The Internet represents the future of all businesses, so nonprofits must learn how to thrive on the Internet through the use of collaboration and partnership. That was the message delivered at a national meeting of communication officers sponsored by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

The meeting comes on the heels of the 1998 Global Information Infrastructure Awards, which honored civic- and education-oriented Web sites.

Two Web sites in particular were highlighted at the seminar: OncoLink, the winner of the GII Health Award; and the Body, GII's Community Award winner. The two sites were recognized for their efforts at transforming how health-care information is delivered, and how nonprofits serve their communities.

OncoLink provides information about cancer to patients, their families and health-care professionals. It is edited by experts at the University of Pennsylvania Cancer Center. The Body is a health-information and "virtual community" site for people with AIDS/HIV and their physicians, friends and family.

Speakers at the event cited collaboration, partnering and alliances with other nonprofits and for-profit companies - which OncoLink and The Body both do - as essential to Web success.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is the nation's largest philanthropic group dedicated exclusively to health and health care issues. The GII Awards program is sponsored by ZD Events, a division of the Ziff-Davis Inc. publishing group.