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BREAKING SURF
Watershed moments of our times: the development of the information revolution, the uncovering of our genetic code and, some contend, the first real evidence of extraterrestrial life. Researchers studying Martian meteorite ALH84001 are convinced that magnetite crystals arranged in long chains inside the 3.9-billion year-old potato-sized meteorite could only have been produced biologically. Researchers in 1996 claimed that this same rock held evidence of life on Mars but they were largely dismissed. The magnetite crystals, in an arrangement that resembles a string of pearls, are nearly identical to those formed by magnetotactic bacteria that live on Earth. Critics contend that not enough work has been done to rule out inorganic origins of the structures.NASA: http://amesnews.arc.nasa.gov/releases/2001/01_11AR.html
Wired: http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,42049,00.html
Space.com: http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solarsystem/meteorite_analysis_010227.html
Nessie to Be Cornered at Last?
Belief, or lack thereof, in the Loch Ness monster is a classic test of your incredulity. Anyone who has seen the Loch knows it can be brooding and mysterious, and can appreciate the notion of a strange beast living there no matter how far-fetched. Periodically, someone or other sets off to capture the monster on film or something. So far, Nessie has dodged them all but now, Wired reports, a double whammy awaits in the hands of the Global Underwater Search Team (GUST): a trap made out of netting ready to spring shut on any beast and a multi-beam, high-resolution sonar system to scan the entire lake in finedetail. Apparently, all GUST wants of Nessie is a DNA sample, but not everyone's enamored of the quest. Some folk worry that seals and otters could drown in the trap. Others just want any mysterious beasts left alone. Nessie has done very well at dodging nosy investigators before and somehow we think she'll manage to evade this latest threat to her privacy and mystique.Wired: http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,41844,00.html
GUST: http://www.gust.st/
Napster installed a new filter Mar. 4 that supposedly prevents access to about a million or so song titles. It probably does work - as long as the uploader spelled the targeted song's title correctly. Misspellings, on purpose or not, won't be caught. Currently, the Napster filters implement lists of songs provided by copyright-holders wishing to deny access but if that method proves unacceptable to the copyright-holders, Napster may be forced to shut down completely. Gnutella or Aimster or something like that will pick up the slack, and the whole process will start again at square one.
CNet: http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-5028511.html
Wired: http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,42196,00.html
CNN: http://www.cnn.com/2001/TECH/internet/03/05/napster.reut/index.html
Britney Spears knows how to use the F-word. You weren't expecting a doctoral thesis out of her, were you? Caught unaware with a live microphone before hitting the stage in Brazil recently, Britney cussed, shrieked that her pants were too short, and repeatedly affirmed the retardedness of it all. You can catch her on Napster (search under "Britney Spears" and "Rio). That's one download music moguls and their lawyer lackeys can't fume about, at least from a copyright perspective. You can also listen to her rant at E! Online or BritneySpears.Org. OK, you caught us - it's not really newsworthy. But it is funny how much she sounds like trailer trash.
E!: http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,7718,00.html
BritneySpears.Org: http://www.britneyspears.org/
Things Start Going Microsoft's Way
Is Microsoft's anti-trust strategy going to succeed? At one time that appeared unlikely but the odds seem to be shifting, if preliminary noises coming out of the US Court of Appeals are anything to go by. In particular, the seven-judge appellate panel scathingly criticized Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson for his damning findings of fact and his allegedly unethical public comments which raise the spectre of bias. Since the fate of the free world clearly hangs on this case, we've brought you a whole slew of sites to click on. CNet and Wired covers the bases, while ZDNet analyzes what the recent brouhaha means. ZDNet's Peter Coffee asserts that what Judge Jackson may or may not have said to the media is irrelevant in establishing good findings of fact that the Court of Appeals should hesitate to dismiss.CNet: http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200-4963229.html
Wired: http://www.wired.com/news/antitrust/
Analysis: http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2691853,00.html
Coffee: http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2690944,00.html
By now, you probably know all you need to about last week's rattle in Seattle. We're here to offer just a few aftershocks. First off, Wired has the geek take on the quake, describing geek reactions that include this immortal line: "My first thought was 'Save and shut down! Save and shut down!' and only after I had done that, did I look to see where my wife was." Next, if you want to own your own pice of rumble rubble, stroll on over to eBay and do a search for "seattle earthquake". Rubble prices start at 55 cents for bits of the Fenix Underground cigar club/pool hall and reach (at press time) as high as $32 for bits of Starbucks HQ which are being sold by an enterprising fourth-grader. If you want a real bargain, go for a bag of "authentic Issaquah (Wash.) earthquake-survived dirt" for a penny.
