By Miguel Sanz.
Montreal (Canada), 28 January, 1996 (EFE).
"Sí,Spain", the information program through computer of the Embassy of Spain in Canada, has surpassed this week the half-a-million mark of consultations by users from all over the world since its inception last March.
After scarcely ten months in operation, "Sí,Spain", a service that provides all kinds of informations on Spain, has already succeeded in occupying an important place within INTERNET, the world communication network through computer.
A proof of its success is the fact that the "McKinley Group", which takes up a million and a half electronic addresses in its research service "Magallanes", has this week awarded it its highest distinction, i.e., "Four Stars".
Thanks to their program by computer, the Embassy of Spain in Ottawa, who was practically the first diplomatic office in the world to join the Internet network, have significantly increased their capacity to serve the public.
"No matter how much we would increase our personnel, the Embassy would not be in a position to attend personally thousands of people a day, as we do through our program", said today the Ambassador of Spain in Canada and the Director of the Program, José Luis Pardos.
"Sí,Spain" presently serves a daily average of over 3.000 consultations coming from numerous countries, according to the constant statistic control carried out by "DocuWeb Information Services ".
"I believe that its success stems from its attractive and managable design that provides a vast array of informations of all kinds on Spain, which are continually up-dated", said Ricardo Mor, Counsellor at the Embassy and responsible for maintaining the program information.
Most of the connections to "Sí,Spain" come from the United States (45.1%), Spain (4.1%), Canada (3.5%) and the United Kingdom (3.3%).
Through the E-mail address of the Embassy of Spain, http://www.DocuWeb.ca/SiSpain/, the computer user may connect with other Spanish information systems as well as others which deal with Spain and IberoAmerica.
"SíSpain" also offers the possibility of reading, on the day they are published, Spanish newspapers such as "ABC", "La Vanguardia", "El Correo Gallego", "El Diario Vasco" or "Sport", through the corresponding connections.
Besides those sections, which are very popular among the program users, there is a wide tendency to consult the sections relating to geography, history, politics and tips on travelling through Spain.
Another highly popular section is that of the Spanish courses, under the direction of the University of Calgary (Alberta, in the Western part of Canada) and "Universidad Politécnica" of Valencia (in the eastern part of Spain). These are interactive courses which makes them all the more advantageous.
"Sí,Spain" offers the possibility of teaching Spanish with the educational revolution that interaction implies. This allows the student to become a direct participant within a distant commmunication with the teacher, through voice and images", the Education Attaché to the Embassy, José Félix Barrio, said today.
As of the beginning of this month, the program provides the user with a research service of world E-mail addresses in Spanish, under the name of "Olé".
"Sí,Spain" devotes a special section on the infamous "Turbot War" (euro-canadian fisheries conflict) and on the differences that arose between Canada and Spain, following the confrontation in 1995.
The idea of the Embassy of Spain in Ottawa is that, in view of its success, the program "Sí,Spain", which began as a mere experiment, be institutionalized by the Spanish Administration.
"My wish is that it be converted into the back bone of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to provide information to the world, within the scheme of diplomacy modernization, through three sections that could be "European Union-NATO, Europe-Mediterranean and IberoAmerica", said Ambassador Pardos.