Corrections or additions?
Love On Line: Cupid on the Internet
This article was published in U.S. 1 Newspaper on February 10, 1999. All rights reserved.
Just because you are computer professional doesn’t mean
you know how to use the Internet to enhance your personal life. Nancy
Blachman is an IT trainer and author who can help.
She and David DesJardins met online in 1997 and were just on
New Year’s Day. Based on her experience (and using the pen name Nancy
Capulet), she wrote a guide to love in cyberspace, “Putting Your
Heart Online” (Variable Symbols Inc., $18.95). Now she has been
making the rounds of the bookstores to talk about it (U.S. 1, September
23, 1998).
Her next talk is to computer engineers at the Sarnoff Center, just
in time for those with the post-Valentine’s Day blues. She speaks
on “New Online Social Dating Trends” for the Princeton ACM/IEEE
Computer Society on Thursday, February 18, at 8 p.m. in the Sarnoff
auditorium. The meeting is free, and refreshments will be served.
Call 609-924-8704 for inforamtion.
Blachman runs her own consulting and training business in mathematical
software, Variable Symbols Inc., at 375 Nassau Street in Princeton
(609-688-9666). A native of Palo Alto, she has bachelor’s and master’s
degrees in mathematics, operations research, and industrial engineering
from University of California at Berkeley, and she worked for Bell
Labs in Holmdel from 1979 to 1984. Then she earned a master’s degree
in computer science from Stanford. She is the author of six technical
books, including the tutorial for the software program, “Mathmatica,”
owned by Wolfram Research.
“I see this as a new, great way to meet people that I think is
going to explode,” says Blachman. She met her future husband on https://www.match.com
when he was studying in California; he works for the Institute for
Defense Analyses on Thanet Circle.
With time at a premium, the Web allows singles to write from the comfort
of home, any time of the day or night, and to end unwanted advances
with a quick E-mail. Her book covers everything from how a novice
can get online, to how to dodge “cyberheads, Web weenies, and
online liars.” Also how to safely exchange information, terminate
an online connection that isn’t working out, and how to move the online
connection into real life.
Blachman’s web site (https://www.heartsonline.com) offers
these questions to consider when you select a site:
How many people are there who have characteristics I desire?How easy is it to find them?Does the service provide information that is useful?Do I feel comfortable providing the information requested?Are the questions and possible answers relevant to whatmy own interests are and how I like to present myself?Can I search for people who meet a particular set of criteria;for example, 35 to 45 years old, live within 10 miles, and are interestedin having children?Does the service indicate which members are active? MightI end up contacting people who are no longer using the service?How do I contact someone whom I find interesting?Does the service provide anonymous E-mail, so I don’thave to reveal my identity? (If not, setting up a free E-mail accountfor that purpose can protect your privacy. But if users expect youto identify yourself in your E-mail, they may respond less favorablyto anonymous E-mail.)How do I receive E-mail from the service? Some peopleprefer to have E-mail forwarded to their E-mail account rather thanpicking it up at a Web page.Does the service provide free browsing so that I can determinewhether the service suits my needs before I sign up?How much does the service cost?The site also offers a annotated survey of two directories andcommentaries on 11 online matchmaking services, everything from https://www.singlejew.comtohttps://www.sports.friendfinder.com. On the latter youcan search by sport and location to find, for instance, a 17-year-oldman who plays billiards in Lithuania and a 39-year-old Asian Indianfrom East Brunswick who likes to go camping and ballroom dancing.”