MICROSOFT INTERNET EXPLORER 4.0
If you don't know it's out yet, you must be living under a rock somewhere,
getting your e-mail with a piece of string and a couple of cans.
Microsoft's new version of the browser can be found here. But wait! There's
trouble in River City....
<http://www.microsoft.com/ie/>
Didn't you just see this one coming? Sun in its lawsuit basically says that
Explorer does not fully and honestly implement Java and that Microsoft has
deliberately sought "to break the cross-platform compatibility of the Java
programming environment". Sun further suggests that "Netscape Navigator is
the best choice for end users who want to be sure they can always run
Java." Heh! This one is going to be fun. <http://www.sun.com/announcement/>
MICROSOFT LAUNCHES SAN FRANCISCO SIDEWALK SITE
The launch of a site for our nearby San Francisco seems as good a time as
any to cover the whole Microsoft Sidewalk effort. The SF site is fairly
typical of the lot with your basic movies, restaurants, events, arts,
sports, and places to go sections. The content behind the listings ranges
from short blurbs to longer articles, for example restaurant reviews -
stuff you'd find in a newspaper's events section. None of it is
conceptually difficult, but then it doesn't need to be. The design is fine,
but why do Microsoft Web sites insist on irritating ridiculously small
fonts which are virtually unreadable at larger screen resolutions? Also
surprising is a lack of easy access to the other Sidewalk sites. All in
all, a fairly slick regional resource. Compare it with Yahoo's San
Francisco site.
Sidewalk: <http://sanfrancisco.sidewalk.com/>
Yahoo: <http://sfbay.yahoo.com/>
Cassini will be the largest planetary spacecraft ever deployed if all goes
well October 13 when it takes off for Saturn. When it gets there in 2004,
it will spend four years mapping the system, conducting numerous scientific
experiments including the launch of a probe to the surface of Titan. The
Huygens Probe will check out Titan's atmospheric composition, determine
whether the surface is solid or liquid, and hopefully send back lots of
cool photos. The nuclear paranoia crowd has threatened to block or disrupt
the launch because Cassini uses a plutonium power system. One can only hope
they don't leave home that day since after all, they could be run over by a
car - a far greater risk than the launch. In any event, watch the loonies
on TV and check out this site for the scientific and engineering details.
<http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/cassini/>
FORBES 400 LIST OF RICHEST AMERICANS
Every year, Forbes magazine compiles a list of the richest people in
America. This year, it takes $425 million to make the cut. If you need
proof that the rich get richer, consider that this year there are over 170
billionaires on that list, up from 13 in 1982. On the other hand, more than
10% of last year's finalists did not qualify this year, and only 106 of
1982's original 400 have stuck around. Staying this wealthy is not as easy
as it looks. You can categorize the fat cats by criteria such as marital
status, type of wealth (inherited, self-made), industry, and net worth. A
sidebar with articles offers profiles of listees. Nobody from online
publishing has made it yet. Hmmm....
Articles: <http://www.forbes.com/forbes/97/1013/6008147a.htm>
List: <http://www.forbes.com/tool/toolbox/rich97/index.asp>
INTERNET ADVERTISING REVENUES UP, COST OF ADS DOWN
The Internet Advertising Bureau's latest study on the size of the online ad
market shows online advertising revenue in the first half of 1997 to be up
322% from the first half of 1996. Another report, from Focalink, notes that
cost per thousand exposures (CPM) is eroding as more and more publishers
enter the online arena. Average CPM for sites has been hovering around $39
in recent months. You can glean much interesting CPM info by type of site
from this report.
IAB: <http://www.iab.net/news/newssource4.html>
Focalink: <http://www.focalink.com/home/fc/fc26ai.html>
RSA DONATES DOMAIN NAME SECURITY SOFTWARE TO THE NET
RSA is giving to the Internet Software Consortium (ISC) software that
enables authentication of DNS names. Currently, hackers are able to spoof
domain name information and redirect services, like Web page requests, to
fake domains. RSA's donation of DNSsafe will make this much more difficult.
Using this software, domain name information can be digitally signed and
authenticated. The ISC is a non-profit body which maintains BIND (the
Berkeley Internet Name Daemon), the most popular domain name software used
on the Net. DNSsafe will become part of an upcoming BIND release.
