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BREAKING SURF
NEARly Perfect Erotic Touchdown
The NEAR spacecraft arrived in orbit around the asteroid Eros on Valentine's Day a year ago. After a year of observation, this week it landed on the rock. Extraordinarily, NEAR isn't designed to land anywhere. NASA planned to have the craft descend so that it could take close-up pictures during the fall, but skill and luck left it with a gentle surface kiss and an orientation that lets it keep transmitting from the surface. At press time, there is even talk of firing the thrusters and sending the craft hopping up off the surface. You can find images and official word on the NEAR Web site, while Space.com has the larger perspective and an archive of NEAR stories.NEAR: http://near.jhuapl.edu/
Space.com: http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/missions/nearlanding_preview_010212.html
One of the great hopes for the Internet was that it would fatally weaken totalitarian regimes by undermining their ability to control access to unfiltered information and news. It hasn't quite worked out that way, however. The LA Times explores why in a fascinating account of how Chinese authorities are dealing with the challenge. Examples of the effective, well-honed government tactics of intimidation and bureaucratic restriction abound. China is also using modern tracking technologies eagerly sold to the authorities by US corporations. China's state security network has lots of bodies to throw at this challenge and is well on the way to creating a safe sandbox in which users can surf without encountering dangerous, non-conformist ideas. Anyone operating outside the sandbox is dealt with quickly and aggressively. One example: a Chinese pro-Falun Gong home page disappeared mere minutes after being posted. At this stage, it's not certain where the yin and yang of freedom and control will take China, but optimists believe the Net remains a force for good that will slowly force change. It's a struggle worth watching.
http://www.latimes.com/business/cutting/features/lat_chiteck010127.htm
Students Hang Beetle from Golden Gate Bridge
This has little to do with anything, but it happened right in our back yard and, as student pranks go, it was quite cool. Students from University of British Columbia hung the shell of a Volkswagen Beetle (old style) from the bottom of the Golden Gate bridge in San Francisco. They tossed the shell, tethered by bungee cords and steel cables, over the bridge railing. Local cops eventually cut the cords and the car plunged into and sank beneath the waves. The pranksters say the stunt commemorated the 20th anniversary of a similar prank when engineering students suspended a Beetle from the Lion's Gate Bridge in Vancouver. The San Francisco Chronicle has details of the story and a neat, almost expressionist photo of the suspended car shrouded in fog. Obviously, only massive escalation can hope to to redeem the honor of American engineering students. You think they'll have to blindfold the elephant?http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/chronicle/archive/2001/02/05/MN60371.DTL
The text of the latest appellate court ruling in the Napster case is difficult to interpret unless you're a trained intellectual property lawyer. However, the gist is that, for now, the service can continue to operate, but it has to stop trading in specific files if the legal owners of such files tell it to do so. The decision also means Napster will probably ultimately lose and may need to pay large amounts of money in damages. CNet has the plain language implications.
Decision: http://www.politechbot.com/docs/napster.021201.html
Story: http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-4792577.html
Google Buys Deja's Usenet Assets
Google has bought Deja's archive of 500 million Usenet messages dating back to 1995. Deja.com got its start as a Web interface to Usenet, but in recent years it has been incrementally abandoning that service in favor of trying to make money with various other business models. Google promises to improve browsing capabilities for the Usenet archive and to reinstate posting capabilities. The press release has more details but no info on how much Google paid.http://www.google.com/press/pressrel/pressrelease48.html
Amazon has devised a clever way to leverage its core expertise in secure electronic payment transactions. The Amazon Honor System lets you tip sites you like with payments ranging from $1 to $50. The PayBox sign on the home page of participating Web sites links to an Amazon page that explains why the site is begging and provides simple access to Amazon's secure credit card payment system. Supposedly, Amazon's privacy policy ensures the sites you pay don't learn your identity, so you don't need to worry about dodging sycophantic e-mails. If you change your mind or want a refund, it's OK up to 30 days, no questions asked. With the program, Amazon hastens the day it achieves the Holy Grail of profitability as the company gets 15% of the take and $0.15 per transaction.
