Throughout the ages, people have been searching for the elixir of slenderness. They have tried high-fibre food, the hip-and-thigh diet, the F-Plan, the Cambridge diet and the drastic cabbage soup formula.

Now slimmer Ali Smith says she has found the answer in cyberspace. Ali has lost more than seven stones and come down from a size 24 to a 12.

She did it with the help of Weight Watchers but it is the Internet, she says, which is keeping her slim.

Whenever she feels tempted to gorge on crisps and chocolate, she just warms up her computer, dials up the Internet and chats to fellow dieters who talk her out of temptation.

This is in direct contrast to those prophets of doom who warned that as more people tuned into the worldwide web, it would create a generation of computer couch potatoes; unfit creatures who never exercise anything but their mouse finger and even do their weekly shopping from the comfort of their computer chair.

Those same harbingers of gloom also forecast that roaming the web for hours on end would mean individuals cutting themselves off from companions, from family, from the real world.

Ali Smith has proved that the Internet can put like-minded souls in touch with each other for companionship, advice and support no matter what the time of day or distance.

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