International Teletimes
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| File:International Teletimes logo.gif | |
| Editor | Ian Wojtowicz |
|---|---|
| Categories | General interest |
| Frequency | Irregular |
| Year founded | 1992 |
| Final issue | 1995 |
| Country | Canada |
| Based in | Vancouver, British Columbia |
| Language | English |
| Website | http://www.teletimes.com [dead link] |
| ISSN | 1198-3604 |
Search International Teletimes on Amazon.
International Teletimes was an online magazine published from Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, from 1992 to 1995. It is considered one of the earliest general-interest magazines published on the Internet, predating the widespread public adoption of the World Wide Web. According to its writer's guidelines, the magazine aimed to present "informed opinion and observation drawn from the experience of living in a particular place."[1]
The magazine covered culture, opinion, and international perspectives, operated on a shareware distribution model. It drew contributions from volunteer writers from around the world presenting their local perspectives on themes such as education, news, travel, sports, and history.
It was founded and edited by Ian Wojtowicz with Anand Mani serving as Art Director.
History
Founding and formats
International Teletimes was launched in 1992, initially distributed in two formats simultaneously: a plain-text ASCII edition and a graphically rich DOCMaker edition.
The DOCMaker and ASCII editions were distributed through the Info-Mac archive (then hosted at Stanford University's sumex-aim.stanford.edu) and its network of over 100 mirror sites worldwide.[2] Readers could also subscribe to the graphical Mac edition via a Majordomo mailing list at [email protected]. An issue published in November 1993 (teletimes-93-11.txt) is documented in Info-Mac Digest V11 #222, confirming its distribution through the archive at that time.[3]
New issue releases were announced through the TidBITS newsletter, the leading Macintosh-focused publication of the era.[4]
The magazine held two registered ISSNs reflecting its formats: ISSN 1190-9161 for the ASCII edition and ISSN 1198-3604 for the World Wide Web edition.[5][6] Both records are confirmed by the ISSN Centre for Canada.
Move to the Web
A December 1993 editor's note archived by Library and Archives Canada announces the transition to the World Wide Web: "Now for some really interesting news: Teletimes will soon be [online]."[7] The Web edition was hosted by Wimsey Information Services, a Vancouver Internet service provider. Its original URL was the explicit path www.wimsey.com/teletimes.root/teletimes_home_page.html, predating the convention of index.html as a default directory page; it later moved to www.teletimes.com.[8]
Editorial Approach
The magazine described itself as setting itself "apart from other electronic magazines by its unusually 'human' content." Each issue addressed broad topics of international concern — from serious themes such as education and human rights, to lighter themes such as creative writing and sports — and featured regular columns including Keepers of Light (photography), The Latin Quarter (news commentary from Mexico), The Wine Enthusiast, Cuisine, and an extensive arts and entertainment section.[8]
The magazine was assembled through a collaboration of volunteer contributors from multiple countries. According to its GNN citation, it aimed to present "informed opinion and observation drawn from the experience of living in a particular place."[1]
Library and Archives Canada archived the publication as part of its digital collections program.[9] It was also cited on page 406 of the second edition of Whole Internet User's Guide and Catalog by Ed Krol, published by O'Reilly Media in 1994, one of the best-selling guides to the early Internet.[10] The magazine was also recommended by PC Week magazine.[8]
International Teletimes featured contributions from other online publications, including theatre reviews from Aisle Say, which noted in John Labovitz's e-zine-list that its reviews "are also a feature of the zine International Teletimes."[11]
The publication ceased in 1995. While the ASCII and Web editions survive in archival collections, the illustrated DocMaker editions are not known to have been fully preserved; surviving issues were uploaded to the Internet Archive.[12]
Recognition
NCSA Mosaic "What's New" listings
Following its move to the Web, International Teletimes was listed on the NCSA Mosaic "What's New With NCSA Mosaic" page in December 1993 and again in January 1994.[13][14] It was subsequently listed on the page multiple times through 1995.[15]
The "What's New" page was the default homepage displayed by the Mosaic browser — the dominant means of accessing the Web during this period — and received heavy traffic from the entire web-using public. It was updated with approximately one new listing per day at its launch, making repeated inclusion a notable distinction.[16]
