When the Internet was just beginning to become trendy (all of three years ago), everyone was talking about the liberating potential for anonymity in cyberspace. You can be anyone. You can explore alternative identities, different genders and ages, varying personas. Martha Baer's first novel, As Francesca, takes a look at what happens when a successful young woman accidently compromises the barriers between her life as a climbing-the-corporate-ladder professional and her online persona as an S&M submissive. In her essay, Baer, who is Executive Editor of HotWired, examines one of the other major strains of internet hype: the Net as revolutionary medium. Send us comments