Wired: http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,42088,00.html
eBay: http://www.ebay.com/
Fenix: http://www.fenixunderground.com/
Australia Goes Nuts, Film at 11
As of March 4, using that "Forward" button on your e-mail client in Australia is illegal and punishable with up to five years in jail or Aus$60,000. The basis of the new rule lies in the application of copyright law - you own what you write and someone who forwards your words without your expressed consent is breaking the law. Whether this will be enforced remains an open question, butat least one mouthpiece urges people sending e-mail to spell out whether they gave permission for the content to be forwarded to others. In a related story, the state of South Australia (SA) took a step closer to China - and not in a detente way. SA's new internet censorship bill makes it a crime to post online material that is unsuitable for children, and the ultimate decision of what is acceptable or not rests with the police. We don't have to draw a picture for you - we're sure you can think up myriad paradoxes, conundrums, and potential abuses yourself. Meanwhile, Australia's Attorney-General has released an explanation of sorts that calls this interpretation ridiculous while making heavy use of conditional language. The practical effect of the bill so far has been to force Web sites offshore, which means there's been no practical effect at all. Despite that, this sort of legislation is expected to spread to all Australian states and territories.Forward: http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,1768268%255E421,00.html
SA: http://australianit.news.com.au/common/storyPage/0,3811,1751598%5E501,00.html
Attorney-General: http://www.law.gov.au/aghome/agnews/2001newsag/931_01.htm
Which Country Consumes the Most Online Porn?
Per capita, of course. What would you guess? The decadent Americans? The sexually charged French? The anything-but-pubic-hair-goes Japanese? Would you believe it's a tie between the Aussies and the Canucks? A third of Internet users in Australia and Canada accessed porn sites from home in December 2000, according to Media Metrix. As you'd expect, persons of each sex tend to visit different sorts of Web sites. A spokesperson for Media Metrix Australia noted that women tend to visit sites that offer greeting cards and free downloads. Men do some downloading of their own at porn sites, which make up six of the ten sites with the highest proportion of male visitors. It's enough to make you deny adults freedom of speech and legislate tyrannical purity.http://australianit.news.com.au/common/storyPage/0,3811,1750864%5E1285,00.html
Who Puts the Most Bugs in the Web?
