The Internet has taken Arabia by storm. In less than a year we
have moved from a situation where most people on the peninsula
were wondering what the WWW is, to one where virtually every major
company is making plans to launch itself on the Web. Kuwait was
the first to offer local users full Internet access but it has
now been followed by the UAE, with Bahrain, Oman and Saudi Arabia
moving rapidly to catch up. The World Wide Web has revolutionised
many different fields of business – from the communications industry
and publishing to virtually any field you care to mention. This
author’s most recent visit to Saudi Arabia was carried out, as
a guest of Saudia Airlines, to speak at the International Airline
Industry Conference, held in Jeddah during November ’95. A far
cry, you might say, from biology, wildlife and publishing but
WWW experts are thin on the ground and our own experience of the
Web has been built up over the past two years – almost from the
beginning of the Web’s creation.
The Internet has in fact helped us in more ways than one – not
only have we become devoted users but we have also honed our skills
as creators of complex interactive multimedia WWW presentations.
Indeed, you can now find parts of Arabian Wildlife on the WWW
since winning pictures from the Arabian Wildlife Photographer
of the Year have been carried by the Web’s first, most popular
and award winning Photographic E-zine: Photon (which you can read
on-line at http://www.scotborders.co.uk/photon/), and have been
included in a Web presentation that has been created for the UAE.
Plans are now afoot to place the whole magazine, including back
issues of Arabian Wildlife, on the WWW.
That’s all very well, you may reply, but what’s all this about
the World Wildlife Web – is it a figment of an over imaginative
author’s wildest dreams or is there some fragment of reality in
the concept? What has this all singing, all dancing, WWW, actually
done for wildlife? The answer is a great deal more than there
is space here to cover. It is being used to assist public awareness
on conservation issues, as a tool in education and research cooperation,
and for management of conservation projects. Above all however
it is becoming a vast source of regularly updated information
on our Planet’s natural world.
How does one access all this information that resides at the ends
of more than a million intricate threads of an ever expanding
web-linked network of computers spread all over the world? Despite
the seemingly impossible task of finding what one is looking for
– nothing could be simpler. In fact, I can often find things more
quickly on the WWW than I can among my own traditional filing
system and I could give many examples of how useful this has been
to our own work.
The Whale Watching Web
Rauno Lauhakangas works in Finland at the Research Institute for
Higher Physics. His daughter brought him on a whale watching trip
a few years ago and so he was inspired to “do something to help
save the whale”. His Whale-Watching – Web (http://www.physics.helsinki.fi/whale/)
is a good example of how the internet can be used to promote conservation.
By using the WWW he has linked whale watchers, and their information,
all around the world. When Arabian Wildlife ran its story on the
humpback whale being rescued from a fisherman’s net off Oman,
I sent a summary of the story by e-mail to Rauno’s server in Finland.
Almost immediately the reply came back that this was being posted
on the “Whale Watching Web”. Within a few days my own e-mail box
was filling up with messages from as far apart as New England
in the USA, and South Africa. The most intriguing message came
from Oman since Oman’s commissioner on the International Whaling
Commission (IWC), Mohammed Barwani, was already hooked up to the
Net and had read the World Wide Web account which described his
own part in rescuing the humpback whale just a few days previously.
He sent an e-mail to Finland, thanking Rauno for covering the
story and the server in Finland automatically copied the message
to our e-mail address in Ireland. This is a good example of how
the technology links people of shared interests and helps to disseminate
information across international boundaries with great speed.
Finding Wildlife Information
The Web is such a massive and intricately woven network of data
that powerful search engines must be employed to locate what you
are looking for. If for example, you just want to get a general
idea of what information might be available under a certain heading
then access one of the search engines such as Lycos or Yahoo,
and type in the key word. Whilst writing this article I used Lycos
to search under the heading of “Whales”. Back came the reply that
2,191 documents had been found and the first ten were presented
in brief abstract form. Thus, I was able to read a Preface to
Roger Payne’s book entitled Among Whales; a series of abstracts
on particular whale species; information on a number of other
whale books; on a Whale Adoption Programme; and several news releases
with graphic details of how Pilot Whales are slaughtered in the
Faro islands. I also discovered how to buy a computer game all
about whales, the answers to a long list of FAQs (frequently asked
questions) about whales and what reading material is available
for young children on the topic of whales. Altogether, I calculated,
it would probably take about six months of full time work to wade
my way through all the internet information that is available
on whales, but I could also locate specific items of interest
very quickly.
It is true that a great deal of WWW data relates to the United
States but, as more countries establish their presence on the
Net, the balance will gradually be redressed. In the meantime,
some of the data from North America is of interest to users in
Arabia, if only as an example of how the WWW can be used in the
fields of wildlife research and conservation work. One quick way
into this mega-database is to access one of the overall listings
of wildlife related sites. This then forms the start of a journey
through cyberspace that can end with learning about how a particular
national park is managed or how a group of school children are
helping to save their local wildlife. A single general entry,
such as “Birding on the Web” will carry one to a huge list of
related sites and information sources from all over the world.
The Yahoo search engine first invites users to narrow down their
area of interest. Thus, if one asks for a search under “wildlife”
Yahoo will turn up 131 entries but each of these consists of long
lists of classified sites, equating, in the end, to thousands
of presentations.
The Arabian Net
But when it does come to Arabian wildlife, WWW relevant presentations
are few in number. The proposal to place Arabian Wildlife Magazine
on the Web is part of an effort to redress this situation. At
the present time if one searches under the word “Houbara” no entries
are found. Our Yahoo search under “Gazelle” turned up a single
entry concerning a call for volunteers to count and mark gazelle
in Israel.
If any of our readers are interested in joining in our efforts
to create a meaningful database on Arabian wildlife, accessible
over the Internet, they are invited to contact the Production
Editor whose details are given at the beginning of this issue.
Meanwhile the challenge to create a World Wildlife Web, linking
biologists, nature-watchers, conservationists, photographers and
all the others interested in our planet’s natural world is still
there, awaiting funding and commitment of resources. Could it
be that this is one Internet project that will grow from the efforts
of Arabia’s wildlife enthusiasts? Don’t forget, you first read
it in Arabian Wildlife Magazine!