The appearance of the "new" TroutPomeroy.com website is a triumph of several parties, all of whom deserve recognition on this occasion.

First and foremost, hats off to Dave Lieben at First City Computer Services in Ketchikan, Alaska, for crafting the current site. Without his commitment to this project, TroutPomeroy.com would still be a billboard, not the fine flop house it's become. Those close to matters most Troutworthy know Dave and I happen to be kinfolk, which means he has a heap o' Trout in him too, and makes all of this entirely rewarding, from the perspective of Arthur Miller.

[From the webmaster: Yes, it's true, Trout and I are kinfolk, which means I have this picture he probably doesn't even remember taking of himself at my sister Beth's wedding in 1995. And being the webmaster, I can put it here where you can look at it and there's nothing he can do about it! HA!]

High on the list of individuals responsible for the existence of a TroutPomeroy website is my long-time computer guru, John Hill, founder of www.theinternetedition.com. In the early-1980s, John and I formed the training and public relations arm of a chain of computer retail stores in Michigan back in the pre-Macintosh days when many people bought computers but few people used them. They were too damned hard. John went on to a long career with Apple Computer and I practiced blarney in journalism and commercial writing. Then, in 1997, at his urging, each of us now with teenage kids and greying hair, John and I secured www.TroutPomeroy.com. Later that year, I began distributing daily columns via email and began contemplating his direction of this website.

Lending additional early support were Calvin Clark and the creative monsters at Frostbyte Communications, who helped initiate initial distribution systems for what began as "Daily Dave" columns, later to be adapted to the TroutPomeroy motif.

No recitation of credit due would be complete without a bold statement of appreciation to longtime client and friend, Michael Popowich, whose insistence on the importance of our family acquiring a home computer set the stage for all this craziness in the first place.

Thanks as well to the friendly and very helpful technical support personnel at my longtime employer, Utechniques, Inc. in Rochester, Michigan, and to everyone at that fine company who subsized my learning curve in this bold and not always comprehensible new medium.

A warm embrace to my wife, Bonny, for giving me enough space to breathe a little halitosis on this thing, and to our sons, Garrett and Buddy, for sharing the computer with the old man, like it or not.

Finally, this TroutPomeroy.com website would not be appearing in a new format now were it not for the encouragement I've received from the dozens of amazingly wonderful new friends I've made via the Internet. Their belief in what I am doing has given wings to my sense of why this website belongs on the Internet, at all. Writing is probably the most insecure of all professions. But all the self doubt in the world can be vanquished in a single "Great job!" response from a cyber friend. Thanks to all of you for giving me the confidence required to strut my ego to this extent.

As Michael and John and Dave and everyone else who's helped me along the information highway kept telling me all along, this IS one hell of a lot of fun ... and more.

Hangin' on the Internet is an informative, captivating, open-ended and highly worthwhile way to spend a part of your day. I hope the same can be said for www.TroutPomeroy.com.

Thanks again to EVERYONE who made www.TroutPomeroy.com possible!

David Trout Pomeroy
June 1999
Waterford, Michigan