The pet-sock hype and IPO hysteria of the Internet are fading like a strange dream. Wide awake now, businesses in every industry still are forging ahead with online strategies, albeit with a sharper focus on one of the Web's original purposes: information. And that is ground RER has been mining for a long time.

For most of its existence, since the 1940s, RER magazine reached you, the reader, once a month, 12 times a year. That seemed just right for keeping the industry informed, with a mixture of company profiles, product reviews, management ideas, safety tips and expert columnists.

About six years ago, in response to the rapid changes affecting the equipment rental world, we launched the industry's first and only electronic newsletter. For all the readers who couldn't wait a month to find out the latest news, RER Reports updated its information-hungry subscribers with exclusive reporting and analysis every Monday.

The newsletter started modestly, gathering momentum each week. At first, some skeptics wondered how we would fill four pages every week and who would pay for the privilege. Our customer service reps could barely keep up with the answer, and before long, we wondered how we would fit all the news in four pages.

Still, many people felt the newsletter would catch its death cold when the roll-up fever subsided. Well, this year, RER Reports became the industry's first and only e-mail newsletter, available free to anyone who signs up. About 5,000 people — and counting — already are receiving the new version, and we'll send them the 300th issue of RER Reports sometime next month. Three hundred. RER Reports is here to stay — you said so.

Now, with this March 2001 issue, RER is taking its information relationship with the industry into a new era — a 24/7 era of access, interaction and efficiency. Let me be the first to formally invite you to an open house at an old address: www.rermag.com. There, you will find the entire contents of this magazine and much, much more.

Unfortunately, we didn't get our 30-second www.rermag.com ad created in time for the Super Bowl this year, but here's what you can expect in the coming months:

We will provide you with a reason to visit the online RER on a weekly, even daily basis, starting with important news updates that let you know what's going on in the rental world today.

We'll bring you surveys, polls and exclusive research that you can be a part of with a few clicks of your mouse. For those who want to go deeper into a subject, we'll offer expanded versions of some RER articles. We'll also serve as your gateway to the entire industrial, construction and DIY rental communities, with links to manufacturers, e-commerce and message boards.

We will not, however, be bringing you animated socks.