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BREAKING SURF
Hours after trying to push out army chief of staff Gen. Pervaiz Musharraf, Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was himself, er, "putsched", in a bloodless coup by forces loyal to the general. With the Constitution suspended, the Legislature dissolved, and the country now under emergency rule, it's not clear whether the army plans a rapid return to democracy or not - military dictatorships have ruled the country for 25 of its 52 years. Yahoo has all the news and worldwide reaction. Read or watch the General's take-over speech on the Pakistan News Service (PNS), whose Islamabad office has been shut down by the army (Web service continues from San Francisco), and brush up on things Pakistani at the Pakistan Virtual Library.Yahoo: http://fullcoverage.yahoo.com/Full_Coverage/World/Pakistan/
PNS: http://www.paknews.org/
Library: http://www.clas.ufl.edu/users/gthursby/pak/
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has announced the 1999 winners of what are unquestionably the most prestigious prizes in the world, and perhaps the richest. You can read why the Nobel Foundation chose the winners it did at the Nobel site, which has biographies of the prize winners along with nicely illustrated essays that clearly explain the noteworthy discoveries and activities. Along with the priceless fame, each prize is worth 7.9 million Swedish Kronor (just a little homework for you!).
http://www.nobel.se/announcement-99/index.html
Ikonos: Spy Satellite-Type Photos for Sale
In late September, Space Imaging (SI) succeeded on its second attempt to launch its Ikonos photo satellite. The spacecraft is the highest resolution imaging satellite in private hands, and lets anybody with ready cash get the kind of images spy agencies have had for years. The satellite provides black-and-whites with one-meter resolution and color images with four-meter resolution. SI released the first Ikonos image this week, a stunningly sharp photo of central Washington, D.C. You can see cars clearly, and if you squint hard you may catch shadows of individual people on the Mall. The images are so good, the US military retains shutter veto control, allowing them to censor images which impact security - for example battlefield photos. Amusing technological competency aside: the company can launch a space satellite but try to find a reseller on their Web site and you get "Microsoft OLE DB Provider for ODBC Drivers error '80004005'". Any bets on how long before they're hacked?http://www.spaceimaging.com/
With a year to go, the US Presidential campaign is in full swing - and this one will be subject to a voracious Internet feeding frenzy. Politics.com is likely to be a major player in that little bloodfest, not least because of its topical domain name. It's a hot site, well designed with excellent content. We found particularly useful the capsule reviews of how the candidates stand on each issue, the excellent coverage of the media, and the extensive information on who's raising how much money with databases of contributors (public information by law). Phillip Morris has donated over $2 million to political parties, nearly twice as much as the next highest donor, Bell Atlantic. A large directory of political links and numerous poll results stand ready if you need them. You can also subscribe to a daily e-mail brief.
http://www.politics.com/
Microsoft Launches Small Business Center
In a word, it's a portal. While it may be popular to beat up on Microsoft for its software and security lapses, you have to give it credit for developing or acquiring useful Web sites like Expedia and Hotmail. This new bCentral site targets the needs of small businesses with such useful features as simplified purchasing of online ads in the AdStore, an easy means to buy corporate credit reports, tax info and forms, shipping price comparisons, links to business/e-commerce-oriented Web hosting sites, and the inevitable links for purchasing office supplies, books, and travel. The nifty SiteInspector feature rates your Web site on browser compatibility, valid links, valid HTML, load time, popularity, and spelling - note the spellchecker choked on "Netsurfer". :) Overall, the site is a nice, compact - but certainly not free - collection of resources for any small business, especially one oriented online.http://www.bcentral.com/
A construction crew has stumbled into the remains of Hitler's bunker in Berlin. It's not like no one knew where the bunker was, but the Red Army sealed it for good and made it inaccessible to prevent neo-Nazi types from turning it into some sort of a shrine. Tabloid fascination with this story prompted us to search the Web, and we turned up a macabre account of Hitler's last days at the bunker from the History Place. The page includes the text of two historical documents written by Hitler during his last days in the bunker: his will and his final political testament. The latter horror seems appropriate for the upcoming Halloween season. The bunker itself will either be filled with concrete and destroyed or given the archeological treatment. Possibly both.