Web bugs are objects (images, iframes, etc.) on a Web page that are retrieved from a completely different Web site. Most Web bugs are banner ads and others can be harmless visitor counters, for example. Sneaky Web bugs, however, can learn your IP address and surfing habits. Security Space recently surveyed Web bugs and came up with some expected and some surprising results. First, the expected: in terms of traffic, ad servers DoubleClick and Akamai rule. File under surprising this result: Microsoft marketing portal bCentral ranked third in terms of traffic and first in terms of number of bugged sites (using its old linkexchange.com domain). Demon, an ISP in the UK, ranked second in number of bugged sites. Web bugs don't have to be evidence of evil, but the results do make one pause and think. ZDNet takes a closer look.Security Space: http://www.securityspace.com/s_survey/data/man.200102/webbug.html
ZDNet: http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2692472,00.html
ICANN Still Not Making Friends
Originally, the .org domain was meant for non-profit organizations only. But that was never enforced, and anyone willing to pay the registration fee could get a .org top-level domain (TLD). Now the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the ruling body over Internet domain names, has proposed rescinding the .org TLD from all but legitimate non-profits - meaning many companies and individuals would lose their domain name. This is the latest in a string of unpopular moves by ICANN, including its $50,000 fee for new TLD proposals of which ICANN received over 40 applications but chose only seven. Oh, and by the way, those new TLDs will be delayed. Such behavior has some companies developing alternate methods of domain registration. New.net, part of Idealab, has initiated an attempt to break ICANN's monopoly of control by offering new TLDs. Wired has the scoop..Org: http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/17299.html
Delays: http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010304/wr/icann_domains_dc_3.html
New.net: http://www.new.net/
Wired: http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,42146,00.html
Microsoft bought WebTV in 1997 for a cool $425 million. The Net on TV technology never quite became the barn burner that Microsoft hoped for, and culture clashes between acquirer and acquiree didn't help, so now the company is folding the service into MSN. WebTV users will now receive MSN services through their TV devices. As corporate shake-ups go, this is hardly earth-shattering, but it does show how tough it can be to figure out consumers or to transform neat technology into a commercial success. Other visions of PC-TV combinations, notably efforts by Gateway, Compaq, and AOL, have floundered as well. CNet has all the details. Microsoft still plans to go ahead with its UltimateTV service, offering interactive TV, digital video recording, satellite TV and Internet access, but that's run separately. Clear?
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1006-200-4997557.html
The last surviving TV Star Trek franchise, Star Trek: Voyager, wraps up later this year but, never the kind of people to let a cash cow die, the Trek bigwigs plan a new show for next fall. Just about all that's really known is that the show is being developed and that Paramount recently sent out a casting call. That hasn't stopped the rumors from flying, though. Section31.com posted an alleged list of characters. TrekToday also had that story, but later sort of backpedaled. Slashdotters, of course, are always eager to toss their two bits in.
Section31.com: http://www.section31.com/stories/mar-2001/030301_d.htm
TrekToday: http://www.trektoday.com/news/050301_05.shtml
Slashdot: http://slashdot.org/articles/01/03/04/2237237.shtml
The first trailer from the upcoming "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's (ugh) Stone" has been released on the Internet at the Warner Brothers Web site. The magic begins November 16 at theaters everywhere.
http://harrypotter.warnerbros.com/web/index.jsp
ONLINE CULTURE
The "All Your Base" Phenomenon Redux
First, let us point you to the Corrections item below that mentions a few more sites where you can find the "All Your Base" video, as the site we referred you to last week went on the way to destruction. Now let us introduce a few more sites. The All Your Base Are Belong to Us History Page follows the development of the phenomenon from beginning to end. We got a few facts wrong last issue - it didn't start with a Tribal War thread. This page will set you straight and lead you to even more, including an article that appeared in last week's Time magazine and a movie review at Jiminy Critic. You can even buy official (by the songwriter) and "bootleg" merchandise now. Heck, there are two - yes, two - Yahoo clubs devoted to the thingHistory: http://hubert.retrogames.com/history.htm
Official: http://www.cafepress.com/tlmom/
Bootleg: http://www.atomo.com/ayb.html
Yahoo Club 1: http://clubs.yahoo.com/clubs/allyourbasetheclub/
Yahoo Club 1: http://clubs.yahoo.com/clubs/allyourbasearebelongtous/
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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 affiliate Amazon.com, and send a few pennies our way as well.
