Theos-Talk Archives (February 1998 Message tt00072)

I'm writing about my "Theosophy and the Internet" presentation
that I made at the Krotona School, Ojai, California at the end of
January.

First, I'd like to thank everyone that offered suggestions and
information for use in the program.

The program was broken down into four one-hour segments.

The first hour was on what the Internet was in general terms, and
what computer equipment and software would be needed to access
it.

The second hour was on the Web and Web browsers, and involved
visiting various useful sites including news, weather, stock
information, movies, finding out-of-print books, locating
information on people, etc.

The third hour dealt with other Internet features, including
pagers, email, online radio and realaudio, news groups, and
search engines.

The final hour brought in Theosophy and the spiritual, and dealt
with theosophical sites, mailing lists, online books, and the
benefits of writing and communicating on the Internet.

It was a rainy day, but still 20 people came. I had rented a
good Proxima LCD projector, so the entire group saw what I was
doing on my computer, which I also brought up.

I attempted to involve the group with what we looked for and did.
We found apartments for rent in Ojai, got an out-of-print book
for Joy Mills, looked up the famous Internet "dancing baby",
noted when the movie "Titanic" was showing that day in nearby
theaters, paged Jerry Hejka-Ekins, read a few theos-l and
theos-talk messages that had come up, made a real-audio recording
of Richard Hiltner talking about the difference between Inner and
Outer Rounds, and did a query against a beta version of an online
THE SECRET DOCTRINE.

The general impression made was, I think, good, and people went
away with a more positive attitude towards the Internet and its
usefulness in both their personal lives and as a tool for
spiritual work.