`Putting Your Heart Online’ is the book I wish I could have readbefore I posted my first online ad,” says Blachman.Top Of PageFollow That Bus!If you’ve ever wanted to take some friends along onthe road to Marrakesh, then Helge Leeuwenburgh’s course on howto lead a tour group is for you. The travel bug, he says, is a consumingaddiction: “It’s like dope, once you’re on it you know you’llnever stop.” Yet despite years of experience shepherding tourists,he remains an idealist. A tour leader must be, he says, “trulydedicated to the well being of the group.”Course content will include pointers on both how to organize toursand how to escort them. Entitled “Professional Tour Planning andEscorting,” the course is offered at Mercer County College oneither Thursday evenings or Saturday mornings in four or five sessions.The Thursday course begins on February 18; the Saturday course onFebruary 20. The cost for either session is $96. To register call609-586-9446.Leeuwenburgh cautions more democratically inclined tour leaders: “Oneof the things you must never do is to take a vote. It sounds democraticbut what you aredoing, in essence, is splitting the group.” Theresult is a great divide — losers, winners and, over to the side,a tour guide who has given up his authority. A benign dictatorship,where the tour leader uses a silken glove rather than an iron fist,is better.Dispensing tips, he counsels tour guides to treat people impartiallyand not to play favorites. Yet for the disgruntled or hard to please,he advises an extra dose of attention from the tour leader. Leeuwenburghalso plans to discuss logistics problems including dealing with missingluggage, lost tickets, and flight cancellations.Group psychology is another topic. “I think every group very clearlyhas a personality. It’s up to the tour manager to balance it,” saysLeeuwenburgh, “not to let frustrations or things get out of hand.”He stresses empathy with those being led. “The traveler givesup a lot of his independence if he joins a group tour, and there isa lot of goodwill. You have to make sure that you keep the goodwill.”Group tours should offer the camaraderie of shared experiences. “Thepeople who join a tour are basically full of expectation, hope, andpositive feelings. It’s very important to maintain this feeling oftogetherness.”Leeuwenburgh anticipates his course will appeal to time-laden retireeshoping to lead a gaggle of friends abroad, travel agents seeking toadd to their store of knowledge and also, “people who are curiousbecause they are travelers and they would like to know ‘could I dosomething like this myself?'”The Internet has taken some of the mystery out of tour organizingsays Leeuwenburgh. Information that was previously difficult to gatheror available only to travel agents is now easily accessible. He seeshis course as in keeping with the prevailing trend to do-it-yourself.”People are no longer so in awe of the expert.” But he warnsthat organizing your own tours is very time consuming.Leeuwenburgh, a native of the Netherlands, has spent the past 40 yearsin the travel business. He has witnessed first hand the evolutionof American travel to Europe. “It used to be that people tookthe grand European tour, which was three weeks or more, and at thattime they didn’t really think they would go again.” Now many travelerstake several shorter trips in a lifetime — each focussing on adifferent region or interest such as 10 days in Scandinavia or a five-daytrip to London museums.Leeuwenburgh worked with Freddie Laker, a pioneer of discount flights,during the mid 1970s. “He changed the entire perception of transatlantictravel,” says Leeuwenburgh.In addition to holding a New York City guide’s license, Leeuwenburghhas worked as a tour leader for Maupintour since 1983. His area ofconcentration is Europe and he speaks Danish, Dutch and German. Thispast September he led a group of 20 through Russia and the Balticcountries.He also does freelance work including leading an annual theater tourof London in January for the department of Fine Arts at Rider College.And, in a bit of geographical role reversal, he sometimes guides groupsof German tourists through the United States.– Caroline CalogeroTop Of PageSmall Business’sElectronic AgeSmall business owners and managers will get a chanceto learn how to move away from paper-based methods of operation andinto the electronic age at business opportunity seminars in Edisonon Tuesday, February 23, at 9 a.m. and 1 p.m.The free three-hour seminars, Business Opportunities with the Departmentof Defense using E-Commerce or Electronic Commerce, will also focuson set-aside contracts and will be held at the PSE&G Training Centerin Edison. Business on the Internet will be the focus of the secondseminar at 1 p.m. Call 800-575-3272 for registration. See page 52for other E-commerce developments in the Princeton area.Elizabeth Zygmont, outreach specialist for the Scranton ElectronicCommerce Resource Center says that “there will be a general overviewof how the federal government is using electronic commerce to postcompetitive solicitations that businesses can bid on and how businessescan access programs such as the Internet and electronic bulletin boardsand other electronic means to bid upon and hopefully win some of thegovernment work.”Explaining the set-aside seminar, Zygmont says