GNN "Best of the Net" Award
On June 1, 1994, at the Internet World Conference in San Jose, California, International Teletimes received a "Best of the Net" award from the Global Network Navigator (GNN), published by O'Reilly Media.[8] GNN, widely described as the first commercial website, presented the award to twelve recipients in total; other winners included the Internet Underground Music Archive, the University of California Museum of Palaeontology server, and the Xerox PARC Map Viewer.[8][1]
The GNN citation noted the magazine's international volunteer model and the youth of its editor: "perhaps most notable is the fact that its editor-in-chief, Ian Wojtowicz, is 16 years old."[1] The award press release was distributed via the net-happenings mailing list at InterNIC and subsequently forwarded to academic mailing lists including H-Net's EDTECH list at Michigan State University.[8]
Academic citation
International Teletimes was cited as an example of Internet-based communication in John December's article "Units of Analysis for Internet Communication," published in the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication in 1996, one of the first peer-reviewed academic publications on Internet communication research.[17]
Television documentary
Wojtowicz and International Teletimes were featured in Understanding the Internet, a documentary film produced by Andrew Cochran Associates of Halifax, Nova Scotia, and broadcast on the Discovery Channel and PBS in 1995.[18][19] The documentary described International Teletimes as "an award-winning alternate magazine available only in cyberspace," published from suburban Vancouver.[18] In the film, Wojtowicz described the magazine's founding and its significance:
When I first got into the internet and started up Teletimes I was quite surprised with the amount of power that I had. This is not something I could have done in the print medium — first of all personally I don't have enough business experience to keep a magazine running without losing money. But also simply interacting with other people — the fact that you don't have that first impression that's there, it's all based on what you have to say. You're judged basically more on who you are than how you appear. And that's pretty special.[18]
He also described the editorial philosophy:
What we're trying to get is not the journalists but the real person who's living and experiencing the news, writing about what's happening — not the foreign correspondent who's just flown in the day before and is bringing all his Western influences and biases into whatever he's reporting.[18]
The film presented the magazine alongside Vint Cerf, co-inventor of the Internet Protocol, Paul Baran, pioneer of packet switching and a foundational figure in the development of the ARPANET, and Marc Andreessen, co-creator of Mosaic and founder of Netscape, as a representative example of the emerging internet.
Media coverage
Wojtowicz and the magazine received coverage from the Vancouver Sun, CBC Radio (French service), and SFU News (the publication of Simon Fraser University), among other outlets.
Global Information Infrastructure Junior Summit
In October 1995, Wojtowicz was selected to represent Canada at the "Global Information Infrastructure Junior Summit '95," held in Tokyo from October 31 to November 3, 1995.[20] The summit was organised following a G7 conference in Brussels and brought together forty young people from ten countries, alongside three hundred participants in a concurrent online conference. Associated organisations included Sega, NEC, Mitsubishi, and the MIT Media Lab.[20]
Wojtowicz was one of four members of the Canadian delegation. In a press release issued at the time, he described the publication's significance: "The Internet has enormous potential for empowerment. It enabled me to publish my magazine without worrying about the costs of printing, or the social barriers of being a teenager." He also reflected on the changing character of the internet: "Although the tremendous commercial growth of the Net is bringing about many positive changes, it is getting increasingly difficult for less 'powerful' groups such as youth to take advantage of the Internet. It's capitalism vs. socialism vs. anarchism — on the Internet."[20]
Significance
International Teletimes was among the earliest publications to span the full arc of pre-Web and Web-era online distribution. Beginning in 1992, it reached Mac users through the Info-Mac FTP archive and its global mirror network in both DocMaker and ASCII formats — the standard channels for Macintosh software and publications before widespread Internet access. Its December 1993 transition to the Web and immediate appearance on the NCSA Mosaic "What's New" page placed it among a small number of publications visible to the entire web-using public during the first mass adoption of the Web.
