FedWorld is a new NTIS gateway to more than 100 federally managed BBS services. It's free except for the phone call to Virginia. You can access DOE, NASA, NSF, EPA, FDA, and the Consumer Information Center, but not JURIS, Legis, or SEC data. (703) 321-8020 (8-N-1, ANSI or VT100). [Laurie Flynn, SJM, 3/21.] Or call Thomas Walker at (703) 487-4650 for "Connecting to FedWorld, PR-936KRQ." FedWorld includes a bulletin information center, private email, public conferences, files, archives, and online help. [MeckJournal, 2/93.] The PC Pursuit service would make FedWorld a local call from almost anywhere in the US, but it has its own monthly charge.

Reports differ on whether the Library of Congress is on FedWorld, but the LC will make 30 databases -- 28M records -- available free over the Internet beginning in April. [PACS News, 3/19.]

Dialog, Nexis, Orbit, CompuServe, and Medlars also offer access to government information, including the Federal Register, Congressional Record Abstracts, Government Printing Office (GPO) Monthly Catalog, Government Reports, copyrights, patents, etc. Roger K. Summit, founder and chairman of Dialog Information Services, says it would be inappropriate for the GPO to duplicate and compete with these services. He wants Congress to bid for services it needs rather than sell its own services, and to give direct subsidies to companies or users who need the data. [SJM, 3/22, p. 9D.]

"Final Report on the Conf. for Exploration of a National Engineering Information Service, June 14-19, 1992, Palm Coast FL" is a 477-page report available for $50 from Media Services Printing, B10 MVR Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853. [[email protected], PACS-L, 3/18.]

CompuServe's extended service has a new White House Forum (GO WHITEHOUSE) and a Political Debate Forum (GO POLITICS). The former has message sections for each cabinet post and libraries of announcements from the Administration; the latter is organized by political parties and issues. Try your hand at Uncle Sam's Budget Balancer, a PC program you can download from SAM.ZIP in Library 6. [Bill Park ([email protected]).]

The addresses and phone numbers for all 536 members of the 103rd Congress may be FTP'd from file congress-103 in /pub/QRD/qrd/info/GOVT on nifty.andrew.cmu.edu. This comes from the US Congress Yellow Book, January 1993. [Elizabeth Fry ([email protected]), nis, 3/19.]