that, “althoughthere are no set-asides for women-owned businesses, there is a programcalled Small Disadvantaged Businesses.””We recommend for businesses to find out if they qualify for thatcategory and to call the Small Business Administration,” she says.”What is interesting is that at each base or activity, there aregoals and not set-aside contracts. They are not requirements but goalsthat each buying activity is urged to try to meet, and there are goalsfor women-owned businesses but not set-asides, per se. There is alsoa set-aside for small business in general and we urge businesses tocontact the Small Business Administration at 973-645-3683. However,we will discuss how businesses can take advantage of some of the programsand how they can find additional information online but the firstline of information is the SBA,” she says.”Our expertise is in the technical areas and how to use the technologyto find the opportunities,” notes Zygmont, as she explains thereal purpose of the seminar.In explaining how businesses should become computer literate, Zygmontsays, “the government is moving away from paper based methodsto more open electronic methods, which is the purpose of the afternoonseminar.”The seminars are aimed at small businesses and according to Zygmont,they are offered free, “because our funding comes from the Departmentof Defense and our purpose is to reach small businesses and to teachthem about electronic commerce.”Businesses do not have to be on the Internet in order to attend theseminars.”This seminar is a good way to show businesses why they need tobecome Internet savvy but by no means do they have to become Internetsavvy. If they go to the seminar and they think it’s something theirbusiness should get into, we have hands-on training that we can offeras well as technical support to implement the technologies that theylearn about in our seminars,” says Zygmont.Zygmont says that attendees will be urged to action through the SmallBusiness 7 Point EC (Electronic Commerce) Strategy Review. Those pointsare: register as a contractor, have Internet access and e-mail, consideran Internet presence, consider an electronic catalog, become EDI (ElectronicData Interchange) capable, have EFT (Electronic Funds Transfer) capability,and accept government purchase cards which could be Visa, AmEx, orMaster Card.– Ernie JohnstonTop Of PageComputers for 50+Green Thumb, a national nonprofit training and employmentorganization that helps disadvantaged and older adults find jobs,offers an information technology training program, beginning earlyin March, to train mature workers for jobs as a PC technician, desktopsupport specialist, computer training technical assistant, or computerapplication position. The total cost of the program is $3,675. Fulltuition scholarships are available, says Sydelle Norris, thestate director, as are self-pay options (including credit cards) butkeyboard skills are a prerequisite.Productivity Point International will conduct the daily four-hourclasses in New Brunswick and Iselin.Green Thumb is located at 2139 Route 33, Lexington Square Commons,Box 8303, Trenton 08560, 609-689-0298. Its employment agency division,entitled Experience Works! has expanded to open a second office next door at 2137 Route 33.For more information about the information technology training programcall Mike Toht at Green Thumb, 609-890-2121.Top Of PageE-Commerce for 50+The New Jersey Bankers Association will study how tomarket electronic banking services to the over 50-crowd at a trainingseminar on Wednesday, February 17, at 9 a.m. at the Summit Bank TrainingCenter in Jamesburg. “Electronic Banking Marketing to Senior Citizens”will be led by Anthony Scanella, Kate Spears, Robert Jaworski,Sheila Kremer, Ruth Reader, William Waits, Rose Sigler, and PaulO’Keeffe. Among the topics will be the senior fraud act and reversemortgages. Cost: $150. Call 609-924-5550.Top Of PageAlumni AlertNew Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) is extendingto all alumni free and lifetime use of the university’s computer networkand E-mail server, a service previously available only to students,faculty, and staff. This will allow NJIT’s 35,000 graduates to stayup to date on campus events, access the university’s extensive libraryand research database, participate in the university’s on-line campusforum, and keep in touch with their former classmates all over theworld with the use of a password.The service demonstrates that being a member of the NJIT family doesnot end at graduation, says NJIT president Saul K. Fenster.”By extending this free service, we can further erode the traditionaldivisions between current and graduated students — thereby fosteringcontacts among faculty, students, and graduates that could increasecollaboration with industry.”The university recently acquired a powerful new mail server as partof its five-year plan for computing. NJIT, currently ranked the nation’ssecond “most wired” campus by Yahoo! Internet Life Magazine,is implementing a $50 million plan to keep the university ahead ofthe curve in information technologies.NJIT is a public research university enrolling nearly 8,200 bachelor’s,master’s, and doctoral students in 76 degree programs through itsfive colleges. Research initiatives include manufacturing, microelectronics,multimedia, transportation, computer science, solar astrophysics,environmental engineering and science, and architecture and buildingscience.Top Of PageAdult LiteracyNearly one-half of New Jersey’s adults function at thelowest level of literacy, as defined by the National Adult LiteracySurvey. State and national data show that 50 to 80 percent of adultilliterates have learning disabilities. These adults have been throughschool where learning disabilities have prevented them from learningto read. The 1994 survey indicated that three-quarters of adults whoare poor or near-poor perform at the lowest level of literacy.Newgrange (an independent, not-for-profit organization providing specializededucational programs for people with learning disabilities) and thePrinceton Area Community Foundation are organizing a two-part adultliteracy series on Thursday, February 11, at the Sarnoff Center, andon Thursday, March 11 at Mercer County Community College, both at12:30 p.m. The programs — oriented towards literacy providersand tutors, supervisors and employers, policy makers, and funders– are free and open to the public. Call 609-924-6204 for moreinformation.”Teaching Adults with Learning Disabilities” on February 11will focus on how to recognize learning disabilities and adapt theappropriate teaching strategies. An undiagnosed learning disabilitycan make learning to read and write difficult, if not impossible,for adult literacy students. Learning objectives of the first session:1. Be able to identify three general traits and five specificcharacteristics of learning disabilities.2. Be able to differentiate the instructional needs forthree common learning disabilities.3. Be prepared to incorporate a variety of instructionaltechniques in a lesson plan.4. Be able to select reasonable classroom accommodationsfor adult students with learning disabilities.5. Locate resources provided by key organizations andagencies and create an inventory for later reference.6. Be able to adapt K-12 learning disability resourcesfor adults.Testing is a regular part of literacy programs. But many testsdo not screen for people with learning disabilities, or else theyfail to make accommodations. The March 11 session “Assessing andAccommodating Adults with Learning Disabilities” will focus onhow to choose the right accommodations in different situations: Howto suggest appropriate workplace accommodations will be among thetopics covered.Each session opens with a forum, followed by a two-hour training program,live via satellite, produced by PBS Adult Services and the Universityof Georgia.Top Of PageMercer Arena:Pay to PlayYour company can get front row seats or front row signageat the Mercer County Arena scheduled to open in next fall. The 10,000-seat,state of the art facility will be home to 35 regular season TrentonTitan East Coast Hockey League (E.C.H.L.) games and 30 Trenton ShootingStars Continental Basketball Association (CBA) basketball contests.Advertising and sponsorship opportunities include:Scoreboard and sign advertising: Rear-illuminated signon hanging center-court, center-ice state of the art video scoreboard,$35,000 each, two for $65,000, or four for $120,000 (yearly per side).Main scoreboard video, 30 seconds each, $250 per spot, multiple commercialpackages available.Luxury suites: Fourteen by twenty-one feet (including14 theater-style seats). The decor of each “box” includescounter stools, cabinetry, optional wet bar, upscale wall coverings,and plush wall to wall carpeting. Prices for the 32 suites range from$40,000 to $60,000 per year depending on location and level of furnishings.Furniture packages will be presented at an additional charge. Suitepricing includes 14 tickets to all team sport events. Other eventsrequire separate additional purchasing of tickets. Each suite is leasedfor a five-year term. Lease sharing options are available.For more information, contact Tom Ryba, manager, advertisingsponsorships, at 609-278-2760 or 619-277-8181.Top Of PageFree Tax ServicesThe