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The BCA has also had an informal web presence for several years, hosted by Bob Church. At the National Councilors meeting in Pigeon Forge, it was noted that Bob has done the Club a great service by maintaining this site, but it was the consensus that it was time for an officially-sanctioned BCA web site to be developed. A committee was established, headed by Ed Scully, charged with getting this project moving and funds were earmarked to establish a home for the BCA on the web -- a 'domain' of our own. Ed mobilized a small group of bulldoggers including Bob Church, Phil Handrick, L.J. Decuir, Cathy Quinn and me. A round of discussions followed and the project was born. In the ensuing months images were scanned and the HTML (Hypertext Markup Language -- the language of the web) for the site was written, debugged and tuned up. Money was appropriated at the first Councilors meeting of 1998 and the site was deemed ready for general release on January 15, 1998.

So, where is it? What is its web address? Naturally, we would have wished to have the site's address to be www.bca.org; in the standard convention of web addresses, the ".org" identifies it as a non-commercial site. The problem is that the domain "bca.org" was already registered to the Black Coaches Association. "bca.net" and "bca.com" were both similarly taken and "www.thebulldogclubofamerica.org" is too long. What could we do? It's simple really: we are THE Bulldog Club of America, so we registered the name "thebca.org". So, to get to the BCA's site, load your web browser and point it to: http://www.thebca.org or more simply http://thebca.org. In fact, most modern broswers will get you to the site if you simply specify it as "thebca.org" (without the quote marks, of course).

What will you find there? The site is organized as a brief main page with links to other information on subordinate pages. We have pages that describe the Club's organization, including National and Divisional officers and member clubs and their secretaries. A section is devoted to the Standard, including the text and images from the 1995 Illustrated Guide to the Standard as well as digitized video clips from the Bulldog Gait Video. The full text of the BCA Constitution and By-Laws is available as is the Code of Ethics. There is a page giving the schedule for the 1998 National Specialty in Oklahoma City and one with miscellaneous information on breeder referral, rescue, BCA membership, etc.

One of the most exciting components of the new site is the result of a collaboration between Ed Scully and Phil Handrick. As many of you know, Ed has maintained a number of massive computer databases containing all manner of information on Bulldogs and Bulldoggers. Phil has developed some web-based tools that allow anyone access to the databases via the Web -- there is now on-line information available on literally thousands of dogs! So far, routines exist to access the BCA Hall of Fame database as well as a database of BCA/AKC Champions. The routines are easy to use and remarkably fast. Although I have not done an exhaustive survey, I know of no other breed club site that has anything like this feature and this is just the beginning!

The neat thing about the World Wide Web is that information on it is dynamic in that it is easy to update and can be virtually limitless in size. We are already working on expanding the Bulldogger's web presence to include the current rankings and other information. The Hall of Fame portraits will be digitized and made available. A page listing upcoming club shows and specialties is also in the works.

Of course, no site is ever done, nor is it ever error-free. I am sure that there are a number of errors on the current pages. For example, the list of member clubs and their secretaries was taken from last year's membership directory so I know that some of them must be out of date. If you find any errors or have any comments or constructive criticism on the site, please send them to me. If you find yourself spending lots of time cruising Ed's databases, by all means, pass on good words to Ed and Phil. Feedback is great, both positive and negative, so please keep the suggestions coming!

Finally, my standard closing line: there is an unbelievable amount of information as well as a growing number of Bulldoggers on the Internet. If you have not yet dipped your toes into this electronic ocean, get someone to help you get started and start surfing!

When not playing with his two pet Bulldogs and his family in Tucson, Craig Foltz is the Director of the Multiple Mirror Telescope Observatory, a joint facility of the Smithsonian Institution and the University of Arizona. He can be reached via email at his cool new email address: craig@thebca.org.