From the Friday June 21, 1996 edition of the Cape Breton Post:

Web site party on island

Celtic music brings group together

	Cyber romances and friendships which blossomed along the 
information highway will bring people from across North America to Cape 
Breton this summer.

	A web site created for the Rankin Family, by a Sydney company 
called Chatsubo Designs, brought together Internet users from different 
parts of the United States, Canada and Europe to revel in their common love 
of Celtic music.

	People who enter the web page are also able to link up with a 
chat room which allows users, no matter where they are 
located, to communicate with each other in real time.

	The chat room is for people to talk together about the Rankin 
Family, but it developed into much more than that, said Jamie Foulds, 
co-owner of Chatsubo Designs.

	We absolutely did not expect it to go this far, he said. 
A group of the users became regulars who are now good friends and they 
are getting together for a party in East Bay this summer.

	There's even a little bit of a romance going on there between 
a man from Victoria and a woman from Vermont who fell madly in love with 
each other in this chat room, said Foulds.

	He said the web site and the chat room are promotional tools 
which give the artists a chance to actually read fan feedback and 
communcate with them directly but they are also inviting places for people 
of all ages to just come and talk.

	Sydney resident Max MacDonald is an Internet user who has 
occasionally visited the Rankin chat room.

	What I find fascinating is the argument that technology keeps 
people apart but this is an example of it really bringing people 
together, he said.

	The whole thing is a really intriguing story of the 90s which 
happens to be centered out of Cape Breton, said MacDonald. People 
think this kind of technology is happening elsewhere but is very alive 
here too.

	Foulds said anyone interested in the Rankin web site can reach it 
at http://www.chatsubo.com/rankins Internet address.

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