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| Not So Historic Hotels Registry |
| Filled with Action, Romance, and Nuclear Mutants |
| Salty Dog Slang |
| Buy Me a Lotus |
| Is There a Doctor in the House? |
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| More Than Setters and Terriers |
| Mozilla Web Browser Release Milestone 11 |
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BREAKING SURF
Another Extrasolar Planet Reportedly Optically Observed
Last week, we reported that astronomers detected the shadow of a planet orbiting a star about 153 light-years away. Now, another group of astronomers report they have detected the light of a planet orbiting the star Tau Bootes, about 50 light-years away. They cleverly used the planet's orbit, derived from wobbles in the motion of Tau Bootes, to examine the light spectrum from the star and separate the portion of the light which came from the star from the portion which came from the planet. The group has not yet formally published the results, but the BBC reports that the planet has a hot atmosphere which contains magnesium, silicon, and oxygen. Hot science, in more ways than one.http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_531000/531486.stm
China Launches, Lands Test Spacecraft
China just passed an important milestone on the way to becoming a spacefaring power. They launched a test version of what will eventually be a manned spacecraft capable of putting Chinese astronauts into orbit. The craft, wonderfully named "Vessel of the Gods", took off, orbited the Earth for 21 hours and came down safely in Inner Mongolia. Yahoo has some additional details about the craft, the Chinese space program, and links to related stories.http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/19991121/ts/space_china_6.html
Turkey for Thanksgiving, and the Week Thereafter
Americans consume the ungainly yet surprisingly tasty bird in prodigious quantities this time of year, and it behooves consumers to understand whereof they eat. In the spirit of such enlightened enquiry, we bring you this site, easily one of the most informative and entertaining compilations of turkey lore on the Web. You'll find cooking techniques, both the delicious and patently unsafe, information on nutrition, what to do with leftovers, information on side dishes - and that's just the consumption content. There's also a ton of non-alimentary info: humor, trivia, a history of Thanksgiving, info on turkey farms, and odd turkey facts. Did you know some turkey toms have breasts so large that they can't mate with turkey hens, which need to be artificially inseminated to breed more large-breasted turkeys? A fun site dedicated to a national obsession.http://www.urbanext.uiuc.edu/turkey/
The civil liberties organization has worried so much about the Echelon spy network that it set up a Web site dedicated to watching the watchers: "This site is designed to encourage public discussion of this potential threat to civil liberties, and to urge the governments of the world to protect our rights." The site contains an extensive FAQ that clearly explains Echelon and why it's a cause for concern. The site also conveniently gathers together a variety of official and unofficial documents related to Echelon, most notably the European Parliament papers on the subject. The links section lists all the foreign intelligence agencies that are believed to collaborate on Echelon, and adds resources from China, Russia, and other nations involved in comparable spying. Finally, a call to action asks you to send a form letter to your congresscritter in support of a high-profile inquiry into Echelon.
http://www.aclu.org/echelonwatch/index.html
Quake 3 Arena on the Verge of Shipping, Maybe
Unconfirmed reports circulating on the Net claim that the most widely anticipated game of recent times, Quake 3 Arena, has gone gold (i.e. the master CD-ROM has been created). There's no official word, but the game's Web site does have a fresh demo version available for PC, Mac, and Linux. Don't bother with the 50 MB downloads unless you have a DSL line or better, unless of course you want to tie up a phone line for the better part of a day. Oh yeah, for the uninitiated (are there any?): Quake 3 Arena is the next-generation, first-person, online shooter from the Doom/Quake folks. Fragalicious!http://www.quake3arena.com/
Amazon.com has teamed up with Sotheby's famed high-end auction house. The Sotheby name supposedly assures buyers of quality in this selection of jewelry, watches, furniture decorations and collectibles. Amazon says that in order to auction goods on its Sotheby's site, you have to be an established auction house, gallery, or other seller who can guarantee the authenticity and quality of your merchandise. In other words, you're not going to find some 12-year-old passing off Mom's earrings as Faberge's lesser work. At press time, the featured auction items included the psychedelic Shagmobile VW Bug from the Austin Powers movies, signed editions of "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone", and Barry Halper's baseball collection. The minimum bid on all Sotheby's auctions is $100.
