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Five years have gone by since thewww.glassonline.com website madeits first appearance on the Internetand had its official presentation inDüsseldorf at Glasstec 1996. Results achieved by the world’s most extensive website dedicated to glass have been amazing: the qualityof services is constantly increasingand improving and monthly contactshave soared beyond 440.000.

ow in its fifth year, on the occasion ofthe new Millennium, GlassOnline.comis quite a mature and articulate website,

constantly expanding to face up to the frenet-ic evolution characterizing new world econo-my. The website, in all modesty, seems itself tohave contributed quite solidly to this modern evo-lution in the fields it concerns. Of course, in thesefive years the core of the system - the contin-uously updated news, its virtual data bank, theresearch tool available to everyone all overthe world working in the field of glass - has beengreatly expanded and added to with new on-lineservices which both improve the system assuch and bring it even closer to the reality of thisincredible data processing enterprise: a publishinghouse with a great tradition which has managedto bring together the requirements of new econ-omy and of modern means of communicationwith traditional publishing experience. ButGlassOnline.com goes beyond a mere on-linereiteration of the information already containedin Artech’s magazines: since the beginning theaim has been to create a real “web-portal” forglass and it very soon came to light to what extentour new project was a service that was completelyautonomous and with developments that wereself propelling, separate from the printed pub-lications produced.

It is possible to confirm that GlassOnline, nowmore than ever, represents a necessary point of

Riccardo Busetto

reference within the Internet for technologyand for industrial and commercial glass appli-cations. In the month of June, in fact, the recordof 440,000 hits per month was topped and con-tinues to rise by approximately 5 to 10 per centevery month. This enormous web-site containsmore than 9,000 pages and is constantly and sig-nificantly growing month by month. Let’s takea look, then, at how it is structured.

HOME PAGE AND SEARCH ENGINEThe nucleus of GlassOnline is its Home

Page. From here, it is possible to access allthe various services offered by the site.

Complete Shape Cutting Lines

GLASSONLINE.COMIN BRIEF

Owner Artech Publishing s.r.l.

Founded 1996

Location Cormano (Milan) - Italy

First presented Glasstec ’96 to the public Düsseldorf - Germany

No. of pages more than 9,000

No. of18

services/sections

No. of monthly hits440,847

(June 2000)

Companies listed 623

Banner ads 40

News published7,367

up until now

Directly under the GlassOnline logo is the firsttool available to the visitor, an internal searchengine that allows you to find any ‘searchable’topic in real time among the more than 9,000pages of GlassOnline.

The result is a list which permits easy trans-fer by clicking on the desired topic. You can alsomake the search more precise by opting forthe advanced search system.

Naturally, from the results of your search,you can access any information of interest,including “GlassOnline Club” services, whichprovide subscribers with various interesting andregularly updated services. Here the visitor canfind the various instruments which have char-acterized GlassOnline in the past, along withother regularly updated products which will betaking on interesting developments in the nearfuture. Said services are widely accessibleand offer an enormous quantity of informationto all users, reserving the possibility to accessmore specific and complete information toClub subscribers, thus allowing a closer exam-ination of matters at hand.

MAIN SERVICESDirectly underneath the search engine,

you can easily locate the links to GlassOnline’stwo main services. One permits access to the database where the glass industry’s leading companies are presented. The other supplies journalistic, financial and scientificinformation.

Let’s proceed in order:

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SERVICES CONSULTATION LISTINGS

SEARCH ENGINE Free ---

WORLD YELLOW PAGES Free Payment

WEEKLY WORLD NEWS Payment* Free

FINANCIAL REPORTS Payment* Free

MAGAZINE ARTICLES Payment* Free

FORUM Free Free

TRADE OPPORTUNITIES Free Payment

EQUIPMENT OFFERED Free Payment

EQUIPMENT WANTED Free Free

EMPLOYMENT OFFERED Free Payment

EMPLOYMENT WANTED Free Free

EXHIBITIONS AND MEETINGS Free Free

DICTIONARY OF GLASS Free ---

HISTORY OF GLASS Free ---

GLASS MUSEUMS Free Free

HOW TO SAY GLASS Free ---

OUR GLASS PUBLICATIONS Free ---

STATISTICS Free ---*Free consultation of the news titles only

the first service is the GlassOnline “World Yel-low Pages”,

www.glassonline.com/directoryyellow-pages/index.html

This is the first service in the world which gath-ers all the most important companies involvedin the glass industry together into one data-base, which can be visited easily and at nocost. It is also extremely simple to move with-in the service, either by searching alphabeticallyor by choosing a more accurate inspection bymeans of product categories, towards the sitesof the more than 620 companies listed. Weemphasize that the links can either be con-nected to companies’ own web sites (created andregistered directly by the clients) or to standard

websites supplied by GlassOnline (createdspecifically for the client). The prices of bothcompanies’ and standard website links are veryreasonable and the minimum placement periodis one year.