PayBox: http://s1.amazon.com/exec/varzea/subst/fx/home.html
FAQ: http://s1.amazon.com/exec/varzea/subst/fx/help/payor-faq.html
Here's whatever you want to know about e-book sales: bestsellers for the fourth quarter, 2000; the top 50 for 2000; lifetime - well, e-lifetime bestsellers; they're all listed here. Some of the authors aren't exactly household names, but three of Robert Silverberg's well-known works are here. The supreme winner over all, with six of the top 20 SF short stories, is Harlan Ellison, an author of significant achievement and output. Perusing these lists makes it obvious right away that e-publishing remains somewhat outside the mainstream of the book business, although there's always hope... always hope. And while we're dabbling in bestseller and author stuff, we oughta point you to Ellison's own somewhat quirky Web home, the Ellison Webderland.
E-books: http://www.ebookconnections.com/bestsellers/b_home.htm
Ellison: http://www.harlanellison.com/home.htm
Two companies are offering the public the ability to do what spammers and Internet marketers have been doing for years - monitor when a recipient opens an e-mail. This uses the same basic method as Web page hit counters: a small image, typically a single pixel, in the e-mail is downloaded from a Web site. When the e-mail is opened, the Web site records the download and notifies the sender that the e-mail has been opened. The recipient of these messages is not warned that the sender is monitoring the opening of the e-mail. Because this is not a hack or exploit, the only way to prevent such reporting is to read e-mail in text-only format. As it should be.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,41686,00.html
The Privacy Foundation has released details of an exploit that allows the sender of an e-mail message to see comments and additions to the e-mail when it is forwarded. The exploit works on HTML-enabled browsers that have JavaScript turned on. Though the Privacy Foundation rates this a low-level intrusion, the exploit is sure to keep businesses and administrators in a state of mild paranoia until a complete solution is developed.
http://www.privacyfoundation.org/advisories/advemailwiretap.html
Profound Non-Security of Wireless Networking Standard
A computer security research group at the University of California, Berkeley has released a scathing analysis of the security algorithms in the popular 802.11 wireless standard. The standard is used in devices sold to the rapidly growing home and office wireless networking market. The group pinpointed at least five different attacks against the system that would enable crackers to listen in on network traffic, and in some cases to alter that traffic. Consider this very carefully when you go shopping for a wireless network.http://www.isaac.cs.berkeley.edu/isaac/wep-faq.html
Apparently, using the name "Carnivore" for the FBI's Net bugging software was proving a bit too frightening to the public. The FBI has chosen as the system's new moniker the decidedly less glamorous "DCS1000". An Illinois Institute of Technology report which analyzed the system last year recommended the name change. CNet has details.
Report: http://www.usdoj.gov/jmd/publications/carniv_entry.htm
CNet: http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-4769965.html
Veteran IUMA Music Site on Verge of Collapse
It's a sign of the times when a veteran music site, one that evolved before the Internet revolution, is close to dissolution. The eight staffers that ran the Internet Underground Music Archive (IUMA) site have been laid off, and the controlling company is actively looking for new backers. The IUMA was created in 1993 to distribute the music of independent and little known artists. As the Internet frenzy took hold, the IUMA rode the wave, became increasingly popular, and got bought out by a larger company. Now that the wave is crashing, so is the stock of the controlling company, and the IUMA with it.http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-4757798.html
Wired.com has published a sort of retrospective of what it is calling "The Greatest Hacks of All Time". While the list is far from exhaustive, it does provide an interesting look back on who was breaking news and what they were breaking into.
