text: what kind of setup would be necessary for this idea? i have an idea for my family (not just the family in my household either). what i would do is set up a server with an account for everyone in one location connected to the internet. from there what would the other people do to log-on with the user account that was set up for them? they might log on 20 miles or so away too, so its not just in my house, but anywhere in the world. some people have dialup, some have dsl. some have xp pro and home. i used to have this same setup on my server.  i used a free cgi script called profile manager basic (version 3.0).  when a family member wanted to sign in, i simply gave them a username and password that was the same for everyone related.  they would go to the sign in page, where the .htaccess file would grant them permissions to enter and add their contact information as well as see all other family members contact info.  very good and extremely simple to implement.  as for the server may i suggest a few things?  first is the abyss server a free one from aprelium technolgies. http://www.aprelium.com/abyssws  next is to visit http://www.no-ip.com and set up a free port forwarding account.  combined you can see the results below on my site.  vary easy to maintain connection, and extremely reliable.  you do realize that you need to have dsl or a cable connection for this all to work, right?  good luck, and i hope this helps