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Jupiter
The Collected Stories of Arthur C. Clarke
The Tiananmen Papers: The Chinese Leadership's Decision to Use ForceAgainst Their Own People - In Their Own Words
InfernoSURFING SITES
Explore Two Concentration Camps
"The concentration and death-camp complex at Auschwitz-Birkenau was the largest killing center in the entire Nazi universe; the very heart of their system. Of the many sub-camps affiliated with Auschwitz, Birkenau, or Auschwitz II, was by far the largest." "The Mauthausen camp was one of the most infamous in the entire Nazi alternate universe of human destruction. Many people, most of whom were innocent of any crimes, were tortured to death in its rock quarry." Pardon us for quoting so liberally, but those explanations match anything we couldadd. These highly interactive pages lead the viewer through two death complexes in a series of technically excellent photos with attached text. The photos, taken in 1996, are incredible, very grim and very moving. The text pulls no punches. We wish we could recommend the parent site, Remember.org, but it uses the ludicrous technique of maximizing your browser window. If you must visit it, use the "To Cybrary of the Holocaust home page" link.http://www.remember.org/camps/
The World Resources Game is an infinite set of user-configurable multiplayer role-playing games based on global trends, resources, and economics. One player sets up a scenario and invites others to join the online game, A judge, often the player who set up the scenario, oversees play. The site offers a variety of examples, the ability to start up a game of your own, and games waiting tostart or in progress that you can join. Games range from the silly to the complex, realistic, and challenging. Players communicate via e-mail and submit moves before deadlines. The judge (and sometimes others) determines outcomes and communicates them to all players. Then a new turn ensues. Here's your chance to run the world the way you know it should be run.
http://www.worldgame.org/networldgame/index.html
Up-to-the-Hour War News and History
The War Elephant site monitors the news from over 1,800 publications as it tracks military news and international affairs, and monitors the latest about many of the world's hot spots. The huge amount of content is this site's blessing and its curse. You cannot, alas, search the information. Without a decent search function, you'll either not find what you're seeking or spend way too much time looking. That's not the only problem. The bulk of the content, although high in quality, comes on one huge page that takes far too long to load even for readers with fast DSL or cable connections; users of modems be forewarned. That's a shame, since no other site has the breadth of current information on this site.http://www.warelephant.com/
Codebreaking for Pleasure, Not Profit
While his playmates fumbled with Crackerjack secret decoder rings, young Jim Reeds was no doubt compiling an analysis of World War II Enigma machines. Jim grew up to be an AT&T Labs Mathematics and Cryptography scientist with ten patents to his credit. Welcome to the world of Jim's spare time, where you'll find the story of how he broke a complex code written by a prominent 15th century monk who disguised it in trashy magic treatises, a data base of the 19th and early 20th century code books used to condense telegram messages, and citations on one of the world's most mysterious texts, the Voynich Manuscript. The page is a compelling hash of the musings of a mathematical genius.http://www.research.att.com/~reeds/
A Theme Park Site that Has Nothing to Do with Sims
People who like theme parks, especially kids with affluent parents willing to travel, have many choices. Enter ThemeParkInsider.com, where you can gather information about theme-park attractions, restaurants, and hotels. Register and you can submit your own ratings and reviews. This is definitely a site to check out if your weekend or vacation plans include a theme park. Editor Robert Niles, of Pasadena, Calif., presents opinions (mainly upbeat, but not shy of criticism) and links to resources in a visually appealing and convenient way that is likely to reward your research. At our latest visit, the readers chose as their top three parks Islands of Adventure (Universal Orlando, Orlando, Fla.), Disney-MGM Studios (Walt Disney World, Orlando, Fla.), and Port Aventura (Universal Studios, Costa Daurada, Spain). Parents will appreciate the BestBets for Toddlers and Best Bets for Kids sections. Palm VII users can download a custom application or connect with the site's wireless page for pocket info on the go.http://www.themeparkinsider.com/
One Part Swedish, One Part Arabic, One Part Hatt