http://sothebys.amazon.com/
Photographer Horst P. Horst Dead
Horst P. Horst was known not only for the quality of his photographic work but also for the extraordinary longevity of his career. He began as a fashion photographer for French Vogue in the 1930s and worked right up to his death last week. Many of his dramatic black-and-white portraits, nudes, and nature photos are still selling well in galleries around the world. One of the best ways to appreciate the totality of his career is to read his book, "Horst: Sixty Years of Photography". You can view some samples of his stunning photos at the Photos URL below, which has Korean text (we think).Book: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0847813894/netsurferdigest
Photos: http://hosting.interpia98.net/~jeidy/photographer/horst.htm
SURFING SITES
Philip Morris: Smoking Is Bad for You
Newsflash: smoking is bad for you. In fact, smoking can kill you. Shocked? Amazed? No, of course not - it's hardly a revelation. Most smokers know fully the damage tobacco causes but feel powerless to shake themselves free of their addiction. Philip Morris (PM), who have been telling us for the last 20 years that smoking their cigarettes is a Good Thing, have now admitted that perhaps it is not so Good after all. If you smoke and it kills you, PM's Web site, full of links and advice on how to give up smoking, lets them say, with their corporate hands on their corporate hearts, that it's not their fault and your kin cannot sue them, for they warned you about all that on the Web. PM's information campaign comes a bit late for most smokers, especially the ones who are dead.http://www.philipmorris.com/tobacco_bus/tobacco_issues/
Hacking children's arms off with machetes because they belong to a rival ethnicity is an excellent example of an activity international humanitarian law is meant to stop. Forcing prepubescent children to take up arms, and to murder playmates who try to escape such servitude is another illustrative example. But some people just don't follow the rules. Read the 1949 Geneva Conventions protocols, which devised limits on the atrocity of war. Then read personal accounts from soldiers, refugees, relief workers and journalists involved in the 20-odd wars around the globe. Then imagine what the so-called bloodiest century might have been like without the Geneva agreements. The International Committee of the Red Cross monitors what's going on in places you don't think much about.
http://www.onwar.org/
The Lowdown on the Lockdown Economy
Snapshot of the land of the free at the end of the 1900s: the US government spent $7 billion a year over the last decade building new prisons; more people work full-time in the prison industry than in any Fortune 500 company except GM; the prison population is rising 7% annually; two-thirds of all people entering prison are sentenced for non-violent offenses. The non-profit Corporate Watch organization's Prison Industry site posts essays examining how specific corporate interests are driving criminal justice policy. Sixties activist Angela Davis, now a professor at UC Santa Cruz, contributes one essay.http://www.corpwatch.org/feature/prisons/
The only thing missing from Jeff at the House is Graham Nash singing "Our House" in the shower. But you'll find just about everything else here. Jeff is a self-confessed single journalist/wannabe comedy writer who has kindly offered to chronicle his life for us via short, easy to swallow, two-minute QuickTime video segments. See Jeff talk the talk with big-name show biz stars and lots more. There's a new clip every day and once they go, they're gone, so if you don't want to fall behind, you'll have to check in every day. There's no place like home.
http://www.jath.com/
If you're going to have someone at your beck and call, it might as well be an expert, eh? About 4,500 experts call Expert Central home, real-life people who'll gladly answer your real-life questions. Simply pick a category, drill down to the expert on your given topic, register, and fire off your question. All queries will be answered free of charge, unless you ask your expert how to design a three-story bath-house or something equally elaborate. In that case, you'll have to pay a mutually agreed upon fee.
http://www.expertcentral.com/
It has been noted elsewhere that Veterans/Remembrance/Armistice Day in 1999 seemed to have rekindled in many circles an appreciation and acknowledgement of the role played by the veterans of various wars. Perhaps movies such as "Saving Private Ryan" and "The Thin Red Line" have brought the issue to the fore; perhaps young people have just heard what others seem to have missed. Whatever the reason sites such as this, displaying the stats of high-flying American fighter pilots in WWII, should remain popular. Each entry includes a brief bio of the pilot in question and the summary section includes data such as the kills, medals, unit, and plane flown for each pilot.
