Phone Books in Cyberspace

Looking for a long-lost relative, a peripatetic friend, a favorite former colleague, or an old college roommate? Then try SwitchBoard (http://www.switchboard.com) the Internet's first major residential U.S. telephone book with addresses and phone numbers for over 90 million people and 11 million businesses.

Queries to the Switchboard database are free of charge and can be made by last name with the ability to narrow the search by city or state. People who are listed in Switchboard can modify their entries by adding their e-mail addresses and personal or business details provided they are willing to register and obtain a password. Switchboard also includes a "knock, knock" feature which alerts a registered user whenever someone asks for his or her listing. The registered user decides whether or not to "open the door" and have his or her Switchboard listing released.

Yellow page business listing can also be found at several Internet sites. Two of the best are the BigBook (http://www.bigbook.com) and NYNEX's BigYellow (http://www.niyp.com). BigBook's features map locations for its 11 million U.S. business listings. For example, you've heard that there is a Pizza Plant restaurant somewhere on Transit Road. The BigBook's map with its zoom feature will help you pinpoint the precise location. BigYellow business listings go beyond terra firma to the Web itself with its "Shopping Advisor" complete with links to online bed and breakfast listings to sites for scoping out Broadway shows and more. Also, BigYellow provides links to phone books around the world from the "Dutch Yellow Pages" to Antarctica's "Little White Book" of South Pole researchers.

Finally, not to be outdone, AT&T offers its Toll-Free 800 Directory (http://att.net/dir800) for searching on the Net. A wide-range of companies are listed by name or by category. Pick the category letter "F" and find not only florists, but fairgrounds, feathers, fingerprinting equipment, floor degreasing, foreign trade consultants, and fraternities as well.

These directories can be readily accessed through Lockwood Online's Ready Reference homepage (htt p://wings.buffalo.edu/libraries/units/lml/Reference/rr.html)< i>. For information regarding Internet access via University e-mail accounts, call the Computing Center's Help Desk at 645-3542. Those having questions regarding online telephone books may contact Don Hartman, unldon@acsu.buffalo.edu , Lockwood Library, 645-2817.

-Gemma DeVinney and Don Hartman, University Libraries