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| @Home, the Usenet Death Penalty, and Online Culture |
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| Stories of Y2K Bug Angst |
| Movie Musings from the Flick Filosopher |
| Street Art |
| The Century of Music |
| The Great White Northern Public Broadcasting Network |
| Netsurfer Recommendations |
| Shift-Internet |
| Dishing the Real Dirt |
| The Seven Sins in (Not of) Writing |
| The Sociology of Surfing, Dude |
| On the Internet, No One Knows You're a Dogged Anthropologist |
| Avians in the UK |
| Tiger, Tiger Burning Bright |
| Eco-Portal |
| Do uGive? |
| Deadline Online Again |
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| LETTERS TO THE EDITOR |
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BREAKING SURF
More Tales of Cracker Blackmail
In the wake of last week's well publicized blackmail threats against CD Universe, more stories of cracker blackmail have surfaced. One victim appears to have been the Visa credit card network. According to this story from MSNBC (based on articles from the Sunday Times which we could not find), extortionists broke into Visa's network last summer and demanded $16 million to leave the data private. Visa didn't pay, and claims that the hackers only got some "outdated materials". The article also mentions that a group of alleged "sophisticated British hackers for hire" targeted at least 11 other multinationals. Meanwhile, American Express and Discover recalled large numbers of credit cards compromised in the CD Universe escapade.VISA: http://www.msnbc.com/news/358991.asp
Amex/Discover: http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1007-200-1526496.html
Abuzz.com Answers Questions, Profiles Responses
A company spawned by the New York Times has just launched this question-and-answer site backed by some intriguing collaborative technology. The site doesn't connect you with experts who answer your questions, but rather provides a set of forums where users answer questions posed by other users. What makes this different from all other online forums is that questions get routed to the users best suited to answer them, based on profiles users fill out when they sign up. Over time, the system will adjust the profiles based on how each user responds to questions. The press release has more details. Incidentally, the most active topic is Five Favorite Books to Share.Abuzz: http://www.abuzz.com/
Press release: http://corp.abuzz.com/news/011900.html
That's according to a new study by search engine maker Inktomi and the NEC Research Institute. Inktomi spiders have been crawling the Web for the last four months to come up with the numbers. Crunching the data, they came up with 6,409,521 servers, of which 60% run Apache Web server software. Pause a second to recognize that this means there is one Web page for every six people alive. Yahoo wins big in terms of link popularity, with 751,974 links pointing to them. Not surprisingly, Inktomi found that 87% of all documents on the Web are in English. More fun facts and a press release are at the site.
http://www.inktomi.com/webmap/
Newstream Feeds Media Streams to Journalists
Many journalists read NSD, and this site will be mostly of interest to them and the press flacks who feed them content. This is of interest to the rest of our readers because as informed consumers, you should be aware of where your news is coming from. Newstream makes available free online multimedia content to journalists and media sites. The content comes from people who want to release information in video, audio, or graphic form, and who pay Newstream for the privilege. The consumers - media sites - can then freely link to this content to fill out their Web sites. Think of it as multimedia press release distribution - in fact one of the site's backers is Business Wire, an old-style text press release distributor. The site is free to accredited journalists, but flacks will have to ask for price quotes on content distribution.http://www.newstream.com/
The Simpsons Tenth Anniversary
Last week, The Simpsons got its star on Hollywood Boulevard. Ten years after debuting on The Tracy Ullman Show, the TV cartoon series still manages to be wickedly funny much more often than not. Time Magazine named it the best TV show of the century - i.e. ever. Appropriately, the Simpsons Web site has had a face lift, hosting not only "A Year-Long Celebration of Homeric Proportions", but also an offer of a free ISP connection. Why? Who the hell knows, but you can get free Net access in exchange for hosting commercials in a navigation bar. There is the usual episode guide, short blurbs about upcoming episodes, and the lively message forums ("What's better, That '70s Show or The Simpsons", "Funniest Ralph Line"). <Mr. Burns>Excellent!</Mr. Burns>.http://thesimpsons.com/
One of our favorite tech news Web sites, Ars Technica, has posted its picks for the technologies, products, people, and events that rang its bell in 1999. This is uber-geek territory, so the awards cover such stuff as CPU of the Year, PC Case of the Year, Peripheral of the Year, Best Toy We Could Never Afford, Controversy of the Year, and the surprising Technological Innovation of the Millennium. Great choices and great write-ups from a gang which takes its technology, but not itself, seriously.
