I first heard about the Internet in a newspaper article in about 1993 which talked about whether the Internet really existed or whether it was a myth. Obviously at that time it was virtually a secret club for the cognoscenti. I next heard about it in late 1994 when I went to a demonstration at the Powerhouse Museum by a woman who wanted to show how great the Internet was for Jewish things - for example listing the kosher restaurants in Amsterdam. There was something magic about the demonstration and the enthusiasm of the demonstrator. After that I started to read the computer section of the Sydney Morning Herald avidly, learning a lot about computers in general and more and more about the Internet in particular. I learned about the imminent arrival of Windows 95 and the constant progression of computer hardware. I could quickly see that buying a computer at any time would be more expensive than buying it a few months later when it would have twice the features. My mother bought a computer running Windows 3.1 but she only had a few basic programmes such as word processing and Paint. Nevertheless it was exciting playing with the computer when she let me. By early 1996 I was ready to take the plunge and bought an IBM Aptiva at a price which one year later seemed exorbitant. Although I had planned to spend a long time learning all about the computer before taking the big step of connecting to the Internet, the  lure of going on line was too great and by April I was connected to one of the big Internet service providers. The  connection process was far from easy with instructions which seemed to make no sense and a result which did not work. In a short time I gave up on that particular service provider and went for one of the small personalised providers who at a reasonable price came and installed all the required software at my place. Moreover the provider offered unlimited time on line for one flat rate. This encouraged me to spend the maximum amount of time exploring the world of the Web, news groups, Email and interesting plugins. I quickly discovered the excitement of downloading new versions of Web browsers, freeware, shareware and plugins for viewing different animated or sound producing sites. What I soon became aware of was that the hunt was more exciting than the catch, i.e. discovering the existence of new programs to download or try to succeed in downloading  was much more interesting than actually using those programs once I had downloaded them. After the initial excitement of discovering the existence of Shockwave for example, then downloading the plugin and using it to view some demonstration sites I quickly lost interest in using Shockwave again, until a new updated version was available for downloading. Discovering the existence of Internet relay chat was great but after wasting a few hours in chat rooms I gave it up. Using the Net for voice communication with Netmeeting was a thrill, except that there was no-one worthwhile to talk to. I felt very proud when I learned to do fancy things with Email such as send scanned photos and my own hand-drawn animated Gifs. However, once I had mastered it there was no particular need to keep doing it, particularly when the Email recipients didn't respond with gushing praise for my efforts. Most recently I learned how to create my own Web pages, complete with voice, music and animation. Getting only about five E-mails of feedback from the 25 or so people I notified about my Web site was disappointing and discouraged me from doing more Web page building. Lately, I have been going back to reading the newspaper and watching TV. I even enjoy listening to the radio. Maybe one day I might read a book. For me, the Internet has shown how the thrill of the new is great but to quote from a different sphere of life - sex is great, but cooking lasts.

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