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,41630,00.html
McAfee has produced a colorful virus map showing the concentration of infected files globally. On the version showing infected files of the past 30 days, North America, the UK, and Australia show up bright red for danger while Russia and most of Africa are wastelands of low infection. You can manipulate the pull-down menus to select infected computers instead of files and for time periods covering the past week and 24 hours.
http://mast.mcafee.com/mast/mass_map.asp?track=1&period=3
ONLINE CULTURE
A classic battle between parody and the humorless forces of political correctness is brewing online. The FBI has reportedly been sucked into investigating a wild parody Web site designed to tweak the noses of the righteously outraged animal rights crowd. Bonsai Kitten is ostensibly "dedicated to preserving the long lost art of body modification in housepets", giving handy if impractical tips for shaping the bodies of kittens to artistically fit them into glass jars. It's a spoof, of course, but some humorless soul called the cops on them. It seems there's a federal law that makes it a felony to possess "a depiction of animal cruelty" with the intent to distribute across state lines. The law is widely believed to be unconstitutional but passing it obviously made some politician feel - well, politically correct. Wired has the story.Bonsai: http://www.bonsaikitten.com/
Wired: http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,41733,00.html
Home Porn Work and the Law of Unintended Consequences
A Polk County, Fla. couple came to the attention of local police after their teenaged neighbor told the cops that the woman appeared naked on the Internet. Ignoring for the moment that this teenager obviously wouldn't know a decent neighbor fantasy if it slapped him, prosecutors decided to charge the couple with obscenity. After the couple threatened to sue, the charges were dropped provided the couple did not engage in further "sexually connected" business activities in Polk or the neighboring three counties. The couple also agreed to pay a $2,000 fine. The punch line to the story is that the woman is quoted as saying that she will continue to pose nude online in order to pay her legal bills. So much for deterrence. Incidentally, it can apparently earn you a cool $1,000 per month.http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-4745928.html
Licensed Net Connections in Your Future?
A Michigan legislator is pushing to pass a law which would require free Internet service providers to collect identification information from subscribers ostensibly to protect that favorite of legislators everywhere - the children. The fear is that pedophiles are hiding behind the anonymity of free ISPs to trade child porn. At least one free ISP, K-Mart's BlueLight.com, has changed its policies in response to requests from the police. Most other free ISPs remain dedicated to protecting the privacy of their users. This is probably the first salvo in the next major online privacy skirmish. It is not inconceivable that a time will come when you will need a government-sanctioned license in order to be on the Net.http://freep.com/money/tech/mwend8_20010208.htm
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Life at the Extremes: The Science of Survival
The Cathedral & the Bazaar: Musings on Linux and Open Source by an
Designs on Space: Blueprints for 21st Century Space ExplorationSURFING SITES
Is it Better to Love Online than Never to Love at All?
Radio and TV talk shows and news segments love cybersex addicts, impulsive e-cheaters, and clandestine e-daters. In "Cupid's Binary Arrow", Bob Bankard collects interviews based on invitations sent "throughout the major social spots in cyberspace." On the basis of a sample of only 106 respondents, skimpily described procedures, and comments by two experts with vague credentials, Bob throws around percentages and pseudostatistical generalizations with penetrating, Cosmo-like insight: "Lynn is the victim of the strangest aspect of online romance: the reckless compartmentalization of affection that seems to be prevalent in many of our respondents across the board." OK, so we have trouble supporting Bob's sweeping conclusions. On the other hand, the piece does have anecdotal value for the stories Bob tells of individuals - their online love and offline loss in particular. If the prose doesn't make an impression, the leather-helmetted studmuffin on the Wild, Wild Web page will.http://www.phillyburbs.com/loveonline/index.shtml
Remembering the Victims of the Butcher of Lyon
In the spring of 1944, Klaus Barbie, the Butcher of Lyon, led three trucks of Gestapo troops to vanquish the threat posed by 44 Jewish children sipping hot chocolate in a French orphanage east of Lyon where they'd managed to hide. Seven adults were hauled away, too. Most were gassed at Auschwitz and others died before a firing squad in Estonia. One 27-year-old caretaker of the children survived to tell what happened. The Children of Izieu site remembers each child with photos, excerpts from letters to parents, and fingerpaintings they left behind.http://home19.inet.tele.dk/aaaa/children/index.htm
Clayton Giles is a 14-year-old victim of divorce. His parents divorced several years ago, and his mother gained custody of him despite his desire to stay with his father. His mother further obtained a court order that prevented Clayton from even speaking to his father. Although he wanted to visit his father, he couldn't legally do so. He discovered he had no legal say in that part of his life. The courts simply ignored him, although he tried very hard to get their attention. Finally, he left his mother although legally she still had custody. A recent 19-day hunger strike did at least make the courts notice him. He still hasn't achieved his personal goals, but he has created the legalkids.com Web site where other kids in similar situations can interact. As the site makes clear, Clayton's situation is by no means an isolated situation. The site promotes the view that kids are humans, not property as current divorce law seems to imply.