It is also useful to point out that the creationof a website by GlassOnline technical staff cangive the client a “double visibility”, seeing thatthere is the possibility of having a direct link fromthe GlassOnline-created company home page tothe company’s official website.

We can now see how the “World YellowPages” are organized: by clicking on the rel-evant yellow box on the Home Page, youreach the “Yellow Pages Main Page” fromwhich it is possible to reach the five sub-pages dedicated to Hollow Ware and SpecialGlasses, Flat Glass, Fibre Glass, Art Glassand Raw Materials respectively. These page titlesare presented in a column on the left-handside of the screen. Further navigation refinesthe search even more by giving two differentoptions: an alphabetically ordered result, divid-ed into three areas (“Suppliers of machinery,equipment, materials and plants”, “Glass man-ufacturers and processors” and “Services”)and a result categorized by product and alsodivided into three areas (“Machinery, equip-ment, materials and plants”, “Glass products”and “Services”). We can demonstrate how touse this service with an example: suppose youwant to find a list of suppliers of the flat andbent glass industry. Starting from the Home Pageand clicking on “World Yellow Pages”, wearrive at this service’s main page. On the leftwe find the blue link to the Flat Glass page. Onthis new page we are presented with twoopportunities: an alphabetical search, by meansof the Alphabetical Index option (clicking onthe “Suppliers of machinery, equipment, mate-rials and plants” link, we obtain a list of the com-panies which operate in this sector), or asearch by product, by means of the Product Indexoption (clicking on the “Machinery, equip-ment, materials and plants” link we reach the

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list of all product categories in this sector). Fromhere it is possible to follow more specified linksto obtain a list of companies for each request-ed product category, and from this list you

can go directly to the respectivesites. It is definitely much morecomplicated to explain such navi-gation processes in writing than totry them directly on-line.

Of course, any search or consul-tation in the “World Yellow Pages”is free, whereas companies that wishto be added to the list must pay anannual fee (which can be taken careof via Internet at the address:www.glassonline.com/directo-r y y e l l o w p a g e s / p r o f i l e s u b -scribe.htm).

265The page which appears by clicking on theGlassOnline Club banner

www.glassonline.com/worldnews.html

is divided into three sections distinguishedby three coloured bands on the left of thescreen, respectively identifying the “WeeklyWorld News”, “Financial Reports” and “Mag-azine Articles” services.

You can browse the published weekly newsheadlines at no charge, whereas, if you wish toread the whole text, a reasonably priced annu-al subscription (made on-line) is required. Witha subscription, you can access the “FinancialReports” of individual companies which are

updated every six monthsand may be examinedeven without users hav-ing to insert their pass-words. From the “Week-ly World News” service,you can easily get thelast week’s news as wellas access the largest fileof glass news, gatheredfrom the last five yearsand assembled in alpha-betical and chronologicalorder. This is the realquality of GlassOnline:the only service of itskind in the world whichhas provided the userwith a complete newsbank (over 7,300 news)since 1996, allowingaccess to the entire glassindustry’s history through-out the last five years. Itsymbolizes a vast mine ofinformation that is notavailable in the constantlyupdated world of Internetwhich is too often limit-ed to “photographing thepresent” while denyingthe user the possibilityof studying and analysingthe past.

266 It is also worth noticing that in the Home Pageimmediately under the links to the two previ-ously mentioned banners, a rotating one showslast week’s news, further permitting imme-diate transfer to the appropriate page withjust a click.

GlassOnline Club also allows visitors to con-nect directly to the page dedicated to technical,scientific, artistic and commercial articles pub-lished between 1995 and 1998 on the majormagazines edited by Artech Publishing (“GlassMachinery, Plants and Accessories”, “GlassTechnology International” and “Glass Style”). Thisservice is extremely interesting and stimulat-ing: with the two years’ publications now avail-able, there are more than 300 articles at presentwhich can be directly downloaded in PDF for-mat. Users will soon have access to all articlesdating back to 1995, for up to over 600 files. Thisservice also allows the user to make an “evalu-ation” of available titles and summaries withoutneeding to insert a password, whilst subscriptionto the Club is required for downloading completearticles with pictures. The service is especiallyimportant for having made interesting quality mate-rial immediately available on the Internet, avoid-ing lengthy procedures when requesting back issuesfrom the publishing house.

