the addresses of other games show in my address book but when i select one and hit enter there is the traditional clunk for the menu but nothing happens.
is there something i'm missing?

Some players use proxy or firewall, so they are unreachable.

Yeah, like me (LAN)

Same here!

sounds wierd to me...
i have zonealarm and both q2 and q3 allowed to act as server and i have joined in q3 games online before

perhaps a quick test without firewall....

Hey! You CAN join games if YOU are a behind a firewall but if YOU are behind a firewall then OTHERS can't join YOUR games!

Hooray!

...er so why can't i JOIN games then?

Maybe the ones making them are behind a firewall

doh!

if you're on a LAN, you may want to read your router manual, look for some sort of "expose network IP to internet" thing.. mine has what it calls a "demilitarized zone", allows me to be exposed to the internet by entering the network IP I'm on [192.168.1.103, most network ips start with 192, by the way]

... of course, this nullifies any protection it may have provided