Text-Number: 0109E
Available: 26/08/1996
Category: CultureNumber of characters: 5061
Author: Pam Blackstone
Written: 
Abbreviation (when applicable):
Title: Burning Trekkie Question
Pending publication by/on:
Previous publication by/on: 
Victoria Times-Colonist, May 1996
Copyright: Pam Blackstone
Diskussion/Letters to the Editor:

Pam Blackstone

Burning Trekkie Question

Did they or didn’t they? That had to be the question on the minds of trekkies everywhere on watching Monday night’s episode of Star Trek Voyager. Captain Janeway and Chakotay are reluctantly left behind by the Voyager crew on a seemingly idyllic planet after contracting a deadly illness. For some strange reason, the planet’s biosphere shields them from the debilitating effects of the disease, and the pair go about the process of building a new life in this apparent paradise. The show deals with the growing friendship and affection — and the developing sexual attraction — between the two. The Star Trek producers finally seem serious about character development. A freak plasma storm brings out Chakotay’s protective feelings towards Janeway, whom he has begun to call “Catherine.” She displays a vulnerability that is rarely seen and totally out of character, in allowing him to shield her protectively from flying debris.
This episode builds, with delicious anticipation, towards a climactic intimate moment between Janeway and Chakotay, but cuts away at the crucial moment. The two subsequently get rescued and, of course, a cure is found. But the producers have exercised a devious and inventive cruelty, leaving those of us with an addiction to this show dangling on the hook of uncertainty. Did they or didn’t they? I had to find out, so I turned to the alt.tv.star-trek.voyager newsgroup to see what other trekkies thought.
Debate was raging in this newsgroup, all right, but about the previous episode in which Janeway had had to make a very tough decision which some were equating with the capital punishment dilemma. Curious, I did a quick search to see where else there might be Voyager discussions. After scrolling through a list of search hits as long as my arm, I began to realize Star Trek is literally all over the Net.
This impression that trekkies dominate the Net was confirmed yesterday by some statistics from the Infoseek search engine published in the latest edition of Web Week magazine. According to Infoseek, “Star Trek” is the third most common phrase searched. In case you’re interested, “Chat rooms” and “USA Today” are the first two. And no, the most common keyword searched isn’t “sex” — it’s “music”, followed by “software”, “games”, 
“Windows”, “college”, “news”, “free”, and “jobs”, in that order. The most common name searched? Not surprisingly, “Pamela Anderson” flies off the fingers of more people than any other name.
However, back to Star Trek. (Sorry, Pam Anderson fans.) For all you fellow trekkies who have been longing for online Star Trek resources, here are a few links to get you started: the official Star Trek web site is at http://www.paramount.com/. Here, you can download audio or video clips, read up on the characters, and bone up on past and upcoming episodes. Fellow Voyager fans won’t want to miss the Star Trek Voyager page (http://www.bradley.edu/campusorg/psiphi/voy/). If you want to go on record with your favourite Star Trek character, alien race, or film, check out the Star Trek Vote site (http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Carl_Plage/vote.htm). The Klingon Language Institute (http://www.kli.org/) has been mentioned in this space before, and deserves a visit. If you’re into aliens, there are web sites (and newsgroups) dedicated to most Star Trek alien races, as well as to favourite characters. Just try a search on the name of the character, actor, or alien race. The Ferengi Rules of Acquisition, for example, may be found at http://www.cs.odu.edu/~baker/rules.html.
The Vidiot site (http://www.bradley.edu/campusorg/psiphi/voy/) is a popular starting point for exploring online Star Trek resources, as is the Select Star Trek Site Guide, found at http://www.research.umbc.edu/~smith/startrek/startrek.html. An excellent collection of links may be found at http://www.halcyon.com/dyar/starfleet/resource.html. Chris Gilliam’s Star Trek Page (http://www.aztec.co.za/users/cgilliam/star.html) is another wonderful jumplist that will keep you busy for weeks. Ditto for the Definitive Star Trek Collection (http://www.execpc.com/~lam/startrek.html), an extensive jumplist containing not only Web sites, but Gopher, Telnet, and FTP resources, as well as a far more extensive list of newsgroups than I could reprint here.
In fact, there are dozens of Star Trek discussion forums, including the TREK-REVIEW-L mailing list (LISTSERV@cornell.edu to subscribe), and the alt.startrek.creative, alt.startrek.klingon, rec.arts.startrek.current, rec.arts.startrek.fandom, rec.arts.startrek.info, rec.arts.startrek.misc, rec.arts.startrek.reviews, and rec.arts.startrek.tech newsgroups. If this isn’t enough for you, you’re in worse shape than I am! Live long and prosper.

Pam Blackstone is a Canadian Internet consultant who writes a weekly column about the Internet for the Victoria Times-Colonist newspaper. You can reach Pam by e-mail at pb@islandnet.com.
Copyright © 1996 Pam Blackstone. All rights reserved. Reprinted here with permission.