http://www.westnet.com/~ssherman/index.html
If you ever find yourself facing a tough biographical question that even the Biography TV show can't seem to answer, you might do well to turn here. Biographie.net includes 8,202 biographies, 4,212 in English. And that little detail, dear friends, is the tip-off. We're talking the classics here: Prince Bernhard von Bulow, Paul Gustav Heinrich Bachmann, and John Travers Cornwell, to name just a few. We liked the option to visit a random biography.
http://biographie.net/en/
At the age of 53, Martyn Bracegirdle, a prosperous businessman in Cheshire, England, decided he needed a challenge. Something to mark the Millennium, and something he could achieve before he got too old to care. So he decided to run 2,000 miles - from Land's End to John O'Groats and back - in the teeth of a British winter, and in less than three months. Mad? Probably - but somehow also heroic, an individualistic reaction to the onset of middle age. He updates his diary with his thoughts, words, and photos each week on his Web site, and all the money he raises goes to Mencap and Marie Curie Cancer Care. The weekly diary makes fascinating reading, a whistle-stop tour of the UK in running shoes and a daft hat. He checks his e-mail every night while he soaks his aching feet, so why not drop by and mail him a message?
http://www.millennium2000challenge.co.uk/
If you like the Amazing Randi, try Tim Riehle, who prides himself on being a skeptic. Riehle's Crank Menagerie site posts theories and ideas he feels need debunking. Of course, there're the usual easy targets such as cryptozoology, satanic abuse, and repressed memories, and the old standby - homeopathy - but the hottest new trend in wishful thinking seems to be loopy pseudo-physics and cosmology.
http://www.lns.cornell.edu/~riehle/crank.html
The Internet for Cocktail Parties
Want to be the hit of the holiday party? Learn a little about the Internet and leave the chitchat about the weather, sports, and politics to the unoriginal schmoes. Visit The Newbies Site to get all your terminology down correctly so you won't say you're surfing your e-mail or maximizing your cookies. George Palmer even offers a phonetic spelling of newbie so you won't sound like an idiot while being demurely self-effacing after having wowed everyone with your Net savvy.http://websites.ntl.com/~r.palmer/
First came personal portals for storing passwords and user names, then ones for uploading your bookmarks/favorites to a Web interface, then others that collect useful links to chat, information, and shopping sites tailored to your personal preferences. Now along comes EZ Login, which does all of this plus a lot more. The sign-up process necessitates the downloading of various small helper files, and the interface has so many options there is quite a steep learning curve, but the service itself has a lot of very valuable features and is especially useful for travelling types - especially with the cascading password scheme made popular by Mac OS 9.
