ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries 3 4 6 /C&RL News In tern et R eview s Sa ra Ama to, editor The Internet M ovie D a­ ta b a se (a.k.a. Cardiffs Movie Database). Access: h ttp://w w w .cm .cf.ac.uk/ Movies/moviequery (also available via e-mail: send subject “help” to movie@ ibmpcug.co.uk). T he Internet Movie Da­ tabase illustrates th e great p o te n tia l o f th e In tern et. Since 1989 volunteers under the direction o f Col N eed­ ham have contributed to and coordinated additions an d corrections from the Internet com munity to create a database that n ow lists over 40,000 movie, docum entary, and television series titles an d over 500,000 o f the people credited with making them. T he Internet Movie Database includes mov­ ies p roduced in every part o f the w orld and television series p roduced in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. The movies range from silents to films currently in produc­ tion. The movies tend to be mainstream, listing v ery little in the w ay o f experim ental films, lesser-known docum entaries, o r pornography. The database is usually u p d ated weekly. Searching the database is as easy as point and click. In addition to title and nam e searches, the searcher can generate lists o f films by cer­ tificate (age rating), country o f origin, produc­ tion com pany, or genre (as yet uncontrolled descriptors). The database provides a search form for character nam es, plot summaries, se­ lected quotations, locations, soundtracks, year o f release, an d rating (a grade from o n e to ten v oted o n by the Internet community). The Internet Movie Database has three main drawbacks. First, the database offers n o b ool­ ean search capabilities. Second, the database is far from com plete. Few er than one in ten mov­ ies contain a com plete physical description and summary, genre classifications, cast and cred­ its, o r age rating. Few er than o n e in 14 provide links to the good, quality reviews archived in the rec.arts.movies.reviews Usenet new sgroup. Fewer than o n e in 20 include biographies. Fi­ nally, because the inform ation com es directly Sara Amato is automated systems librarian at Central Washington University; samato@tahoma.cwu.edu from Internet users, the qual­ ity an d authority o f records vary. Because searching is only possible by one data element at a time, the Internet Movie D atabase is best used to pro­ d u c e f ilm o g r a p h ie s . A l­ though all o f the search in­ d e x e s lis te d a b o v e a r e available, users w ho w ish to view a film or individual’s cred it list will b en efit the most. While not yet authori­ tative or com plete enough to ake the place o f th e CD-ROM movie databases r the multivolume print com pilations, the In­ ernet Movie D atabase is highly recom m ended. esides, w hat other film resource allows read­ rs to contribute ratings a n d corrections o r sub­ it their o w n entries?— Mark Emmons, Occi­ ental College, e-mail: mee@oxy.edu ed eral Com m unications Com m ission G o p h e r. Access: gopher://gopher.fcc.gov; http://w w w .fcc.gov; f tp //ftp.fcc.gov The Federal Communications Commission FCC) go p h er could be very useful to anyone nvolved with communications, especially those ho have to k eep u p with its latest regula­ ions. The g o p h er houses m uch valuable infor­ ation, b u t using it is a daunting experience ithout know ledge of the FCC’s general struc­ ure. The main g o p h er m enu includes 31 differ­ nt categories. What it desperately needs is a EADME file. Files ending in ‚wp (WordPerfect eadable) fill o n e ’s screen with com puter lan­ uage, an d com pressed files (.zip) have to be u n zip p ed .” Universally available WAIS search­ ng is never explained and thus is rendered irtually useless. Only via the FCC ftp site README file was I ble to decipher bureau codes u sed in various ubm enus. According to an FCC official, the ite came u p in February 1994, is still u n d er onstruction, an d will be u p graded as soon as ossible. I encountered some problem s con­ ecting to the site, although I received a swift eturn telep h o n e call from som eone at the FCC n d via e-mail from cjboyer@uci.edu (w hose t o t B e m d F ( i w t m w t e R r g “ i v a s s c p n r a http://www.cm.cf.ac.uk/ mailto:mee@oxy.edu gopher://gopher.fcc.gov http://www.fcc.gov ftp://ftp.fcc.gov mailto:cjboyer@uci.edu mailto:samato@tahoma.cwu.edu May 1 9 9 5 /3 4 7 address I found at the FCC ftp site). The some­ what helpful subdirectory “index.txt” unfortu­ nately m oved from near