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Or to put it more simply, what can we learn by looking at the Web pages produced by Heaven's Gate? What can we learn about the cult members as people? Are there secret messages to be found? Was there a method to their madness? If we are -- or the media is -- going to make broad assumptions about the group based on the fact that they were a part of the Net community or cyberculture, then we owe it to ourselves and our subject matter to attend to the ways in which they are typical or atypical in terms of the Net. We need to develop a frame of reference.

Access the front page of the Heaven's Gate site and view the source code (on the Netscape menu bar, choose View and the Document Source). If you are new to HTML, don't be surprised if much of the encoded information initially looks like nonsense.

^ Advertisement

Notice that the information below is embedded at the top in the <meta> tag. This is the Heaven's Gate advertisement that was posted to a wide variety of newsgroups:

Heaven's Gate

How and When the Door to the Physical Kingdom Level Above Human May Be Entered

Organized Religions Are Killers of Souls

UFOs and Space Aliens -- Sorting Good from Bad

Final Warning for Possible Survivors

-- www.heavensgate.com

^ Keywords

Notice too below, another <meta> tag with a list of keywords used for search engines. Strung together in this form, the keywords resemble chanting. If you scroll to the bottom of the source code, you'll see two more lists, the first in a <meta> tag, the other colored black so that it isn't visible against the background. On the home page, they run behind the scenes in the blank space at the bottom (below the footer and information on how to order Applewhite's book). The lists are excerpted below:

Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate Heaven's Gate ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo ufo space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien space alien extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial extraterrestrial misinformation misinformation misinformation misinformation misinformation misinformation misinformation misinformation misinformation misinformation misinformation misinformation freedom freedom freedom freedom freedom freedom freedom freedom freedom freedom freedom freedom second coming second coming second coming second coming second coming second coming second coming second coming second coming second coming angels angels angels angels angels angels angels angels angels angels end end times times end times end times end times end times end times end times end times end times end times.

Key Words: (for search engines) 144,000, Abductees, Agnostic, Alien, Allah, Alternative, Angels, Antichrist, Apocalypse, Armageddon, Ascension, Atheist, Awakening, Away Team, Beyond Human, Blasphemy, Boddhisattva, Book of Revelation, Buddha, Channeling, Children of God, Christ, Christ's Teachings, Consciousness, Contactees, Corruption, Creation, Death, Discarnate, Discarnates, Disciple, Disciples, Disinformation, Dying, Ecumenical, End of the Age, End of the World, Eternal Life, Eunuch, Evolution, Evolutionary, Extraterrestrial, Freedom, Fulfilling Prophecy, Genderless, Glorified Body, God, God's Children, God's Chosen, God's Heaven, God's Laws, God's Son, Guru, Harvest Time, He's Back, Heaven, Heaven's Gate, Heavenly Kingdom, Higher Consciousness, His Church, Human Metamorphosis, Human Spirit, Implant, Incarnation, Interfaith, Jesus, Jesus' Return, Jesus' Teaching, Kingdom of God, Kingdom of Heaven, Krishna Consciousness, Lamb of God, Last Days, Level Above Human, Life After Death, Luciferian, Luciferians, Meditation, Members of the Next Level, Messiah, Metamorphosis, Metaphysical, Millennium, Misinformation, Mothership, Mystic, Next Level, Non Perishable, Non Temporal, Older Member, Our Lords Return, Out of Body Experience, Overcomers, Overcoming, Past Lives, Prophecy, Prophecy Fulfillment, Rapture, Reactive Mind, Recycling the Planet, Reincarnation, Religion, Resurrection, Revelations, Saved, Second Coming, Soul, Space Alien, Spacecraft, Spirit, Spirit Filled, Spirit Guide, Spiritual, Spiritual Awakening, Star People, Super Natural, Telepathy, The Remnant, The Two, Theosophy, Ti and Do, Truth, Two Witnesses, UFO, Virginity, Walk-ins, Yahweh, Yeshua, Yoda, Yoga.