If you like music videos - and "All Your Base" - hurry on over to catch this site's great video. It seems to have started as a perfectly innocuous song in Arabic, but somewhere along the line morphed into transliterated Swedish subtitles with images from who knows where. The graphics do not reach Madonna video quality, but have an odd charm of their own. The Coke bottle seemed out of place, although it may provide an important plot point. It is, in a nutshell, very, very odd. It's also very, very loud, and rather mesmerizing. By the end of your second viewing, you're going to be singing along with the Swedish subtitles - unless you know Arabic, we suppose. We cannot recommend a third viewing and retain our clear collective conscience. Reader explanations are encouraged.http://come.to/hatten/
How to Look Cool and Pick Up Chicks
"Most people think 'car guys' always have dirt underneath their nails (and some do) but even dirt could look appropriate with a tuxedo, if you wear it theRIGHT way!" And so begins our journey into the world of Curry, a race-car driver with some refreshing views on life, permanently pursed lips, and terracotta blonde hair that would sit quite impressively on any Charlie's Angel. Come and share his diverting "PICK-UP-A-CHICK" video series on, yes, picking up chicks - although he's perfected only one of six techniques so far. In the meantime, take a peek just to see the photos. Sure makes those other drivers look downright colorless.http://www.rubberburner.com/
A Nag a Day Keeps the Clutter Away
If you're anything like us, you're amazed and horrified at how clutter has crept up on you over the years, to the point where moving is out of the question because then you'd have to pack all that junk. Have you heard of FlyLady yet? She's been on Oprah and in several fine print publications. If not, let us introduce you. At first - heck, on an ongoing basis, even - you may find the tone of her daily e-mail housekeeping reminders a little too "girlfriend", but somehow, insidiously, her approach seems to work. Our reviewer, a diehard barefoot gal, has not heeded FlyLady's frequent exhortations to put on lace-up shoes first thing in the morning, but nonetheless the week she's spent on this list seems to have had some effect on the state of her house. If you can see past the corny acronyms (we're all Sidetracked Home Executives, and FlyLady wants to teach you to Finally Love Yourself) you might just find that the brainwashing of all those reminders sneaks up on you and gets your house a bit more liveable. You never know.http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FlyLadyMentors/
King Features' Comics, Editorial Cartoons, and Columns
You probably know King Features as a comic strip syndicator, but it also has editorial cartoonists, game and puzzle features, and columnists in its ranks. Its site contains current and archived versions of its 61 strips ranging from Prince Valiant to Sally Forth to the new Edge City. The site makes finding and viewing any strip simple. The columns cover everything from Dr. Ruth to some pretty extreme political opinions. The editorial cartoonists range over the entire political spectrum. Three different sets of crosswords are offered along with many popular newspaper word games. There's also a bridge quiz and some children's games.http://www.kingfeatures.com/features/comics/comics.htm
We confess we were unnerved by the following statement: "Now 15000 customers have made confidence to our best and funny service!!", but we thought the idea of sending a postcard from across the world was just too tempting to let a little bit of outrageous French communication indigestion get in the way. And sure, sending a postcard from say, Yugoslavia, could be pretty funny, especially if everyone knows you're a Net addict who rarely leaves the house to get milk. Still, the question remains: what the hell do you write on it and how do you explain this brief moment of giddiness to your friends or relatives when they ring up to ask what the heck is going on?
http://www.postcardland.com/
Governments and cabals are all watching, all listening. You know they read every e-mail you write and send. Conspiracy theorists have pointed it out for years, yet only now have you seen the truth. Software helps combat this invasion - PGP and GnuPG integrate with an awful lot of stuff these days and let you quickly encrypt your e-mail to resemble a pile of noise. But why lean towards the complex? It's too obvious that you're encrypting your mail to keep it from prying eyes. Instead, let the Illuminati see plenty of your e-mail and bore them to tears with it. SpamMimic encrypts any message as long diatribes of order processing and plenty of ways to get rich quick. The result can be fed back into SpamMimic by the recipient to reveal the original message. Presto! E-mail that looks like all the other crap out there. It's kind of like a Q ship of electronic communication.