http://www.arstechnica.com/wankerdesk/1q00/arswards99-1.html
Microsoft vs. DOJ: Proposed Findings of Fact
First, the government Department of Justice (DOJ) lawyers put their spin on the antitrust trial with their own proposed filing of fact. Now it's Microsoft's turn to respond with its own version. Basically, each side is trying to put the best possible spin on their case with these long, dense, legalese documents. Here they are in all their glory for the legal masochists among you.DOJ: http://news.cnet.com/News/Pages/Special/Microsoft/doj_conclusions_of_law.html
Microsoft: http://news.cnet.com/News/Pages/Special/Microsoft/msft_conclusions_of_law.html
New US Encryption Export Rules
People who follow such things know that the US government recently announced it was loosening rules for the export of encryption software. Here is the reference information on the new rules: the announcement; the complete text of the new rules; and comments from the vocal opposition (EPIC, EFF, ACLU) outlining the fundamental problems with trying to control the distribution of crypto code.Announce: http://204.193.246.62/public.nsf/docs/60D6B47456BB389F852568640078B6C0
Text: http://www.epic.org/crypto/export_controls/regs_1_00.html
Comments: http://www.epic.org/crypto/export_controls/joint_release_1_00.html
More Details on US Spy Satellites' Y2K Problems
The Chicago Tribune has more information on the spy satellite problems we reported in the last issue. Looks like the problem was a bad software patch designed to fix a Y2K problem. Three KH-11 imaging satellites and two Lacrosse radar satellites returned bad data for about three days before the problem was fixed.http://chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/article/0,2669,ART-40599,FF.html
ONLINE CULTURE
@Home, the Usenet Death Penalty, and Online Culture
In the consensual anarchy of Usenet, it takes some serious misbehavior to prompt a call for the Usenet Death Penalty (UDP). Last week, admins around the world finally judged that the @Home Network had crossed the line. Spammers have long used its servers to flood Usenet with spam, and the company has not addressed the problem. Influential members of the Usenet community got fed up and decided that unless @Home cleaned up its act within a week, all Usenet posts from @Home users should be blocked. The call for the UDP got the attention of @Home management and by the end of the week the company had cracked down on spam. The admins called off the UDP and placed @Home on a 30-day probation. It's worth your time to understand what happened here, and why - this is online culture at work. Start with the UDP FAQ to get some background, then read the @Home story via the UDP declaration, @Home's response, and news of the reprieve (which also has some good information on Usenet popularity among netsurfers).UDP FAQ: http://www.stopspam.org/usenet/faqs/udp.html
Declaration: http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=571636137
Response: http://slashdot.org/articles/00/01/13/1121209.shtml
Reprieve: http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1004-200-1526165.html
Geek Sex Culture in Silicon Valley
An amusing article in Salon discusses the (obvious?) fact that geeks of the male persuasion aren't getting laid in Silicon Valley. Particularly foreign geeks, those legions of smart young men who flock here from who-knows-where to labor in the Field of Bits. Culture shock, long hours, and lack of eligible women plague the tech immigrant in search of nookie. Suburban morality and puritanical prosecutors plague the sex workers who would willingly service the affluent, affable tech-droids - who have to travel all the way to San Francisco instead. A snapshot in time view of sex and the single geek.http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2000/01/12/body_electric/index.html
It may be old the Y2K bug was hyped way out of proportion and ultimately did not cause any major problems. Dead story, right? Not quite. There still exists a surprisingly large amount of Y2K fallout. True, most of the problems are pesky, even laughable, but they still suck up valuable programmer time. This state of affairs gives us a good opportunity to re-acquaint our readers with the venerable Risks Digest (RD), the long-running bible of modern technology problems. Issue 10.74 of RD has a particularly juicy collection of Y2K problems, such as the dangers of using localtime() in programs, multiple billing on credit cards, and even information on how Sprint handled the Y2K phone rush. Great e-zine, still a good story.