the beginning to near the end of the submenus on subsequent visits. The Daily Common Carrier items are very current, arranged in reverse chronological or­ der, and go back through 1994. After wading through too many subdirectories, one finds valu­ able information such as tariff transmittal sched­ ules, public notices, news releases, FCC stud ies, complete texts or ordering information, and notices and requests for comments on proposed rule-making. The Daily Digest section is less well organized w ith the dates inexplicably mixed u p and a lot of material repeated from e ls e w h e r e . T h e D aily B u s in e s s /C a b le subdirectory has an enorm ous 618 entries. O ther useful subdirectories include News Releases, Events, Panel Discussion, Speeches, and Forms. Less useful w ere P hone Books (zipped), GN-Docs (a very technical WAIS setup guide), and Informal. International and Fees w ere repeatedly inaccessible. Unfortunately, spelling mistakes abound throughout and too much information is repeated. The FCC gopher has valuable, current in­ formation but it needs to be more clearly and simply organized to make it easier for the pu b ­ lic and librarians to use.—Elaine Hoffman, State University o f New York at Stony Brook, e-mail: EHOFFMAN@CCMAIL.SUNYSB.EDU T h e N in e P l a n e t s : A M u lt im e d ia T o u r o f t h e S o l a r S y s te m . Access: http://seds.lpl. arizona.edu/billa/tnp. Owner and contact: Bill Arnett (http://seds.lpl.arizona.edu/billa/ arnett.html). The Nine Planets is a hypertext-based tour of text and images about the solar system. De­ signed for general audiences, the tour consid­ ers each o f the objects in our solar system: the Sun, planets, their satellites, asteroids, and com­ ets. Users brow se am ong approxim ately 65 HTML pages that provide inline images o f the objects, discursive text, charts of physical data, and links to a variety of images and anima­ tions. Any technical vocabulary is linked to a glos­ sary which defines the terms in relatively simple language. Images are plentiful throughout the tour. They are taken from or point to a variety of sources, mostly at NASA and other government sites. In fact, many of the images com e from two similar World Wide Web sources: Welcome to the Planets (http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov/plan- ets/) and Views of the Solar System (h ttp :// w w w .c 3 .la n l.g o v /~ c jh a m il/S o la r S y s te m / homepage.html). Arnett’s tour is differentiated by its fuller background text o n the objects; the other sources are more descriptive of particu­ lar images. Arnett also includes an “O pen Is­ sues” section on each planetary body, giving the general reader an idea of major questions that astronomers have not yet answ ered on the object. The text is quite readable, statistics check out with standard reference sources, informa­ tion is updated frequently, and the choices of images are excellent. A significant portion of the images are available only in GIF format, rather than JPG, w hich requires that larger files be transferred. However, I found response time to be fine from the cited server (several mirror sites are also given). The less-common animation files require a variety o f players, including MPEG, FLI, PICS, and Quicktime, w hich could be intimidating for some Net users; however, this is the result of the author’s extensive knowledge of and links to astronomical resources available o n the In­ ternet. Overall, this site is a fun and educa­ tional experience for those interested in the heavens and could serve as a reference source for a num ber o f factual inquiries.— Christopher W. Nolan, Trinity University, e-mail: cnolan@ trinity.edu Feature you r collection on the cover of C&RL N ews C&RL News wants to feature aesthetically pleasing photos o f items from library col­ lections on its covers. If you have material in your library’s collections that you think would make an attractive C&RL News cover, please send us color photocopies to review and a brief description of the item and the collection. Selected illustrations will require a color transparency or photograph. Illus­ trations with a vertical orientation work best. Materials submitted will becom e the prop­ erty of C&RL News and cannot be acknowl­ edged. Send to: C&RL News Covers, 50 E. H uron St., Chicago, IL 606 l l . mailto:EHOFFMAN@CCMAIL.SUNYSB.EDU http://seds.lpl http://seds.lpl.arizona.edu/billa/ http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov/plan- http://www.c3.lanl.gov/~cjhamil/SolarSystem/