The documentary explicitly contrasted International Teletimes with Time Warner's newly launched internet presence, framing a 17-year-old publisher in suburban Vancouver as an established competitor to one of the world's largest media companies. Wojtowicz responded on camera: "Time Warner — they don't scare me."[18]
Its two ISSN registrations confirmed by the Canadian ISSN Centre; its archival preservation by Library and Archives Canada; its documented distribution through the Info-Mac archive; its repeated listings on the NCSA What's New page; its recommendation by PC Week magazine; its inclusion in the O'Reilly Whole Internet User's Guide and Catalog; its GNN "Best of the Net" award; and its citation in peer-reviewed academic literature make it one of the better-documented independent online publications of the early Web era. Its inclusion in a 1995 Discovery Channel and PBS documentary alongside the inventors of the internet reflects the degree to which it was regarded as a representative example of the new medium at the moment of its emergence.
See also
- Global Network Navigator
- NCSA Mosaic
- Info-Mac
- TidBITS
- DOCMaker
- Whole Internet User's Guide and Catalog
- History of the World Wide Web
- Vint Cerf
- Paul Baran
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Savetz, Kevin (1995). "Winners of the Global Network Navigator 1994 "Best of the Net" Awards". Internet Top Ten Lists. Retrieved 2026-03-22. Search this book on
- ↑ Engst, Adam (19 December 2005). "The Info-Mac Network Retires". TidBITS. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ "Info-Mac Digest V11 #222". Newsgroup: comp.sys.mac.digest. 9 November 1993. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ "TidBITS Goes to Eleven". TidBITS. 16 April 2001. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ "International Teletimes (Online. World Wide Web ed.) – ISSN 1198-3604". ISSN International Centre. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ "International Teletimes (Online. ASCII version) – ISSN 1190-9161". ISSN International Centre. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ "Editor's Note, December 1993". Library and Archives Canada. December 1993. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 8.4 8.5 Wojtowicz, Ian (17 June 1994). "Teletimes Receives International Award!". H-Net: Humanities & Social Sciences Online. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ "International Teletimes". Library and Archives Canada. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ Krol, Ed (1994). The Whole Internet User's Guide and Catalog (2nd ed.). O'Reilly & Associates. p. 406. ISBN 1-56592-063-5. Search this book on
- ↑ Labovitz, John (9 October 1995). "John Labovitz's e-zine-list". Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ "International Teletimes". Internet Archive. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ "What's New With NCSA Mosaic: December 1993". National Center for Supercomputing Applications (mirror, Aberystwyth University). December 1993. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ "What's New With NCSA Mosaic: January 1994". National Center for Supercomputing Applications (mirror, University of Rochester). January 1994. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ "What's New With NCSA Mosaic: October 1995". October 1995. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ "NCSA What's New". The History of the Web. 14 June 1993. Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ December, John (March 1996). "Units of Analysis for Internet Communication". Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication. 1 (4). doi:10.1111/j.1083-6101.1996.tb00173.x.
- ↑ 18.0 18.1 18.2 18.3 18.4 Cochran, Andrew (producer) (1995). Understanding the Internet. Halifax, Nova Scotia: Andrew Cochran Associates.
- ↑ Cochran, Andrew. "Bio". Retrieved 2026-03-22.
- ↑ 20.0 20.1 20.2 "Teen Internet Publisher to Represent Canada" (Press release). International Teletimes. 9 October 1995.
External links
- Surviving issues of International Teletimes (Internet Archive)
- Screen recordings of International Teletimes (YouTube)
- Understanding the Internet documentary, 1995 (YouTube)
- Library and Archives Canada archive
- GNN 1994 "Best of the Net" citation
- Award press release, H-Net EDTECH archive, June 1994
- ISSN 1198-3604 record (Web edition)
- ISSN 1190-9161 record (ASCII edition)
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