theglobe.com Selects Network Appliance's NetCache to Deliver High Speed Access to 9 Million Users

Business Wire, April 7, 1999

SANTA CLARA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 7, 1999--Network Appliance, Inc. (Nasdaq:NTAP), the leading provider of dedicated cache appliances for building the Internet's infrastructure, today announced that theglobe.com (Nasdaq:TGLO), one of the world's leading online communities, has implemented Network Appliance(TM) NetCache -- enabling theglobe.com to offer superior response time to its end users and serve significantly more traffic without adding new infrastructure.

According to theglobe.com, each NetCache(TM)appliance is estimated to do the work of five standard Web servers, resulting in very large capital and floor space savings.

"NetCache has enabled us to handle significantly more traffic by increasing our capacity and allowing us to decrease response time for our customers," said Dean Daniels, chief operating officer at theglobe.com. "We selected the NetCache appliance because its high performance architecture can scale smoothly with our rapidly growing capacity requirements."

"We are pleased to be working with theglobe.com to meet their Web acceleration needs," said Tom Mendoza, vice president, sales and marketing at Network Appliance. "NetCache helps leading content providers like theglobe.com offer superior speed to their end users therefore providing an important competitive advantage."

Deployment of NetCaches as Web accelerators allows content providers to offer very high levels of service by dramatically improving response times, and by providing advanced features such as guaranteed freshness of content across distributed sites. NetCache also brings the advantages of Web acceleration to enterprises needing to employ distributed Web servers for fast, worldwide access to Intranet information and applications.

About theglobe.com

theglobe.com is one of the world's leading online communities with over 9.3 million users in the United States and abroad. An intuitive site designed to foster a user's creative and interactive experience, theglobe.com is setting the standard for online communities by providing members with a wealth of services and content.

Member content is promoted in every area of the site, integrated around the abundance of data and news available at theglobe.com. By satisfying its users' personal and practical needs, theglobe.com seeks to become their online home. The company's primary revenue source is the sale of advertising, with additional revenues generated through e-commerce arrangements and the sale of membership subscriptions for enhanced services. Visit theglobe.com at http://www.theglobe.com.

About Network Appliance

Network Appliance, a veteran in network file serving and caching, has been providing data access solutions for over six years. Major corporations and ISPs, including Lycos, Yahoo!, Citicorp Securities, Siemens, Lockheed, Cisco, Motorola and Texas Instruments have deployed NetApp(R) solutions.

NetApp's Internet caching solutions (NetCache) and file servers ("filers") deliver fast, simple, reliable and cost-effective access to network-stored data and enable simultaneous shared file services for UNIX(R), Windows(R) and the World Wide Web.

The company pioneered the concept of the "network appliance," an extension of the industry trend toward dedicated, specialized products that perform a single function. Network Appliance filers and NetCache appliances are based on the company's innovative data access software known as Data ONTAP(TM) and standards-compliant hardware. More information is available at http://www.netapp.com.

Note to Editors: NetApp is a registered trademark and Network Appliance, Data ONTAP and NetCache are trademarks of Network Appliance, Inc. All other brands or products are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders and should be treated as such.