OTHER SERVICESGlassOnline’s Home Page is also charac-

terized by a blue strip along the left-hand sideof the screen, where all services offered arehighlighted in a column. In addition to theabove mentioned services (the “World YellowPages” and the “GlassOnline Club”), othersof equal importance can be accessed from theblue strip.

The first of these is the “Forum” service

www.glassonline.com/forum.html,

a sort of grand dis-cussion forum per-taining, naturally, tothe glass world, andallowing any kind ofproblem (technical,hobby-related, col-lector ’s), which isoperationally rele-vant to glass and itsapplications, to beposed on-l ine. Aresponse is guaran-teed from the many who frequentthe Forum.

There is highdemand for this service as can be seen by the num-ber of messages placed on-line. A total averageof fifty each week has already been topped.

“Forum” requests are supervised by the Glas-sOnline staff who put them on-line. In thepages dedicated to this service, it is also possibleto review all messages published since 1997when the service was first started.

From the same page (as with the blue strip onthe left-hand side of the Home Page) you canthen be directed towards another service, the“Trade Opportunities”:

www.glassonline.com/trade.html

This service is indispensable to whoeverwishes to promote their own company and itsproducts, or to whoever is in search of a busi-ness partner. Its page can be consulted by any-one and the classified advertisement is main-tained for at least three months. The text is sub-ject to a charge per word. Another servicewhich is highly demanded by site-visitors is thatof buying and selling used machines or equip-ment (to purchase a new machine, on the oth-er hand, the best method is to directly con-sult the producers listed in GlassOnline’s“World Yellow Pages”).

The “Second hand equipment” page:

www.glassonline.com/secondhand.HTML,

which can be reached from the Home Page’sblue strip, is divided into five links; two are formsto fill in that allow advertisements to be insert-ed into the sections “Equipment Offered” and“Equipment Wanted”; the other three permit youto see all previously published advertisements.

There is a charge per word for an “Equip-ment Offered” ad (just as for “Trade Oppor-tunities”). If, however, you are looking for aspecific piece of second- hand equipment, theplacement of your advertisement is free ofcharge. Both classified ad lists can be consulted

as many times asdesired. They offera frequently updat-ed panorama of thedifferent requests ofnumerous compa-nies or individualswho regularly usesuch pages to finda buyer of their usedequipment, or usedmachinery at suit-able prices.

A similar serviceis available for seek-ing or offering work(in the glass indus-try) which can bereached by con-necting to the page:

w w w. g l a s s o n l i n e . c o m / e m p l o y m e n t / -index.HTML

In this case, whoever is looking for newemployees is charged for the advertising, whilstthose in search of a job can promote them-selves at no cost (in this case, it is even possi-ble to put a Curriculum Vitae on-line).

The next link, “Exhibitions and Meetings”

www.glassonline.com/exhibitions.html,

is a list of Exhibitions and Meetings for theyear in place and the following year. For who-ever needs to know about the industry’smost important fairs and conferences,this page offers a simple navigationchoice by chronological or alphabeti-cal search.

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For all fairs and conferences, the user will findthe location, the date it was or will be heldand the complete address of the organizers.For those who operate in the world of glass, suchinformation is invaluable.

Let’s step back for a moment from the pure-ly technical-commercial aspect of the servicesavailable on GlassOnline and analyse the nextfive services of the site. Their great impor-tance is demonstrated by the high number of vis-itors who browse over them each week.

The first is the glass dictionary,

www.glassonline.com/dictionary/index.html

The dictionary is ordered alphabetically andcan be consulted free of charge. It currently con-tains more than 650 terms and is presently

undergoing development andexpansion. It represents the vasteston-line dictionary in the world

268 of glass, using explana-tions that are clear andeasily accessible, evenfor the layman. Wherepossible, meanings areaccompanied byillustrations.

Reference toArtech Publish-ing’s printedp u b l i c a t i o n sshould not beoverlooked.

The presenta-tion of ArtechP u b l i s h i n g ’smagazines is notlimited to a mere descrip-tion: the publications arepresented, issue by issue,starting from January1997, and in addition tothe cover of each issue,you can also view its con-tents in order tokeep up to datewith relevantsubjects. It isthrough thesepages that a

www.glassonline.com/ourglasspublications.html

direct subscription can be made via Internet. Thefront cover of the last issue of the magazine isdisplayed next to the information regardingsubscription procedures, publication frequencyand the cost per copy of the above. From this pageit is also possible to connect to the forms for on-line subscription, or to send an e-mail messageto Artech Publishing’s sales department, shouldyou wish to publish an ad in the magazine.