RSA: <http://www.rsa.com/pressbox/html/971006.html>
ISC: <http://www.isc.org/>
SANS SECURITY DIGEST NEWSLETTER HACKED
The SANS Security Digest is a nifty newsletter which periodically sends out
summaries of known security holes and other software security alerts. While
lacking timeliness (it's only published eight times a year), it is a widely
respected summary of current security issues with contributions by some of
the best known names in the security biz. Security sites tend to attract
hackers like manure attracts flies, and the SANS mailing list is only as
secure as the ISP which hosts it, so it's not too surprising that the list
was somehow hacked and a bogus issue sent to the subscribers. CNet has a
story about the hack and SANS has a sample issue online. Subscriptions are
$80 per year.
CNet: <http://www.news.com/News/Item/0,4,14831,00.html>
SANS: <http://www.sans.org/>
GIVE US YOUR TIRED, YOUR POOR, YOUR UNDEAD MASSES
Here's the deal - there are way more Halloween horrors and sick stuff out there on the WWW than we can possibly perambulate. We're now working like busy little vampire beavers (there's a scary thought) to reach again the zenith of zombiedom, the greatest of the ghoulsome, and the apex of ewwwww with our annual Halloween issue, so if you know of a site that sends shivers down your spine or leads you to lose your lunch, let us know now at pressrm@netsurf.com or forever hold your pieces.
Usenet, as we know it, has succumbed to a classical malady known as the
Tragedy of the Commons - the pursuit of individual interests using a "free"
resource in the absence of external controls results in collective
disaster. Usenet is overrun by spam, out-of-control binary postings, and
neverending cancel wars. Usenet II (UII) is an attempt to deal with some of
those problems by carving out a part of Usenet and making it subject to
consensus controls. The notion is based on the idea of "soundness". UII
sites only connect to other "sound" sites, a term which is not explicitly
defined but subject to a kind of negative voting definition. If enough UII
sysadmins vote you unsound, your site becomes not sound and will be dropped
from the network. Anti-authoritarians will not like these rules at all, but
then that's the beauty of the Net. If you have a better idea, go forth and
implement it. These two sites offer more.
<http://www.usenet2.org/>
<http://usenet2.vrx.net/>
CROWDS BRINGS ANONYMITY TO NETSURFING
Looks like the engineers at AT&T are concerned not only with making faster
phone switches. An intrepid group of AT&T engineers has created some
surprisingly simple software that lets you disguise your deplorable
netsurfing habits in a crowd of like-minded colleagues. The software,
called Crowds, anonymously bounces Web requests among the participants so
that a Web server you visit only knows that your request came from the
crowd, and not from which particular member of the crowd. You gain
anonymity by - yes - getting lost in the crowd. The sofware is written
entirely in Perl and runs on various flavors of Unix and presumably under
the Windows version of Perl also. Great idea. Wired wrote it up, too.
Crowds: <http://www.research.att.com/projects/crowds/>
Wired: <http://www.wired.com/news/news/technology/story/7331.html>
THESIS ON THE INTERNET, LITERALLY AND FIGURATIVELY
As those who've witnessed its evolution have seen, the Internet is an
everchanging construct that at times defies explanation and expectation.
Jeff Hogan, a recent graduate of the Manchester Business School in the UK,
attempted, in his MBA thesis, to offer insight into the manner in which the
Web, and the Net as a whole, affect the course of specific industries. As a
case study, Jeff chose the UK newspaper industry. He analyzed how the
Internet's diverse audience and the rapid pace of technology have forced
those businesses to adapt. He also attempted to perceive if and how the Net
can really give a competitive advantage to a business. The entire thesis is
available for download on a chapter-by-chapter basis at this Web site. It
makes an interesting read, if you're into that sort of thing.