Bunker: http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/europe/9910/15/BC-GERMANY-HITLER-BUNKER.reut/index.html
Last Days: http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/death.htm
Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Fails to Pass
In a vote that looks uncomfortably partisan over efforts to control nuclear proliferation, the US Senate has voted against approving the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. The result of literally decades of work stretching back to the Eisenhower administration, the treaty has already been signed by 154 nations but full implementation requires the endorsement of all 44 nuclear-capable countries, including the US. President Clinton has assured allies who have already signed, and the world, that his administration will carry on as if the treaty were in effect. The full text of the treaty and further background information about it come thanks to the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBTO PrepCom). Yahoo has more news.CTBTO PrepCom: http://www.ctbto.org/
Yahoo: http://fullcoverage.yahoo.com/fc/World/Nuclear_Test_Ban_Treaty/
Two More Nasty Security Bugs in Explorer Browser
Holes in Explorer enable crackers to read your hard drive and, worse yet, write and delete files on your machine. The first bug, a JavaScript exploit found by Georgi Guninski, lets crackers read files on your disk and do window spoofing. The second bug is a serious Java problem which allows everything from reading the hard drive to modifying and deleting files and spying on your keystrokes. Microsoft is working on a fix.JavaScript Bug: http://www.nat.bg/~joro/execc.html
Java Bug: http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200-852686.html
One Last Link about the Brooklyn Museum of Art
We all know Roger Ebert for his movie reviews, and maybe for his column in Yahoo! Internet Life. But whenever he opens his word processor, he has something worthwhile to say. Here's his take on the recent bruhaha over Chris Ofili's "The Holy Virgin Mary" at the Brooklyn Museum of Art, an item we covered last issue. We wish we'd had this to link to then.http://www.suntimes.com/output/eb-feature/ebert11.html
SURFING SITES
While the Net is a natural medium for archiving records, presenting them naturally is often more problematic. The Archives of Australia show how to do it really well. The Treasures section contains images of actual documents, for example a furious telegram sent in 1917 by the Prime Minister after someone threw an egg at his head in Queensland. This seemingly minor incident bubbled out of a major conscription crisis, and visitors can quickly access details of the background, the participants, and the outcome through icons - an excellent way of presenting history as it was lived. Intriguing images of objects such as hats, machines, and buildings scattered around the archive further enhance the site. You can further explore the items, which leads to more detailed info, which leads to.... The whole site cleverly invites exploration and the visitor will always come away with new knowledge or insights.http://www.archivenet.gov.au/
Overly Sensitive Need Not Visit
Enter the mind of an intelligent and bitter young man. Yes, Desensitized is an ego site, but the author, Chris Hocker, does not take himself entirely seriously. Witness the top section of his front page, with the heading, "stuff only i care about". One of the best parts of the site is Gas Face, where he rants about everything that's wrong in his world. Note that this is not a site for all eyes. It should also be noted that it should only be visited by those with an active sense of humor. As he replied to someone who attacked him about one of his rants, "And yeah, it was in poor taste. Several of the articles on this website are in poor taste. OK. A lot of articles on this website are in poor taste." But most of them are also well worth it.http://www.desensitized.org/
Precocious Mute Paraplegic Genius 13-Year-Old
Hero Joy Nightingale edits From the Window, a Web-zine of "journalism, poetry, travelogues, and experiential writing" from people in all walks of life and all parts of the globe. Hero also happens to be 13 years old and suffers severe disabilities. She describes the magazine as "celebrating a joy in language and run by a pretentious and pompous crip child..." but after reading the text it is quite obvious that this 13-year-old is determined to change the lot of those suffering from disabilities. We little doubt that she will succeed.http://atschool.eduweb.co.uk/hojoy/index.html
There's a niche for everyone at Regrets Only, whether your biggest regret was passing up the love of your life or the haggis you ate for supper. A page filled with people's regrets - what a unique concept. You visit, read the samples, and then submit your own chief regret in life. Choose your words carefully, because they may live on outside the electronic domain; author Barry Cadish will compile the best entries in a book. Ironically, the page prides itself in not selling a product or a service,and for existing solely as a "place where people come to think and to reflect."
http://www.regretsonly.com/
We're really sorry. We should have printed this last week, but the thing is, our writer's girlfriend was trying to finish her term paper and she spilled her Coke over the keyboard, which caused a minor electrical fire and singed his eyebrows, making him spend four days in hospital having them surgically refitted. OK, now we're ready to submit this to the Work Excuses section of this gently entertaining site. Some of the excuses used in school are the funniest - especially those which teachers use themselves. We'd tell you more about them but we're suffering temporary amnesia. Sorry.
http://members.tripod.com/Madtbone/
If you wake up on Monday mornings and groan at the thought of another day at work, have a look at the occupations described at WorstJob.com and rejoice, maybe. If not, maybe you can rejoice at the cartoons or the mildly amusing "what is he doing in this photo" section. At the very least, vote for the job you think is the worst (yours?) of those listed.