Underneath these two links a banner appears,which links back to the page with the old articlesof the magazine, which can also be downloaded- as previously mentioned above - by accessingthe area reserved for the GlassOnline Club.

Alongside such a service, a brief history ofglass deserves mentioning:

www.glassonline.com/history.html

clearly summarizes fundamental events from5000 B.C. to present today. Thesepages will very soon be enhancedby moving films and photos thatmake navigation more interest-ing and enjoyable.

The fourth service of this group,

www.glassonline.com/glassmuseums.html

gives information on how to reach the mostimportant museums that deal directly withglass or that possess artistic or archaeological

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collections made up of such materials.Finally, it is the visitors themselves who

contribute directly and effectively to the com-position of the short linguistic glossary of theword “glass”, accessible by clicking, as always,on the title “How to say glass” on the HomePage’s blue strip.

www.glassonline.com/howtosayglass.html

This service currently translates the term“glass” into 60 different languages and soonexpects to integrate special graphic characters(Chinese, Arabic, Hindi, etc.).

These five services are widely used by GlassOnline visitors as a means of reference aswell as simply for cultural interest.

SUBSCRIPTION AND CONTACTSThe last group of links on the Home Page’s

blue strip is dedicated to communicationsbetween GlassOnline and the user. Here thereare links in order to obtain the previously men-tioned services: a subscription to the “Glas-sOnline Club”, information on how to insert yourcompany into the “World Yellow Pages,

you wish to examine the development of the website and, above all, the number of userscontacting us every month.

GlassOnline’s high visibility inside the Inter-net obliges us to briefly speak about the site’scurrent access statistics. The numbers pub-lished in the statistics are provided directly bythe computer server of Artech Publishing’sInternet provider.

We have only mentioned the 440,000 hitsrecorded in the month of June. Anyone can, how-ever, take a look at the trend of increasing hitsby connecting to the relevant page each month:

www.glassonline.com/statistics.html

These figures also indicate a weekly amountof visits which totals well over 110,000 hits (fora total of more than 30,000 pages consulted inthe last week of June). Therefore, GlassOn-line assures extremely high visibility for thosewho operate in this sector: in fact, most hits areregistered during the working week (althoughon Saturdays and Sundays, the number of vis-itors remains respectable, never going below atotal of 40,000 hits during the weekend).

The high level of contacts around the clockdemonstrates how all worldwide markets areinterested in GlassOnline, with even more inter-est in areas that have more up-to-date telecom-munication networks. We know that the Internet’sdevelopment is more widespread in North Amer-ica, but although the domain names “.com” or“.net” originate from the US, they are obtainableeverywhere in the world (GlassOnline.com is anexample). It means that the types “.com” or“.net” (those connecting to GlassOnline accountfor almost 49 per cent of total contacts) do notcome only from the US but from all over the world.A careful analysis of the remaining percentage(always keeping in mind that the sources of 25per cent of the contacts cannot be preciselylocated) outlines a clear picture, with a netprevalence of strong European and Asian mar-kets, with hits that reach even 4 per cent each fordeveloped countries such as Germany, Italy,France, Great Britain, The Netherlands, Bel-gium, Mexico and Japan. On just slightly low-er levels, other equally respectable world mar-kets are always stated (see the appropriate table

270 www.glassonl ine .com/worldnewssub-scribe.htm,

and the link to the screen that provides infor-mation about inserting a company banner intothe site’s pages:

www.glassonline.com/banneradvertise.htm

GlassOnline already presents over 40 ban-ner ads. It is in fact important to take into con-sideration how essential such a service is for acompany’s visibility. This type of on-line adver-tising, provided within the service’s most high-ly frequented pages, attracts an abundance of con-tacts: a simple click on the banner connects youimmediately to the company’s web-site. Thisis a paid service which is directly managed by Glas-sOnline both in the design phase of the banner(if it is not directly provided by the company) andin its placement on-line.

Last among the list of links appearing onthe blue vertical band there are the servicesgiving information regarding Artech Publish-ing. This is a shortcut giving rapid access to theareas reserved to the Club and to the serviceregarding statistics, which is very interesting if

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24.99% .com (Commercialworldwide and USA)

22.84% (unresolved numerical addresses)

