The Internet is different things to different people. E-mail is by far the most popular use of the Internet, and set to remain so for the foreseeable future. According to the research firm, IDC, the number of person-to-person e-mail messages will grow at a compound rate of 138% to reach 1.2 billion in 2005. Despite the impressive growth in the use of e-mail, there are other important uses of the Internet in traditional areas such as e-commerce and education. According to the research firm Edventures, the e-education market will increase from $4.5 billion last year to $11 billion by 2005. Online education represents the marriage of the Internet to age-old distance (sometimes called “correspondence”) education. Thus, online education offers the benefits of distance education, and more. Perhaps the greatest advantages of distance education include increased access of education, and reduced costs of providing it. While traditional distance education relies on regular (or “snail”) mail to deliver course materials and examinations, online education provides for much faster and cheaper e-mail- and Web-based instruction, communication, and evaluation. In the same vein, the fact that Web-based courses can be accessed by more people in far-flung places (in contrast to radio and TV-programs) makes them even more attractive.