http://www.worstjob.com/
Sure there are champagne, wine, and single malt scotch connoisseurs, but an epicure of the Mai Tai? The Search for the Ultimate Mai Tai provides a great service for the good of mankind: it exists solely to help you find the best Mai Tais around the world. The site contains a history of the famous drink, some book reviews, and a handful of recipes, but the highlight of the site is its review of Mai Tais around the world, arranged by geographic region, tasting score, and date. Reviews rate each locale on the taste of its offering as well as the atmosphere, and the reviews each run several paragraphs long to give the reader a real feel for the opinion.
http://www.kevdo.com/maitai/
Bored with dot.com investments? Looking for something less conventional to invest in? Like bricks and mortar? Victory City seeks investors. Orville Simpson II appears to have spent the best part of his life designing an urban utopia. He just needs to get the cash to build it. The idea is simple. Residents will live in giant, self-contained tower blocks, eat all food in gigantic canteens, and commute from city to city on monorails. Sounds good? Hey, this almost describes some lives now. While designing every last precise architectural detail, Orville overlooked one small factor: culture and human interaction. But let's not get picky - you need to see this site and if you want to part with those dollars, someone will take them from you.
http://www.victorycities.com/index.html
Borrowing from football, soccer, and video games, Futureball hopes to be a professional sport of the next millennium. Two teams of eight players, each a driver inside a transparent mechanized sphere, clash to rock music and lasers in an hour-long high-tech battle to score goals in a stadium full of screaming spectators. Or so the founders of Futureball, Inc. envision it. The Web site lays groundwork to generate enthusiasm and, no doubt, attract sponsors. You'll want to have QuickTime 4 installed to view the enticing but disappointingly brief simulation. It all sounds like a garish mixture of hope and idealism, hype and crass commercialism. A movie synopsis has already been posted on the site.
http://www.futureball.com/
Paste a few links and a slow search engine on a page these days and you can call yourself a portal, it seems. The buzzword of the year on the Internet, portals range from the highly useful and organized to those overladen with ads and underladen with information. Cue the inevitable entry of... the portal portal. Traffick has collected links, reviews, and opinions of every major portal site and has gauged the features, speed, and effectiveness of their search engines. The Traffick site appears businesslike and offers plenty of information. If you don't know which portal site to favor, Traffick can offer some good analysis and a powerful feature comparison chart. Or just use Traffick as your portal to the portals. We await the Guide to Portals of Portals.
http://www.traffick.com/
To paraphrase novelist Saul Bellow, "I want, I want, I want." Hence, iWant, where buyers can post what they want to buy - vehicles, vacations, collectibles, whatever - and sellers can find them. To call the site a community, as iWant does, reaches a bit (how many would call eBay or Amazon a community?), and the potential for scam looms, though not any more here than over any other auction site. On the other hand, the potential market for this kind of exchange seems huge, and you can get pretty specific in your stated desires. We've got to ask ourselves, though, how many legit surgeons would respond to a post from Iowa asking for "minor plastic surgery... near downtown Seattle"? Hmm. Caveat postor.
http://www.iwant.com/
Roughly 30 million North American homes have access to cable modem service, which is roughly 20 times faster than 56-kbps modem dial-up service. Check the Cable Modem Information Network to find out if you qualify. The articles at the site help sort through other important issues in subscribing to a broadband ISP through your local cabler: technical info; business and consumer aspects, such as the difference between national ISPs Road Runner and @Home; and how to hook more than one computer to a cable modem. In case you want to buy your cable modem instead of rent, you can find out which is fastest for uploading and surfing.
http://www.cable-modem.net/
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Items our staff likes and you might too. Click on the image or title to order at a hefty discount from our affiliates Amazon.com and Beyond.com, and send a few pennies our way as well.