RD: http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks
RD 10.74: http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/20.74.html
ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT
Movie Musings from the Flick Filosopher
There's always a niche for movie essays and reviews with a personal, well-read touch, such as these by the Flick Filosopher. In her essay, "The Ghost of Christmas Movies Past", for example, site doyen MaryAnn Johanson insightfully compares the 1951 cinematic version of "A Christmas Carol", which stars Alastair Sim as Scrooge, and the 1999 version with Patrick Stewart as the miserly merchant. You won't often find such comparisons at other review sites. We also like the convenience of grouping movies by theme, as in "A Very Flick Filosopher Christmas" and "Academy Award Special 1999". (The latter revisits classics and recent hits alike.) Such goodies come with a price: ads, including a pitch for the Flick Filosopher refrigerator magnet and T-shirt. Throughout the site, Johanson sticks admirably to her manifesto: "I like to think I'm recreating the kind of intelligent conversation thoughtful movie fans engage in after leaving the theater or while the video is rewinding."http://flickfilosopher.com/
Why dub a glorious sweep of finely-drawn color and shape graffiti, and by doing so condemn it to the culture of street gangs and obscenities? Street art is the correct term for the wonderful painted scenes found on walls all over America. To launch its book, "American Street Art", the Soho Book site is displaying some samples of this work alongside its colorful Graffiti Observer e-zine, which examines street art and provides posters of the best works. A fascinating look at this often neglected undercurrent of the art world.
http://www.sohobooks.net/
Music is memory in motion, as peppy pop stars prove. Music365 has a glorious passel of it. Thirty-six reviewers contributed to the main feature, "2000 for 2000", a guide to "the most influential, remarkable and popular albums from the century of music" (meaning the 20th, of course.) Through drop-down menus in a pop-up window, you can search for songs alphabetically, by genre (from African to World), or by superstar (from Aerosmith to Zappa). Folk, big band, blues, Cajun, Christian, disco, flower power, gospel, hip-hop, jazz, Latin, reggae - the selection of reviews here may overwhelm you. Alas, we found no MIDI or MP3 freebies to download. Thanks to e-commerce links, though, you can buy what you want. If you enter the site's competition, you could win 2,000 CDs. Beyond "2000 for 2000," Music365 has news of the industry, a message forum, music charts, contests, reports, and interviews. Bop on!
http://www.music365.com/
The Great White Northern Public Broadcasting Network
Yankees who straddle the 49th parallel know the joys of intercepting air waves from up north - especially those carrying superbly intelligent Canadian Broadcasting Company (CBC) news and information programming. The CBC Web site lets you read or listen to radio reports (using RealAudio). Links break down much like newspaper sections: Headlines, Business, Entertainment, Kids. Be sure to check out the unusual and useful Consumer news link laden with food, toy, and car industry news - or anything else that helps keep the individual aware of both hazards and delights of the marketplace.http://cbc.ca/
BOOKS & E-ZINES
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The Naked God
The Cluetrain Manifesto: The End of Business as Usual
ACT! 2000 5.0 for Win98/95/NThttp://www.shift.com/shiftonline/html/core/core.html
In the muckraking journalistic tradition, Alexander Cockburn's bimonthly subscription newsletter, Counterpunch, connects right in the ol' breadbasket much of the time. Reconsideration of Serb genocide in Kosovo might knock the wind out of CNN-heads, but the Cockburn doesn't shy away from asking the worthy questions. Treatment of a Northern California tree-sitter gets beyond cheap shots about a romantic young drip and presents hard facts about the politics of ecology and logging. To some, an objection to this genre is the self-consciously pugnacious writing style, which may suggest a lack of trust in the underlying strength of the material - but hey, it worked for Matt Drudge. Counterpunch online lets you read selected essays, but not everything published in the subscription version.
