THE Internet is proving itself more and more useful. Dave Fox of Telecom Eireann's information technology section made use of it when trying to think up a name for the new joint venture software company Telecom has set up with its partners Telia and KPN.

Proposed names were put into search engines to see if they would register a "hit" on the Internet. However, the Internet kept coming up with hundreds of hits for even the most obscure names. At first it was amusing. Soon it became irritating.

Eventually "Accuris" was keyed in, came up blank, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Accuris comes from accurate and is for information systems. But of course.