Have you ever wondered if there was an online service that would send news to your email address for you to read at your convenience? Well, it's not a brilliant new idea. Newsletters -- the name given to the earliest English newspapers that spread news in the written or printed word -- have been given a new lease of life on the Internet.
Everybody likes their news summarised and to the point. A newsletter is like a concise summary of the day's top news that the newscaster narrates before beginning his programme. It's designed to get your attention, which will generate better viewership for their stories, resulting in hits on their site.
Newsletters are any day better than handling bookmarks and visiting individual sites to read up on news. Imagine plowing through a maze of windows, juggling them one by one. Newsletters are differently designed: A single email can contain all the useful nuggets of information of events over the week or month. It's a "push" technology: it comes directly to your inbox. Also, it's inexpensive -- messages can be read offline, something that's really vital for most of us 56'Kers.
Almost every established news site with a decent amount of Web activity has its own Internet mailing list that distributes daily or weekly newsletters. On the Internet you will find newsletters based on every weird demographic and community out there.
Many sites also send in weekly updates, news bits, reader feedback, opinions, and columns. And then there are a few advertising plugs. Add an editor's note and there you have it, the pinnacle of newslettering - The E-zine. These "newsy e-letters" have started a culture online. The e-zine is sent by a Web master/ editor of a site, with articles and advertisements. Some of these E-zines like Dilbert have lasted more than seven years.
Making newsletters work for you
Newsletters keep a community of subscribers informed. It's as easy to start your own newsletter as it is to get a free e-mail account. It's a handy and inexpensive tool that only requires a mailing address, and you can reach anyone who's online. Use a programme like Eudora or Pegasus for starting the newsletter. Both can be configured to subscribe and unsubscribe automatically. Or try free mailing list providers, like www.egroups.com or www.listbot.com, who will usually include their own ads at the bottom of every issue.
Subscribing, unsubscribing, and spam
When you find a site that offers a newsletter, just follow the links to the place where you can subscribe. You'll have to enter your email address in the text field and check or uncheck some options -- it's not that complicated. Later you may need to send a confirmation from your email account and you'll receive a newsletter regularly. Most sites give you the option of plain text or HTML format. The latter allows you to click on links embedded in the email, just like a regular Web page does. But HTML formatted pages also include bandwidth guzzling ads, so it's a trade off.
Preferably, subscribe only to newsletters that discuss topics relevant to you. Subscribing to many could clog your mailbox as you'll be inundated with email and never be able to read them all. Start with one or two and if you can handle them, add more.
If you find a newsletter irrelevant or full of spam, get rid of it by unsubscribing. The unsubscribe information will either be on the Web site or within the newsletter itself.