18.19% .net (Network)3.44% .it (Italy)2.72% .uk (United Kingdom)1.72% .de (Germany)1.65% .edu (USA Educational)1.40% .nl (Netherlands)1.39% .fr (France)1.33% .be (Belgium)1.21% .au (Australia)1.13% .ca (Canada)1.11% .mx (Mexico)1.10% .jp (Japan)0.80% .es (Spain)0.75% .ru (Russian Federation)0.69% .sg (Singapore)0.67% .br (Brazil)0.66% .cz (Czech Republic)0.56% .gr (Greece)0.50% .se (Sweden)0.49% .tr (Turkey)0.48% .pl (Poland)0.47% .pt (Portugal)0.46% .fi (Finland)0.45% .in (India)0.45% .my (Malaysia)0.43% .org (Non-Profit Making Org.)0.42% .ch (Switzerland)0.40% .nz (New Zealand)0.40% .il (Israel)0.39% .at (Austria)

0.39% .sa (Saudi Arabia)0.34% .dk (Denmark)0.34% .us (United States)0.30% .ar (Argentina)0.29% .gov (USA Government)0.26% .th (Thailand)0.25% .za (South Africa)0.19% .mil (USA Military)0.19% .ae (United Arab Emirates)0.18% .ro (Romania)0.18% .cn (China)0.17% .sk (Slovak Republic)0.16% .ie (Ireland)0.16% .hr (Croatia)0.15% .ee (Estonia)0.14% .no (Norway)0.14% .hu (Hungary)0.14% .ua (Ukraine)0.13% .tw (Taiwan)0.13% .co (Colombia)0.13% .id (Indonesia)0.12% .kr (South Korea)0.12% .cl (Chile)0.12% .lt (Lithuania)0.12% .pk (Pakistan)0.10% .pe (Peru)0.09% .lv (Latvia)0.08% .bg (Bulgaria)0.08% .yu (Yugoslavia)0.07% .si (Slovenia)0.07% .lb (Lebanon)0.07% .uy (Uruguay)0.06% .hk (Hong Kong)

0.06% .mk (Macedonia)0.05% .ve (Venezuela)0.05% .arpa (Old style Arpanet)0.05% .cy (Cyprus)0.05% .eg (Egypt)0.04% .ye (Yemen)0.04% .is (Iceland)0.04% .lu (Luxembourg)0.04% .tt (Trinidad and Tobago)0.03% .mu (Mauritius)0.03% .su (Former USSR)0.03% .ph (Philippines)0.02% .py (Paraguay)0.01% .om (Oman)0.01% .jo (Jordan)0.01% .cr (Costa Rica)0.01% .do (Dominican Republic)0.01% .ge (Georgia)0.01% .ec (Ecuador)0.01% .et (Ethiopia)0.01% .bo (Bolivia)0.01% .ag (Antigua and Barbuda)0.01% .li (Liechtenstein)0.01% .kz (Kazakhstan)0.01% .ba (Bosnia-Herzegovina)0.01% .by (Belarus)0.01% .kw (Kuwait)0.01% .qa (Qatar)0.01% .hn (Honduras)0.01% .bm (Bermuda)0.01% .int (International)0.01% .ma (Morocco)0,13% Others

ACCESS TO GLASSONLINE.COM BY COUNTRY/DOMAIN% hits DOMAIN % hits DOMAIN % hits DOMAIN

on page 271, which reflects the planet’s economicsituation almost exactly).

Analyses of the most visited pages inform usthat, apart from the Home Page that receives themost contacts, the most frequented pages arethose services that present the industry’s businesses:“World Yellow Pages”, and on-line news: “Week-ly World News” and “Financial Reports”, aswell as the illustrated dictionary. This proves tous, therefore, that interest in the site is not just pure-ly for business purposes.

The blue control panel closes with a link backto the page enabling direct contact with Glas-sOnline’s staff, where both questions and com-ments can be sent.

CONCLUSIONSIn the field of glass, especially in the fast and

dynamic world of the Internet, GlassOnlinehas come to represent an unavoidable step, asan instrument of research, as a means of com-munication and, above all, as a system allow-ing strong commercial feedback. The greatnumber of contacts every month, now nearinghalf a million, is important for the many oppor-

tunities the website gives its users. The enormousquantity of elements, information and entitieswhich could easily be lost in the vastness of theInternet are organized and made available on thissystem in the most simple way possible. The expe-rience provided by this website is not, howev-er, exclusively horizontal, as it would be inNew Economy “real time”. Because of its verytradition and history, GlassOnline permits avertical approach, allowing users to discover thepast of this technological field and its branch-ing out towards other fields, such as technical-scientific, artistic, commercial and financial,throughout the years.

GlassOnline is an indispensable tool for mil-lions of operators in the industry, but not onlythat. It is a reality which is continually grow-ing and evolving. This website is today thetrue glass “portal” with an enormous amount ofeasily accessible information thanks to its wellorganized structure. GlassOnline is surely thefuture of glass on the web at the beginning ofthe new millennium.

Entire content © 2000 by Artech Publishing S.r.l.