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Dune: House Atreides
Sin and Syntax: How to Craft Wickedly Effective Prose
Run Devil Run
Age of Empires II - Age of KingsONLINE CULTURE
Steve Jobs is one of the towering business figures of our times. He's made at least three fortunes: one during his original stint at Apple; one with the sale of NeXT (to Apple); and, lastly, with Pixar which made him a billionaire again when it went public last year. He's likely on the way to making a fourth fortune as the CEO of Apple even if he did sell all his stock when he took charge. What's even more remarkable is the vindication of his vision of computing - constantly. The original Macintosh, its latest best-selling incarnation, the iMac, and even the NeXT computer to some extent all embody the concept of computer as consumer appliance despite the years between them. You plug it in and it works. Clearly, the man is worth listening to. Time magazine has an extensive interview with Steve Jobs on their Pathfinder site.http://www.pathfinder.com/time/magazine/articles/0,3266,32207,00.html
The User Friendly Bold Backwards Step
Do you still yearn for the good old days when the only people on the Internet were geeks and a BBS was an exciting, leading-edge technology? Then pop to User Friendly, home of the excellent comic strip of the same name. It has started up a Geek BBS, complete with Telnet access, green-on-black screen and no images at all. It is proving immensely popular both with the original denizens of the Internet and with newcomers who like to feel haughty and exclusive. Warning: if you work for Microsoft, just pretend you work for Red Hat.Comic: http://www.userfriendly.org/
BBS: http://bbs.ufies.org/
ONLINE TRAVEL
Following Marco Polo's Alleged Footsteps
Through November 5th, explorers traveling across China will use the Internet to lead students (and us) in Marco Polo's footsteps along the Silk Road. But did Marco Polo actually cover all the territory he said he did? How come he never mentioned in his accounts ubiquitous Chinese customs such as foot binding and tea drinking? AsiaQuest's interactive, interdisciplinary journey uses a wealth of technology and intellectual talent to re-examine the facts and to introduce a host of other topics as well. But guess what? The whole package ain't a freebie. You gotta pay. The site offers some worthwhile free stuff, but among the info it doesn't offer free is that an expedition photographer was nearly crippled by a camel.AsiaQuest: http://quest.classroom.com/asia1999/
Camel: http://www.cnn.com/NATURE/9910/15/asia.quest/index.html
America in a Hand-Painted VW Bus
Few mechanical devices transcend the sum of their moving parts and assume archetypal status. The 1963 VW panel van embodies that potential. When you paint it with vivid graphic art, drop a rebuilt 1600 engine in its bead box butt, and endeavor to rove the United States for a year, having adventures everywhere you go - well, you start to evoke that Huck-Finn-on-the-Mississippi feeling. Sculptor and painter JP and his wife might be driving through your town. Read about their adventures on the open road, and maybe you can catch them when they cruise by, promoting freedom, creativity, and general merriment.http://www.freeloop.com/
A photo site that isn't trying to sell you anything can be a nice change of pace. Rob's Travel Photos, an unassuming collection of personal photos, has but one persistent banner ad. Rob's colorful panoramas of Africa are something of a testimonial for throwaway cameras; many of his 35-mm wildlife shots are straight from a tourist's heart. Clearly, Rob has upped the ante for travelers. It isn't enough to be a photographer and veteran adventurer. Nowadays, with so much competition, you have to be a webhead, too, to make an impression. As Rob reminds us, "My photos may not always come up to professional standards, but under the conditions (limited time, heat, humidity and erratic equipment) there are some pretty good photos here...." Agreed. And some good links.
http://oasis.fortunecity.com/bondi/346/
Native's Guide to Yunnan, China
Yunnan Province, sparsely populated by a mere 40 million people, is located in southwest China. Myanmar lies to the west, Laos and Vietnam to the southeast. The native in question is a 70-year-old who claims not to know very much about the Internet, but he knows a great deal about his home province. The site is a loving and detailed tribute to the area, and is also somewhat of a companion to the book, "Mr. China's Son", written by the webmaster, He Li-yi.http://www.homestead.com/yndali/homepage2.html
FLOTSAM & JETSAM
Twenty-two words. That's all it takes to graduate from the SimShatner school of acting. Shatner, known for his staccato speech, is perfect fodder for the WWW with its time-warp delay. Simply click on any of the buttons and compose a sentence spoken just like the real man himself.http://www.hecklers.com/simshatner/simshatner.html
At a site called the Writer's Daily Quote page, most would expect writers' pithy descriptions of the challenges and rewards of stringing words together. That's what you get, with some surprises: "When power corrupts, poetry cleanses" came not from a poet but from a politician, JFK.
http://members.tripod.com/michael_tombs/WritersQuotes.html
Get Yer Free Webmaster Stuff Here
Webmaster Resources contains a list of free services found on the Internet, from graphics and sounds to news content and CGI scripts. This site is effectively organized into intuitive categories to save the webmaster time and effort.http://www.worldzone.net/ss/antelope/
Now We'll Never Have to Go to Class
StudentU is yet another site for college kids, only this one offers class lecture notes for more than 60 colleges nationwide. Be aware that these are notetakers' interpretations of lectures, not professors' notes, so don't sleep in all the time.http://www.studentu.com/
SOFTWARE
We've all seen the so-called short cuts available on the Web, the all-in-one search engines and the like. Most leave much to be desired, but the Best Internet Site Resource Center is a genuine exception to the rule. Here is a complete database of 12,000 handpicked sites, all available to download in one easy-to-use file. You'll find a handy list of "best of" sites in over 170 categories including hardware, software, product reviews, e-mail, Unix, MP3, and newspapers.http://pacumming.home.mindspring.com/bestsites/index.html