http://legalkids.com/
Guys only. And you need a pretty good job. But for your $1000 minimum you get the services of a female non-geek skilled in the intrapersonal arts. This site doesn't appear to be a come-on for services of questionable legality. The opening screen is classic. To call it tacky is to insult the truly tacky sites on the Web. The exact promise is: "Cool chicks will take you shopping, pick out your clothes, and discuss the ins and outs of this city with you." The city is San Francisco, or any Silicon Valley locale. The service probably can't hurt most of the customers and might even help a few. Once you work past the brilliant opening screens there's actually a lot of decent content. Getting to it is your treat.
http://www.geekboyservices.com/
Despite somewhat sparse content here, we enjoyed much of what we did find. Among our favorites is the piece of Real True History that details how a psychic lost the British forces at Yorktown to the Americans in 1781. Gamers will want to check out the five Dewdz segments. Good animation and some great dialog make it a solid bet, even for those who don't Dreamcast. "The Lonely Astronaut" accomplished that rare feat of actually making us laugh vocally. It obviously has roots in "South Park" and a fan of one will like the other. Two other sections offered limited content, and we're eagerly awaiting new additions. For now, we'd suggest a dose of Dewdz and some Real True History to get you going. You'll need RealPlayer to run these goodies, but you may have figured that out.
http://www.twistedmojo.com/menu.html
Come to Spatch's site to play the riveting interactive fiction "Pick Up The Phone Booth and Die" or its sequel, "Pick Up The Phone Booth and Die 2". Have a very zen moment in "The Lesson Of The Chicken" or hang out at Coney Island in "When I Grow Up I Want To Be A Firetruck". The whole mess works best with a Java-enabled browser, but Spatch provides an alternative. If all of this has you jonesing for things Infocom, poke around his site for the Interactive-Fiction-A-Minute piece. We're not going to tell you where it is, cause his site's just too amusing not to let you discover some other hidden gem on your own.
http://www.spatch.net/games/
Here, Little Squirrel, Little Squirrel...
If you've been harboring an uneasy suspicion that the boys at them big ol' Ivy-League schools are just kind of coasting on through, not being given enough homework, not being put through the meatgrinder that you suffered/are suffering/will suffer through, check this place out. Yup, these Harvard boys apparently have a glut of time and string. What they have clearly learned thus far is that in academia, pretty much anything can be described in terms that imply work - note the subtitle "A new approach to rodent performance evaluation", which probably appears on their resumes. In order not to spoil the surprise of what the heck is going on, we'll just describe perhaps the best of the dozen or so photos: a particularly tenacious squirrel, with a death-grip on a peanut tied to a string, is lifted completely off the ground. What will these Harvard engineers think of next?http://www.eecs.harvard.edu/~yaz/en/squirrel_fishing.html
We were initially hooked by the cooking section of this site, but we couldn't resist doing it all. This site highlights the adventures of a stuffed monkey, and no, not one of those creepy sock monkeys your aunt gave you when you were three that gave you nightmares well into high school. This is an adorable little monkey who's equally handy with the repast and the repartee. Not only does he show you how to cook varied foods (including cheese and crackers, always a favorite amongst college students), but he takes you with him to the dentist, trick or treating, and on the road. The highlight of the site is the monkey hanging out with the Tibetan monks from Drepung Loseling Monastery in India, in which he watches as they create a sand mandala.
http://www.himonkey.net/
Anyone can publish anything on the Web. For the last few months, Truth Watch, the Citizens for Truth newsletter, has been claiming that Bill Gates was assassinated in LA's MacArthur Park on Dec. 2, 1999. Most of the newsletter consists of "evidence", all of which is at least possibly plausible if you want to believe. The material is well done, even if it's entirely fake. The alleged lone Gates gunman, Alek Hiddell, just happens to have the same name that appeared on a forged Selective Service Registration card Lee Harvey Oswald carried the day he shot JFK. Nice touch. Truth Watch has spawned a documentary movie, "MacArthur Park", which should be released in the next month or two.
