Excite@Home and GO Network Wednesday both announced calendar services though the two companies' respective Web sites in a play to the appeal of both personalization and practicality.

Excite@Home Wednesday rolled out the Excite Planner, a free Internet-based organizer that can store and synchronize important calendar events, contacts, tasks and memos.

"Excite Planner lets users keep track of key events on a Web-based Calendar, further supporting our strategy of 'All Band, All Device, All the Time'," said Joe Kraus, Excite@Home's senior vice-president of content.

The Excite Planner is integrated with Excite Mail and can remind users about appointments via e-mail or pager. The planner can be accessed and updated from any Internet connection, and can be synchronized with several handheld device organizers through a free download.

GO Network will soon offer a calendar service on its network through a partnership between Infoseek Corp. and calendar solution provider eCal Corp. announced Wednesday.

The "live" calendar can be updated and shared between parties, as well as the usual task and contact management options.

"Partnering with eCal let's us offer consumers valuable solutions for creating and managing personal event schedules, integrated with world-class content and services," said Harry Motro, president and CEO of Infoseek.

The GO Network calendar solution is expected to become available by the quarter.