Sci-Fi Site of the Week: The Science Fiction Resource Guide

Sci-Fi Site of the Week

The Science Fiction Resource Guide

Bringing order to chaos on the Web

The Science Fiction Resource Guide
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/2801/sf-resource-guide.html
Maintained by Chaz Boston Baden
sfrg@geocities.com
Supports text-only

Review by Brooks Peck

he Science Fiction Resource Guide is one of the oldest indexes of science fiction and fantasy Internet resources around. Although the site stagnated somewhat over the past nine months, Chaz Baden -- fresh from his stint managing the 54th World Science Fiction Convention Web pages -- is back at the helm, and new links and updates are now being added at a rapid pace.

When the World Wide Web first became popular, many lists-of-links sites arose because there were no centralized directories or indexes for the Web, but many people wanted to share the delights they had found with others (as well as organize their own bookmarks in some coherent fashion). For a time it appeared that sophisticated search engines like Webcrawler would put an end to the need for these specialized indexes, but these days the Web has grown too huge, so searching for, say, "Anime" turns up thousands of choices. This means that once again the niche guide has become a needed item.

The SFRG is divided into 21 broad categories, from Art & Artists to Zines, each category being an annotated list of links to other Internet sites and archives. The entries range from professional Web presences such as Paramount Pictures to fan labors of love like the British Starfleet Confederacy. There are links to many Star Trek and other television resources, including episode guides for dozens of shows. There are also links to sources of review and criticism, author and fan home pages, gaming sites, art sites, writer's resources -- the whole spectrum of the science fiction world just a mouse click away.

The coverage of SFRG isn't entirely even, tending to focus on traditionally fannish concerns. So, for example, while the list of science fiction clubs is quite extensive, there is only one listing under the comics heading (The Dark Horse Comics home page). The book publishers list is comprehensive, but the gaming section is light, with only one computer game listing. This lack of obvious links can be frustrating. However, the fact that many unobvious links are also listed means users will run across many sites not cataloged elsewhere.

The design of the SFRG is clean, with quick-loading, stripped-down graphics reminiscent of Yahoo! -- they may not look pretty, but they also don't get in the way of the information. Each section also has links to the Next and Previous areas, so it's quite easy to get around. Oddly, the site uses red to indicate an unfollowed link, which is the exact opposite of the Netscape default of red for followed links. This can be somewhat confusing, but it's not a major problem.

Anyone looking for a specialty science fiction resource will find the SFRG a very useful starting point in their search. It's also a good place for those who run or maintain a science fiction page to get their site listed.

It looks like Chaz has done it again, the scoundrel. -- Brooks

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