http://www.citizensfortruth.org/truthwatch/
The Web Page Thumbnail Search Engine
This is a real good news/bad news situation. Don't you just hate running a Web search and finding hundreds of hits, each with a cryptic line of text that sort of indicates what might be at the link? Room 102's technology solves that problem handily. A search there may present you with a ton of hits, but instead of cryptic text, you get a sample of the Web page, formatted as a series of slides. You can tell immediately that you haven't found what you need. As search engines go, however, this one's pretty spotty. We ran a quick test, searching for "Oregon Zoo" over here and on Google. Google dropped us to a live link to the zoo in milliseconds; Room 102 took us all over the place. The Room 102 folks are aware of the deficiency; on their opening page, they boldly state that Room 102 isn't as good as Google and that their directory isn't as good as Yahoo, but that they feel their technology holds promise. We do, too. Web page thumbnails are easier to decipher than hyperlinks. As they tell you, when in Room 102, surf, don't search. A blend of surfing and search technology has the potential to make life easier.http://www.room102.com/
Picture this: a Pentium II with a 19.2 kbps wireless Internet connection, 8x4x32 CDRW, 30 GB hard drive, 5x DVD, and 10.4"TFT flat panel and 6"TFT flat panel displays. Not a bad little system, you might be thinking. You'd be right. But toss it all into a Chevy Blazer, along with a killer sound system, and you're probably looking at the ultimate in portable computing. Forget about hauling the kids off to soccer practice, or the dogs for their walkies in the park - there's no room in this puppy! Now open your eyes, put on a bib to catch the drool, and cruise over for a look.
http://www.jacksonville.net/~amc/blazer.htm
Can public input into TV programming fly? Judge for yourself at iaffectTV.com. Traditional feedback depends on polls and audience reactions to pilots, but iaffectTV.com wants to engage a larger audience - the Net. You're invited to review episodes and scripts of network shows and submit your own suggestions and scripts. But who's going to benefit the most, scriptwriters and producers under contract who can scrape your ideas for profit, or you? This site purports to be in the public interest. It may well be. We found no offer of remuneration for hard work or testimonials from Hollywood pros who have acknowledged or used materials submitted here. You're supposed to enjoy a sense of contribution to the general good, and apparently that's it. You get no offer of representation by an agent or even a token hundred bucks. It would be nice to see proof that ideas submitted through this site are indeed making a difference to viewers.
http://iaffecttv.com/
Yet Another Alumni Database Site
An increasing percentage of Web users is wasting time finding old friends. Alumni.net, among other sites, will help that rapidly growing segment. Alumni.net says it has 1.5 million people listed, although ClassMates.com says it has more. Alumni.net, however, is free. To actually get useful information from Classmates.com (and many others), you pay up first ($25 is typical). Alumni.net, at least for now, gives you e-mail addresses free, as long as you register. It also lists organizations other than schools (add virtually any group you want) and claims to have worldwide coverage. Downsides? Most schools and groups are in the US, and there aren't near as many people registered as at ClassMates.com. That's today; tomorrow may well be different.Alumni: http://www.alumni.net/
ClassMates: http://www.classmates.com/
ONLINE TRAVEL
When Shaun O'Boyle talks about urban decay, he isn't commenting on the state of the morals of the youth of America or a cosmetics line for the ultra-hip. He's talking about modern architectural ruins, created by the progress of industry, medicine, and a variety of other factors. He captures their haunting stateliness in his Modern Ruins Photographic Essays site. We only wish that more of the ruins came with the context offered along with the Northampton State Hospital or the Carrie furnaces; often you'll find yourself wishing you knew more about the structure or, more importantly, the people who once inhabited the walls.http://oboylephoto.com/ruins/
The Borscht Belt Can't Be Beat
