in service can place a goldfish bowl in reception requesting business cards from customers offering discounts and special offers or even prizes in exchange. 2. Online businesses create virtual goldfish bowls. You fill in contact details and agree to receive email then get the chance to win a free gift or peruse discounts. 3. Even cleverer are marketers who let their existing contacts build their list. A high profile airline recently sent a game to their list offering free flights to winners. They only got to play if they passed the email on to four friends. The friends then had to
'opt in' to play and pass it on themselves. When a friend played, you could play again, as long as you emailed four more friends. The challenge is to find the innovative ways to build your mailing lists and stay on the right side of the consumer and the law. 
Freshties.com - brings together a world of expertise The Internet organically creates communities. People come together joined by common interests and concerns. FRESHTIES is a developing community steeped in the very human desire to share experiences and learn from them. It’s an idea that sounds so obvious you might think it has already been done. Harnessing the Net’s encompassing nature, the site gives us all a chance to share our knowledge and gain from others. Every member becomes a life coach and gains one. The site is split up into 4 main sections. Career & Work, Study & Learning, Entrepreneur and Charity & Community. While you might be looking for advice in a particular area, you might also find that you yourself have valuable experiences in another area that members will benefit from. Ash believes that anything is possible when people help each other. And FRESHTIES is his chance to prove this point. From the outset he is using the success of the site to benefit others. A contribution of all the corporate supporters fees (between 10 and 60%) goes to charity and community work. Developing the Back end of a Website is often crucial to the shop front's success. A travel website after all is only as good as the airline, hotel and car rental partners that can deliver the goods visitors search for. Ash and his team work very hard to create an infrastructure for all the sections. Just months into the project, FRESHTIES has the backing of Further Education centres across the UK, local government agencies and businesses primed to step up both funding and expertise. General site innovations include Mentoring schemes and section specific opportunities. The Entrepreneur section, for instance, is discussing the development of initiatives with the backing of related organisations, such as, Young Enterprise, an agency looking to encourage entrepreneurs in the 16-25 age bracket. With the aim to have one million users by its first birthday, FRESHTIES is an ambitious project and right now, you can join free for a whole twelve months. So, I’d recommend you sign up and make some new connections.
Back in July I brought to light the phenomenon that is Google Earth. Over the last two months the world has caught up and it seems the search giant has caused something of a global stir.
Less lucky are the South Korean government! They are currently seeking answers from their American counterparts as to why their military facilities are on plain view to any North Korean spies. And they are not the only military who have noticed the invention. A Thai military spokesman suggests that Google might think about limiting it’s tool to pictures of tourist attractions, while the Russian secret services admit that Google Earth gives away more information than any nation would care to. The Indians have adopted a much more passive viewpoint and decided that ‘technology cannot be stopped.’ But is this technology really providing a real threat to national security? The Register decided to check this out and did their own trawl of the world’s military bases courtesy of Google Earth, concluding that any decent nation would have their own satellites that provided far better images. The other thing that should appease the angry eastern nations somewhat is the fact that much of Google Earth’s satellite imagery is in fact 2 years old and much can happen in 730 days.
The Top Ten countries with the highest Internet penetration rate.
The stats come from http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm Correct as of July 2005. As ever, I hope the Newsletter has provided a useful insight into UKFast this month. Best wishes, 
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Research and Development can’t get enough of coding this month. A string of programming challenges has set their office aglow as the team's expertise has been utilised by clients across the UK.
The Internet is a tremendous leveller. Potentially, anyone anywhere can make a mark online. As the world’s youngest industry, it is still
growing at a rate of knots and great ideas continue to find dominance. From his enviably picturesque corner of the Brecon Beacons Ashish Poddar is doing just this. 
Singing its praises is Italian farmer Luca Mori who, whilst browsing the satellite map system, noticed unusual shadings on the grounds of his property. Archaeological investigations revealed
that Signor Mori is in fact living on the site of a Roman villa dating back to the time of Augustus Caesar. Lucky fella.
I’ve done my own investigation into Thailand’s suggestion but the lack of excitement conjured up by this aerial view of Disneyland, California, suggests we’ll
all be happier looking up where we live for the time being!
Internet World Statistics 