<http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/jeffrey_hogan/thesis.htm>
PEER-REVIEWED TAKES ON THE NET
First Monday will remind you of the early days of the Web: minimal
graphics, text, and more text. At first, you might ask what's missing
before realizing that what's not here is all the visual and commercial
poofery that slows things down. This barebones, peer-reviewed scholarly
journal has a wealth of articles, most of which focus on economic and
social issues in computing and the Web. Recent titles indicate the
journal's scope: "Formalizing and Securing Relationships on Public
Networks"; "Primary Sources, Research and the Internet: The Digital
Scriptorium at Duke"; "Business Information and the Internet in the
Developing World". Current issues and archives also contain interviews and
book reviews. Newcomers may find the subject index the easiest way to find
topics of personal interest. We like the "Recommend First Monday to Others"
fill-out form that lets you forward the title of an article you like, with
comments, by e-mail. It makes the formality of this thoughtful site a
little more interactive and friendly. <http://www.firstmonday.dk/>
First cousin to cameos and some oriental carving arts, scrimshaw is a
traditional North American craft. Practised most notably by whalers, it
involves etching or carving marine or elephant ivories, mammoth fossils, or
antler. Today, conservation concerns have all but eliminated this
traditional medium, turning even discarded ivory piano keys into a precious
resource for scrimshaw artists. Artist Mark Thogerson describes the variety
of media and the character of their surfaces, colors, and textures.
Scrimshaw is a craft that works necessarily in the small scale, but takes
considerable time; a traditional basket plaque, for instance, consumes
15-20 hours. Mark also clarifies regulations surrounding the trade and use
of ivories; accordingly, he refuses work where the object has incomplete
provenance or documentation. <http://members.aol.com/scrimshndr/index.html>
BARD EDLUND, REPEAT OFFENDER...
At NSD, we're usually happy to see sites we've favorably reviewed prosper
in the online community. However, it's relatively rare that we find a
repeat offender, who consistently comes out with more and superior Web
content. Putting the big spots on Bard Edlund's most recent new site is a
pleasure. The new site has an autobiographical aspect that shows off some
of the works Bard has created over the years, including some spectacular
3-D images from a virtual city. Overall, this is the same kind of great
looking site that got Edlund into our zine in the first place ("Buddy, Can
You Spare a Graphic Arts Scholarship?", NSD 1.38). He got the scholarship.
<http://www.edlundart.com/>
...AND THESE ARE THE GUYS WHO LOCKED HIM UP
You may not believe this, but we decided to cover the Maryland Institute
College of Art (MICA) independently and before realizing that these guys
are the ones who gave Bard the scholarship. MICA Online's stunning
presentation comes with a caveat: it's an art college, which means the
graphics are big. With that warning, delve into their galleries or peek
into the studios via the personal Web sites of the students and faculty.
The Continuing Studies section even offers online courses. For the full
MICA experience, be sure to resize your browser both horizontally and
vertically or you'll miss out on some of the images and navigational aids.
<http://www.mica.edu/>
HAVE TELEPHOTO LENS, WILL TRAVEL
Nature photographer Art Wolfe has put up an unquestionably commercial site,
but what he offers are beautiful images in evidence of a connection to the
subjects that goes well beyond sterile stock photos. The pictures range
from what must be called portraits of the worlds great mountain peaks to
surprisingly intimate studies of rhinoceroses and explorations of human
faces. To fully appreciate the site, you should have RealAudio and
Shockwave in pocket, but they are by no means necessary. A prolific artist
and publisher - and an astute entrepreneur - Art also sells books, games,
and mugs through the site. <http://www.mountainzone.com/artwolfe/>
BOLD STUDIES IN LIGHT, COLOR, AND CULTURE
Luigi Fumagalli's paintings vary in style and tone, but you can identify
them as strong studies in light, line, and color. In fact, these elements
are so important to the artist that he relocated from Italy to Hawaii to
take advantage of the clarity of its light and colors. Fumagalli also mixes
cultural styles, painting Oriental subjects in a sparse Romantic style that
still echoes their Eastern origins. His horse studies, on the other hand,
suggest the economy of an Oriental style, but they're powerful and lush,
capturing physical strength in color. The site is modest - a single page is
all - and there's only a handful of paintings, but we liked what we saw.
<http://www.argo.net/~fumagalli/>
HAVE A CHEESESTEAK AND A SCULPTURE
The city of Philadelphia, birthplace of that exotic delicacy the Philly
cheesesteak (oddly, but thankfully, not made with Philadelphia cream
cheese), also happens to be a great place to take in public sculptures,
memorials, and fountains. Over 250 of these pieces are now being exhibited
on the Web, too. Besides simply flashing pictures of the various religious
and military monuments, the site has information on the creators, and where
possible, the history behind the sculptures.
<http://www.libertynet.org/~artguide/>
Tonight's featured creature is "Interface Culture: How New Technology
Transforms the Way We Create and Communicate". Go nuts.
