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Artists celebrate Black History Month in cyberspace

Today marks the halfway point through Black History Month. In honor of the spirit of this celebration, NBC and a Web site called Loci have teamed up to create Club Noir, a World Wide Web chat line. Each weekday since Feb. 1 a different African American musical artist has joined Club Noir at 9 p.m. EST to answer questions typed in to them since the beginning of that day.

Alan Cohen, NBC's executive vice president of marketing, was right on when he said, "Never before has the online community seen an event of this magnitude."

Already such well knowns as Quincy Jones (Feb. 1), Chaka Khan (Feb. 2), Seal (Feb. 7) and The Sounds of Blackness (Feb. 12) have answered a myriad of online questions addressed to them. Yesterday evening Barry White did the same; tonight, Babyface and L.A. Reid will join in the fun.

Loci, a site "developed by college students for college students," was the brainchild of Barnes & Noble Bookstores, which recognized the lack of Web sites for college-age students. Staffed almost exclusively by Boston University students, Loci is a logical choice for such a great Information Superhighway venture.

Questions for an artist to appear on a particular weeknight can be typed into the Club Noir database during that day. The procedure for joining Club Noir is as follows:

1. Join Loci's homepage (http://www.loci.com).

2. Click on the statement which begins "<artist's name> will be online ..."

3. A list of instructions on how to submit questions and hear the artist's responses will be provided.

Guest artists include r&b vocalists, jazz musicians, rappers and various bands. The black artists scheduled to appear during the rest of Black History Month are as follows:

Thurs., Feb. 15: Babyface and L.A. Reid

Fri., Feb. 16: TLC

Mon., Feb. 19: Organized Noize

Tues., Feb. 20: Sonie Marie and Tony Rich

Wed., Feb. 21: Toni Braxton

Thurs., Feb. 22: George Duke

Fri., Feb. 23: L.L. Cool J

Mon., Feb. 26: Andrae Crouch

Tues., Feb. 27: Tevin Campbell

Wed., Feb. 28: Earl Klugh