American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) Tax-AideProgram offers free tax assistance to low and moderate income taxpayersin Mercer County through April 15. The Tax-Aide program is in its31st year of operation.”Our locations are staffed by people who have been thoroughlytrained to complete the basic tax forms and answer tax questions,”says Alex Banks, district coordinator, Princeton area. Specialemphasis is given to tax provisions such as pensions, social security,IRA distributions, credit for the elderly and disabled, earned incomecredit, child credit, and education credit. The taxpayer should bringa copy of last year’s tax return, booklet with forms received fromthe IRS, and all pertinent information for the 1998 tax year.AARP tax sites include the Plainsboro Public Library, where help isoffered on Tuesdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the History Room. Call609-275-2897 for details. For more information about other sites,dates, and times, call 609-655-4358.Top Of PageSmiles in FashionThe Mercer Dental Society is offering a month-long “SmilesAre Always in Fashion” program to custom-fit school children withfree mouth guards and protect them from serious sports injuries. Nearly50 participating members have volunteered to provide free mouth guardsto children from grades 1 through 12 as part of the National Children’sDental Health Month campaign of the American Dental Association.”Mouth guards work,” says Mark McDonough, coordinatorof the program. “Mouth guards prevent nearly 200,000 oral injuriesevery year in the United States.” The mouths of children are particularlyvulnerable, says David Young, president of the Mercer Society.”The normal preventive cost of custom-made mouth guards is nothingcompared to the cost of treating a child after injuries have occurred.”Football presents fewer problems because players wear mouth guards.Most traumatic injuries occur in sports where mouth protection isnot mandatory, such as basketball, soccer, hockey, volleyball, andskateboarding. Most common injuries are chipped, loosened, or lostteeth, and other injuries to the lips, cheeks, and tongue.To arrange appointments with participating dentists, parents can callthe Mercer Dental Society at 609-844-0575.Top Of PageHelping HeartsThe Sharing Network and Saturn automobile dealershipsin New Jersey sponsor a Valentine’s Day Organ Donor Drive on Saturday,February 14, for National Donor Day. Stephen Franzman of Princeton,a heart transplant recipient, will distribute organ donation materialsand discuss his personal experiences at Saturn in North Brunswick.The Saturn dealership at Livingstone will display the New Jersey DonorFamily Quilt, a tribute to New Jersey donors, created by their families.The Coalition on Donation has teamed with Saturn Corporation and itsUnited Auto Workers Partnership Initiative, America’s Blood Centers,the Red Cross, Minority Organ and Tissue Transplant Education Program,National Marrow Donor Program, Transplant Recipients InternationalOrganization, Health and Human Services, and the National Kidney Foundationto sponsor the second annual national donation drive of its kind.The Sharing Network is a non-profit, federally certified and stateapproved procurement organization responsible for recovering organsand tissue for New Jersey residents in need of transplants. For moreinformation, or to obtain a donor card, or join the New Jersey Organand Tissue Donor Registry, call the Sharing Network at 800-SHARE-NJor visit the website at https://www.sharenj.org.Top Of PageSexual Harassment ForumNew Jersey Civil Action is organizing a free forum entitled”Know Your Rights! Sexual Harassment in the Workplace” onWednesday, February 24, at 7 p.m. at the North Brunswick Public Library.Attorneys, mental health professionals, and labor leaders will informwomen about sexual harassment and provide information about federaland state laws protecting women from discrimination at work.”Sexual harassment is not just upsetting — it is against thelaw,” says Phyllis Salowe-Kaye, executive director of NewJersey Citizen Action. The project is aimed at heightening women’sawareness as to not only what constituents sexual harassment, butalso what a woman can do to protect herself against such inappropriateand illegal behavior, says Michele Querques, from the law firmGiordano, Halleran, and Ciesla PC, a participant at the forum.Citizen Action’s Sexual Harassment Project also offers a toll freehotline — 877-666-6625 — that provides information and counselingin a supportive and confidential manner.Next StoryCorrections or additions?This page is published by PrincetonInfo.com— the web site for U.S. 1 Newspaper in Princeton, New Jersey.