<http://www.netsurf.com/nsd/books/book.03.32.html>
GO2 SOMEWHERE, BUT NOT ENTIRELY CLEAR WHERE
It's hard to define exactly what Go2net is. It falls somewhere between
content provider and content aggregator, with a lot of technology for glue.
Take MetaCrawler, for instance. It's a parallel engine that searches
AltaVista, Excite, Infoseek, Lycos, Webcrawler, and Yahoo simultaneously.
They've also got their own version of push technology, Go2vision, which
puts news headlines and sports scores on your desktop, and PlaySite, a Java
gaming room. Perhaps the most unique section - and the reason this article
is in the Books and E-Zines section - is Go2business, which offers stock
picks and daily commentary on the market. <http://www.go2net.com/>
You can use the "Words Words Words dot Com" Web site to create a free Web
page on which to place your prose. If you'd rather hide your literary
light, you're welcome to critique the brave souls who like the spotlight.
There are also links to help writers and wannabes build their vocabulary.
<http://www.wordswordswords.com/>
FAMOUS BEAN COUNTERS TELL IT LIKE IT IS
Mathematicians are mysterious because their passion is logical and their
logic passionate to the point of philosophy. To wit, Simeon Poisson: "Life
is good for only two things, discovering mathematics and teaching
mathematics." So much for food and sex.... The Mathematical Quotations
Server offers more mathematical wisdom in several ways. The Random
Quotation Generator serves up random quotes from the collection - math
meets the sound byte. That method is fun (for us, anyway) but if you tire
of random generation, you can download the entire collection in a single
HTML file or browse the alphabetical pages, where you can find this musing
by Descartes: "If you would be a real seeker after truth, you must at least
once in your life doubt, as far as possible, all things."
<http://math.furman.edu/~mwoodard/mquot.html>
If you saw Comet Hale-Bopp, you're probably aware that, from time to time,
amateur astronomers make an important discovery or two. The wonderful
passion behind such solitary stargazing powers the Galactic Core site.
Timothy J. Finucane has created a fine resource for his fellow hobbyists as
well as for those interested in space exploration. Observer's Guide points
out planets and other heavenly highlights from month to month. The Updates
link to press releases at NASA and news sites. The Planets has a nice slide
show of Mercury, with shows of other planets apparently on the way. Hot
Spots will take you to Astronomy Picture of the Day, Ask the Space
Scientist, the Virtual Sun, and other cool sites. There are also
astronomical classified ads and a Java-based discussion forum here. The
forum crashed our Internet Explorer 4.0 session while we waited for it to
load, but hey - the universe exploded once too, didn't it?
<http://www.thewatch.com/galaxy/>
KOKO AND PENNY'S 25TH YEAR OF INTERSPECIES COMMUNICATION
The Gorilla Foundation's Web site offers info about the foundation itself
(established in 1976, it seeks to protect and preserve gorillas, as well as
help them to propagate) and of course showcases Project Koko, a primary
focus of the foundation. Designed to teach a modified form of American Sign
Language to Koko and other gorillas, the project recently celebrated Koko's
25th year of communicating with and swearing at humans through the use of
sign language. <http://www.gorilla.org/>
MARIMBA ANNOUNCES CASTANET 2.0
Marimba is a major player in the push wars with their Java-based tuner and
player software. They've just announced version 2.0 of their Castanet
suite, which enables the distribution of multimedia content and executable
software. The latter is of particular interest to various companies seeking
to manage large distributed networks of computers. This version includes
mostly security and system administration upgrades. A press release with
details is available here. <http://www.marimba.com/2.0/>
JAVASOFT RELEASES JAVABEANS DEVELOPMENT KIT 1.0
Sun's JavaSoft has released a new version of the JavaBeans Development Kit
diagnostics, a better tutorial, and so on.
<http://www.javasoft.com/beans/bdk_download.html>
Over 850,000 missing child reports are filed in the US every year. It's
impossible for frantic parents - no matter how frantic - to search the
whole continent, but the Lost Child site can help. It features individual
cases with photos and asks other Web sites to display banners with info and
photos of missing kids. Other resources at the page include lists of
relevant agencies, a form for anonymous reports of missing kid sightings,
and a search facility for known child molesters. Lost Children is
heart-rending and the stories do not all have happy endings, but this
wonderful application of the Internet gets a million far-flung pairs of
eyes looking. <http://nmnet.net/lostchild/>
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