http://www.spammimic.com/explain.shtml
ONLINE TRAVEL
Fire and Ice and Travel Pics That Are Nice
Got cabin fever? You'll love Fire and Ice Photography, a collection of fascinating landscape photos and assorted travel articles by professional photographer, writer, and (apparently) site designer Mark Dornblaser. A monument to patience and craft, Dornblaser has snapped travel photos since childhood. His background and passion is splendidly evident. "My quest has taken me from Alaska to Antarctica, from Africa to Australia," he states on his "bio" page, "in order to preserve on film the grand landscapes that are in danger of succumbing to man's encroachment." His seven glorious galleries - Fire and Ice, Cape Cod, Badlands, Alaska, The West, Nepal, and Africa - convey diurnal and nocturnal grandeur of land and sea, peak and glacier, river and sky, all with rich color, dramatic contrast, and instant appeal. Many of Mark's vistas are spectacular. It's hard to single out any for special recognition, except the fantastic and almost surreal view of Antelope Canyon on the home page. Dornblaser's is the majestic kind of art that many students of photography - and, we dare say, many colleagues of his - dream of. His pop-up window for gallery navigation is convenient, and enlargements of his thumbnails load quickly. What a marriage of emulsion and electron! Exquisite.http://www.fireandicephoto.com/
Longitude Is the One that Goes Sideways, Right?
If you're one of those gadget gurus who bought a GPS as soon as they hit the shelves and then didn't know exactly what to do with it beside mess with commercial pilots' heads, you have a new calling. The Degree Confluence Project needs you. As explained in the FAQ, "The goal of the project is to visit eachof the latitude and longitude integer degree intersections in the world, and to take pictures at each location." The result is a fascinating definition of our planet, much in the same vein as the Balloon Hat Experience (NSD 5.25) or Mark A. Thomas's Payphone Project (NSD 4.18).http://confluence.org/
The Canal Zone Brats home page is imbued with the high school reunion spirit we all may wish we could have. The camaraderie is so palpable it somehowtranscends low grade nostalgia. Maybe it's because the zone was such an exotic, peaceful place to grow up. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that the canal was one of America's greatest triumphs both as an engineering feat, and in the end, as a political gesture of good faith. Photos and memoirs capture the all-American city-state bounded by impoverished Spanish-speaking indigenous people, by jungle, and by the great canal itself. Historical links harken back and the latest news links old friends who may have lost touch.
http://www.czbrats.com/
We found some very nice photos and a bit of hiking information, but on the whole, the content here spreads a little thin. You have to admire the symmetry, however. Many of the offerings come in groups of three: three main pages; three photos of the Mount Garibaldi area; poems presented in groups of three; etc. Even the Knowledge folder contains exactly three articles - though try as we might, we really never quite made the connection between British Columbia and the essay on the biogeography of the sweet orange. Our best guess on the orange thing was that these rogue western Canadians might be planning to corner the market on oranges when global warming heats the planet enough to allow them to grow up there. Crafty, eh?
http://www.aquapulse.net/
FLOTSAM & JETSAM
How sick of that monkey are you? If you read NSD, probably very. Now you can sit at your computer and bash away at a poor defenseless monkey as dabs of blood spatter on the background and the site begs you to stop.http://members.nbci.com/spiralmike/flash/monkey2.html
A new haiku every day? If that thrills you, subscribe to Tinywords.com. You can even submit your own if you like. If we were clever, we'd make up a haiku about this site, but we're not, in fact we can't even think what to say next.
http://tinywords.com/
Mad Cow Disease or BSE, for which we'll spare you the expansion of the acronym, has been in the headlines of late. A formal report filed in October 2000 to the UK government describes the history and response to BSE and variants, along with how it has been handled by different fields.
http://www.bseinquiry.gov.uk/
Our reviewer saw this site in February, Black History Month. "Glory", a movie celebrating black Americans' contributions to the Civil War, is highlighted. This is a great chance to watch movies you may never have considered before, for reasons based on someone else's clever analysis of the calendar.
http://movie-a-day.com/
CORRECTIONS
All Your Base Are Move Fresh Site
To borrow a phrase, it appears we have slashdotted the "All Your Base" site we brought to your attention last issue. ("Slashdotted" means sent so much traffic, the site went offline.) No matter, the Flash flick can be found at several places. Here are a few more....All Your Base: http://curtis.curtisfong.org/fobonics/bases/
All Your Base: http://modzer0.cs.uaf.edu/~warbird/movies/AYB%5B1%5D.swf