The curtain appears to be coming up on a Catskills comeback: the BBC is doing a documentary on Borscht Belt comedy, NPR's "All Things Considered" is tracking down Catskills radio recordings for a series on Yiddish-American radio, and Brown University is teaching a course on the culture of the Catskills. It's been about 30 years since this Jewish resort area in the mountains of upstate New York fell to ruin - not so long ago that plenty of people still live to tell tales of first kisses, first drunks, and other firsts in the bungalow colonies. The Catskills Institute, which has been holding conferences to study the area's history, publishes a site replete with scholarship, fiction, interviews with screenwriters, music, and Judaica.http://www.brown.edu/Research/Catskills_Institute/
The Unbelieveable Times of Gloucestershire County
Is it any wonder the best mysteries and horror come from England? A Glimpse at the Glorious Glut of Gloucestershire Glitches is an archive of human and bestial weirdness reported in Her Majesty's Gloucestershire County. It's updated "at least once a week" with links to news items such as "Six hurt in sword attack", "Dead man sat at desk for five days", and "Nose bitten off in scuffle". If current stories on the home page seem too tame, browse the archives. How can you not follow links such as "Why I drilled a hole in my own head", "I saw aliens, says nurse", "Rebel cheese rollers in the clear", and "Soldier jailed for cooking hamster". As they say in journalism school, if it bleeds, it leads. Hollywood screenwriters must be lapping up this hodgepodge of the supernatural, paranormal, extraterrestrial, and tabloid ilk. You've got to read it to believe - or disbelieve - it.http://www.geocities.com/lab_lav/glos.html
FLOTSAM & JETSAM
The Joy of Being Trampled by Animals
If you dream of being stepped on by horses, this is the site for you. Vicarious horse trampling is available via text description and three very dark .avi movies. You can watch or, if you have experienced your own tramplings, you can share them with the world.http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Hollow/5258/
This site is not only enlivened by people who fought or who supported the troops, it embraces successive generations. Visitors try to pinpoint where relatives fell. Historians appeal for stories of combat. Dealers trade memorabilia. The bookstore, happily, offers vet discounts up to 30%.
http://ww2.vet.org/
Eatsleepmusic.com is karaoke without the cheap beer and the embarrassment of singing in front of strangers. Ignore the sales pitches and the free RealPlayer tunes will have you singing along with the Backstreet Boys, Third Eye Blind, Metallica, or even Three Dog Night within minutes.
http://www.eatsleepmusic.com/
Interactive Navigation for the Flash-Challenged
Web sites need interactive site navigation buttons, right? This site quickly creates neat Flash-based navigation menus for your pages. Anyone can have pro grade interactive multimedia on their site. The nav menus are free if you can tolerate an ad, $8 if you have a personal site and don't want one. Very slick.http://www.flashbuttons.com/
The Shaw Guides to Educational Vacations
This site indexes more than 4,300 career and educational workshops, tours, and events around the world. You won't get much detail, but you will get started with links to calendars, brochures, and newsletters. You might be surprised by the variety of recreational and career opportunities in your area.http://www.shawguides.com/
Rendering fantasy into blueprint requires research. If you dream of building a cedar wood home, you might start with construction company Lindal Cedar Homes. Photos and blueprints help you find a style and figure out the logistics of your design. Yeah, it's purely commercial, but boy, it's set up well.
http://www.lindal.com/
SOFTWARE
Some say you get what you pay for; others swear that free is an excellent price. Windows users here have a reference point to the best available freeware in eight categories ranging from business to systems and security. Whether you want Sun's powerful StarOffice software or antivirus protection for your home system, you can find and download it for free. Of course, some of these are pretty hefty downloads for a dial-up connection; probably best accomplished in the wee hours of the morning while you're examining your eyelids for pinholes. While no site has ever been built that is truly indispensable, this one comes close. Free is indeed an excellent price, and this site features the most comprehensive set of links to quality freeware that we've ever run across.http://www.sover.net/~whoi/Priceless.html
This latest version of Netscape Navigator fixes bugs and notably contains some important security fixes. The original 6.0 version was widely criticized for its extreme bugginess. Grab it from the Netscape Web site.
http://www.netscape.com/browsers/