http://www.counterpunch.org/
The Seven Sins in (Not of) Writing
Sarah E. Edgson's light hand and tongue-in-cheek approach work exceptionally well in this entertaining collection of short sharp essays themed on the Seven Deadly Sins. We are still laughing at the wonderful mental pictures, and the gentle self-mockery delivered by "Give 'Em The Old Razzle Dazzle" in the Lust section. A delicious concoction of humor and a wry look at what life is really like, this is a site you simply have to read. Especially if you too are a cereal junkie.http://freespace.virgin.net/sarah_e.edgson/default.htm
SURFING SCIENCE
The Sociology of Surfing, Dude
Most people outside California or Hawaii get to know surfers through beach movies, but if you've ever watched surfers unload their SUVs and mingle before they hit the waves, it's easy to imagine them a breed apart, with their own values, point of view, and goals (or lack thereof). In the 1970s, surfer Stephen Wayne Hull attended sociology graduate school at San Jose State. His thesis, "A Sociological Study of the Surfing Subculture in the Santa Cruz Area", now exists online in all its academic rigor. Hull admits up front that some insights in his aging thesis no longer hold and that he failed to anticipate phenomena such as the "graying" of the sport, increased female participation, and the development of surfer family dynasties. Even so, there are wonderful passages here, such as "How to spot a surfer: The symbols of surferhood" and "Surfing as Self-Actualizing". Much of his analysis may apply to skateboarding, skydiving, snowboarding, and other individual-yet-somehow-group sports with elements of danger and devotion. For the record, Hull says he still surfs.http://facs.scripps.edu/surf/srf_thes.html
On the Internet, No One Knows You're a Dogged Anthropologist
Cyberanthropology is the study of Online Man, and Cyberanthropology.org is a way to keep up with the latest happenings in the research community. The message boards, called Virtual Seminars, offer guided discussion on topics and useful references. The site includes lists of cyberanthropology courses at different institutions around the world and of upcoming seminars and conferences. The site uses frames, and although it looks like Java, the expandable navigation is actually just a cleverly thought-out animated GIF. If this is your bailiwick, you might want to answer the call for contributors to help build the site.http://www.cyberanthropology.org/
Are you a twitcher? Can you distinguish between a Slavonian grebe and a Baillon's crake? If so, you'll appreciate the UK Birding site, run by Dave Walters with help from hordes of talented bird-watchers who provide beautiful pictures, descriptions, and information. The site records sightings of rare birds from all over Great Britain and Ireland, and offers learned treatises on the subtle differences between species and sub-species, shades of plumage, and length of beak. The site has regional sections including an excellent one for the Marbury Country Park area which is a finely-detailed tour of the whole park describing all the birds who live or visit there. An exceptionally good Web site packed with interest for both the passionate twitcher and the casual walker.
http://www.ukbirding.freeserve.co.uk/
This site captures the timeless fascination with the largest of the extant great cats in a series of stunningly beautiful photographs. The pictures, nicely presented in imaginative groupings of thumbnails, are supplemented by articles on everything tigeriffic from mating to extinction - with the latter a sad probability. Check out the cleverly-done surprise picture when you visit - at least we hope it is cleverly done, in these days of cloned sheep, you never know.
http://www.loadstar.prometeus.net/tiger/
Environmental students and interested parties should bookmark this site. Eco-Portal selects and indexes ecological content under categories like Biodiversity and Water. Full search capabilities produce excellent results. Searching for specific locations is a good way to start to appreciate the wealth of resources available.
http://www.eco-portal.com/
COMMUNITY SUPPORT
How'd you like to donate to your favorite charity without ever cracking your wallet? That's the option iGive provides. iGive has provided more than half a million dollars in support of worthy causes since 1997. Originally, the site donated part of their advertising revenue to worthy causes, but most of the donation money now comes from revenue derived from affiliate programs located in the iGive mall. What organization does your money go to? It goes to any one you choose from over 6,300 offered - or you can list your own if you head up a philanthropic cause.http://www.igive.com/
CORRECTIONS
Alan Schlein, who runs Deadline Online, wrote both to thank us for reviewing his site in NSD 5.42 and to correct us. He says he had only the opening pages up when we visited on the site, with about 30 more to go. Alan uses the site more for training than as a plug for his book. We'll post another notice when Alan tells us he's done.http://www.deadlineonline.com/