1. New and Notable... The Koll Company has put up a new site describing its comprehensive real estate services and promising research from its National Real Estate Index soon. Two other large asset management services firms have sites: Compass Retail and Trammell Crow Residential Services. More of the institutional services companies are expected to have sites before year end. *Find these sites by clicking the Text Search button and entering a complete or partial word.*

2. Road Warrior II... For those of you receiving this Dispatch for the first time, you’ll note that it is coming from Spain where PikeNet is on "vacation" for the next 10 days. Once leaving Madrid, logging on has become much more difficult due to line interference which prevents a connection completely or which limits the speed of the connection to 2.4k baud (just like the old days). This has deterred me from accessing the web itself, although I can still use e-mail. I’ll be back in Madrid on Tuesday, July 16, and able to log on at 14.4k and in my office on Thursday, July 18, late in the afternoon with 128k ISDN access.

3. Changes at PikeNet... I could not post a new story this week because of slow connection speeds. The next story will be on Ohio’s site and will be posted after midnight on the 15th. I have a number of new sites and revised reviews to add to the Directory but will have to wait until returning to my office. The administrative tools that I use require downloading some fairly large files which isn’t feasible at low speeds.

4. World Wide Web... The International Herald Tribune started a series this week on the web. (Although PikeNet is in Europe, I do not think that there is a connection.) Talking about the impact of new technologies, the first article said that the introduction of the telegraph in 1844 was predicted to bring about world peace. Just one more reason to remember that the web is simply a tool, not an end. Real estate services will still be rooted in personal relationships between individuals.

5. Subscribing and Canceling... If you do not want to receive this Dispatch, please reply with "cancel" in the Message field to remove your name. If you know a person who would like to be added to this list, please send me an e-mail with the word "subscribe." Please include your name and company.

-- Peter Pike