http://ezlogin.com/index.html
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River Horse
Astronomer's Computer Companion
Foie Gras: A Passion
Lotus Organizer V6.0 for Win95/98/NTONLINE CULTURE
There's little as amusing as a media stunt. This particular stunt holds some relevance for us as it involved having a Canadian reporter spend five days living strictly online. We cover the Net and a surprisingly large number of our staff hails from the Great White North, so this story is a natural for us. Robert Cribb was assigned "to eat, work, shop, socialize and sustain life entirely through computer lines" for five days, which he more or less managed to do without losing his sanity. This is his all-too-brief story. Amusing reading proving - well, we're not sure what it proves other than assignment editors are cruel.http://www.thestar.com/thestar/editorial/news/991122NEW01d_CI-WIRED22.html
Spam Wars: Hotmail Goes with RBL
In a big boost for one of the more controversial yet effective spam fighting schemes, Microsoft's Hotmail service has decided to start using the Realtime Blackhole List (RBL) to filter e-mail from spam-friendly sites. We've talked before about the RBL, basically a database of Net sites which deliberately or through inaction allow themselves to be used for sending spam. We think the many free e-mail services which compete with Hotmail will now feel pressure to also use the RBL to block e-mail from spam sites. CNet has a story about the Hotmail decision. The RBL site has information about how it works and how sysadmins can make use of it.CNet: http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-1433577.html
RBL: http://mail-abuse.org/rbl/
ONLINE TRAVEL
Telecommuting from the Outback
Lord only knows what the late Songlines author Bruce Chatwin would have made of this latest excursion into Australia's unforgiving outback. What we have here is not an author in search of the secrets of the Aboriginals, but an IT man who, in an effort to demonstrate the value of the MiniSat MultiMedia service, was dispatched to the middle of nowhere so that he might continue to do his normal job working on IT projects while building the demonstration module for this site. Shaggy is his name and intellectual survival is his game. The site features a daily diary as well as video clips from the site.http://www.telstra.com.au/remote/
Even if you don't have a hope of ever booking a suite at the sumptuous 1920s-era Hay-Adams Hotel just across from the White House, or the Grand Colonial on the sands at La Jolla cove, a leisurely tour of the National Trust Historic Hotels of America site is like waking up with your shoes spit-shined and waiting outside the door. The site links pages describing 128 splendid old hotels of architectural note which have been restored and are open for business (and which are taking reservations over the internet).
http://historichotels.nationaltrust.org/about.htm
Not So Historic Hotels Registry
A recent study indicated that this Thanksgiving, more Internet users booked their flights online than ever before. So while online reservations may be the bane of travel agents around the world, there's no denying that world travelers have begun to strike out on their own. To this end, one of the largest hotel databases can be found at HotelGuide. Here you'll have access to over 60,000 hotels in 200 countries. The searchable database includes details on the various hotels, photos, and even a detailed map of the area. And best of all, of course, you can book your rooms online.http://www.hotelguide.com/
FLOTSAM & JETSAM
Filled with Action, Romance, and Nuclear Mutants
Paul Brians shows how the Nuclear Age has permeated American pop culture, providing insightful narration along with his comic book covers, candy wrappers, and other "atomic" paraphernalia. Don't think you're affected? When's the last time you ate an atomic fireball or looked at a bikini?http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/nukepop/index.html
We're positively anchor-faced about Jeff Crowell's Naval Terminology, Jargon, and Slang page. Now even ARABs and BAMs can decipher code while having a totally essence time at the next bird farm banyan.
http://www.uss-salem.org/navhist/faqs/slang.htm
The person who built this site would like a Lotus. He/she requests that we all send a dollar, and in payment we get a ride around the block in the Lotus and get listed on a contributors page. The totally bizarre thing is that there are already names on the list. Can this actually work?
http://members.truepath.com/buymealotus/please.html
Is There a Doctor in the House?
This directory of physicians aims to give Americans an easy way to find a nearby doctor. Details include each MD's specialty, location, education, office hours, and even accepted health plans. The directory also contains listings for related providers and products.http://www.doctordirectory.com/
Support for Women with Endometriosis
Endometriosis can cause serious problems for women, and this Web site seeks to provide them with support. Among the site's goals is the education of women, health providers, and others as to their rights and treatment options.http://www.endoactiongroup.com/
More Than Setters and Terriers
Irish Animals provides a searchable database of Irish animal welfare and rescue groups and a list of local pet-friendly holiday accommodations among many other features. The Homes Needed section, including the adorable Appeal of the Week featured on the front page, is sure to make a pet owner out of anyone.http://www.irishanimals.com/
SOFTWARE
Mozilla Web Browser Release Milestone 11
The open source Web browser is moving slowly but steadily to final release. This latest milestone has the usual numerous bug fixes, much improved stability, code optimizations and what the developers call "architectural stability", meaning that it has all the scaffolding in place and it's just a question of hanging features off the existing fundamental code base. If you want to contribute to the open source community, a good way to start is to download (click the Binaries link), use this code in your day to day websurfing, and report any bugs.http://www.mozilla.org/projects/seamonkey/release-notes/m11.html