Unlike long-distance providers, ISPs normally charge a flat rate for monthly services, and that includes accessing information on the internet any where in the world. There are several other tools, such as telnet, finger, IRC, talk, and gopher, but those are either outdated or more complicated than the main tools. Hayden also publishes a Windows edition of this book. Email is an electronic messaging system that allows you to send text-only messages to any email address in the world. Messages travel through the internet in a matter of minutes, but can take up to several hours to arrive at their destination when conditions are less than ideal.
Email is useful for a wide variety of purposes.
By far the most popular email program for Macintosh and PC users is Eudora, which comes in both a free and commercial version. The free version, known as Eudora Lite, has all the features most Internet users need, but the commercial version, Eudora Pro, has additional features, like mail filtering, that some users find invaluable. Most ISPs include Eudora Lite in their startup packets for new users, and it also comes on a disk when you purchase the Internet Starter Kit series mentioned earlier. Whenever you or anyone else who is subscribed to the list sends a message to the list address, everyone in that database gets a copy of the message. At first it might seem hard to tell the difference between newsgroups and mailing lists.