BREAKING SURF
| Blogger Personality Typology |
| E-Mail Addresses: To Obfuscate or Not to Obfuscate? |
| ISP Firewalling: Opt-In or Opt-Out? |
| Forgotten New York City... |
| ...And Forgotten Detroit |
| Postcards from Disneyland |
| "Nukie", the Worst Movie of All Time |
| Art of the First Cities |
| Pictures and Cultures of Native Americans |
| Writing in Elvish |
| The Rocky Fellowship Palantir Show |
| Four-Word Film Reviews |
| Netsurfer Recommendations |
| GI Blog from Iraq |
| Breaking the "The Baroque Cycle" Code |
| Numbers by Color |
| Enough to Drive You Batty |
| The Speed of Gravity |
| Beating Gravity |
| Sky-Darkness Predictor for Astronomers |
| Skype: Peer-to-Peer Internet Phone Software |
| New Source Code Comparison Algorithm and Software |
| BOOK REVIEWS |
| LETTERS TO THE EDITOR |
| Contact and Subscription Information |
| Credits |
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BREAKING SURF
Every obituary will tell you that Edward Teller was known as the father of the hydrogen bomb. Teller was even thinking about building his H-bomb while he was supposed to be working on the Manhattan Project's atomic bomb, which pissed off his fellow scientists because his duties had to be re-assigned. Later, Teller, along with Stanislaw Ulam, did indeed discover how to set off a fusion H-bomb using the light pressure from the explosion of a fission A-bomb. The politicians loved him, but his fellow atomic scientists never forgave him for testifying to Congress that Manhattan Project leader Robert Oppenheimer was untrustworthy. Teller worked tirelessly to promote the H-bomb but was not named to head the project of developing it. He did some good atomic science over the years, but is perhaps best known in the political arena, most recently for his strong support of ballistic missile defense (a.k.a. Star Wars). This endeared him even more to conservative politicians, and just this past July, President Bush awarded the Hungarian-born Teller the highest US civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom. We have a few bio links, a relevant Amazon offering, and a do-it-yourself H-bomb Web site.Teller: http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/bios/teller.html
PBS Bio: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/bomb/peopleevents/pandeAMEX73.html
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0684824140/netsurferdigest
How to Build an H-Bomb: http://my.ohio.voyager.net/~dionisio/fun/make-your-own-h-bomb.html
The word legend gets thrown around pretty casually these days - God knows we do it all the time - but in the realm of country music it is surely justified when applied to Johnny Cash. Think about the statistics: 1500+ songs on about 500 albums which combined have sold more then 50 million records, 11 Grammy Awards, host of a TV show, author of best-selling autobiography, 38 years of touring. It's all quite staggering without even considering his influence on several generations of musicians. Undeniably, the man also led a troubled personal life, beset by addiction and occasional bouts of political incorrectness. But in the long term who will remember those things? In the long term there will only be the music. On the eve of his death there is one album, his last, which is eerily appropriate to the occasion: "American IV: The Man Comes Around". Turn down the lights and listen to it. It's the only way to say goodbye to Johnny Cash.
Johnny Cash: http://www.johnnycash.com/
American IV: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00006L7XQ/netsurferdigest
There are four things you need to know about Leni Riefenstahl: she made the greatest propaganda film ever, "Triumph of the Will"; she made the greatest sports documentary film ever, "Olympia"; she took the famous and beautiful photographs of the erotic and beautiful Nuba tribe in Africa; and she was scuba diving and making underwater films at the age of 100. OK, there's a fifth thing: she appeared uncredited in some of the nude athletic shots in the beginning of "Olympia". These things circumscribed her life and all of them, maybe with the exception of the nude thing and the scuba, were controversial and remain profoundly influential to this day. To the end of her long life, she could never live down "Triumph of the Will" or questions about her closeness to Adolph Hitler - she always denied having an affair with him. It's probably fair to say that in her 101 years, Riefenstahl lived more lives than most of us can dream of, though not all of them we would wish to live.
Leni Riefenstahl: http://www.leni-riefenstahl.de/
Filmguide to "Triumph of the Will": http://www.stanford.edu/class/ihum42/filmguide.pdf
"Triumph of the Will": http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00004WLXZ/netsurferdigest
"Olympia": http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/6304459025/netsurferdigest
"Last of the Nuba": http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0312136420/netsurferdigest
NASA's incredibly successful Galileo spacecraft is going to plunge into Jupiter's atmosphere Sept. 21, ending one of the most ambitious and productive missions in the agency's history. From Galileo, we learned that the Jovian system might harbor life in Europa's vast ice-covered ocean and witnessed Io's volcanoes erupting against the backdrop of space. In its final transmissions, Galileo will tell us even more about Jupiter's magnetosphere. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory has a site that is counting down the craft's end, complete with amazing pictures and videos from the mission. To think that this mission launched in 1989, before the Web, with incredibly primitive hardware, makes the site all the more remarkable.
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo/countdown/
The Impact of Aliens on Religion
In "E.T. and God", noted science writer and scholar Paul Davies ponders the possible impact of the discovery of intelligent life elsewhere in the universe on organized religions. The piece is published in the September issue of Atlantic, but that magazine does not make Davies's piece available online for non-subscribers. The article is available from an unknown someone who's posted it in PDF format. Davies handles the provocative question with aplomb, reviewing a wide range of implications in his usual thorough and winning manner. He concludes that most religions seem to have wriggle room for just about any discovery and would probably survive - although not without considerable adaptation - evidence that we're not alone in the universe after all. Don't let our spoiler deter you from reading the intriguing, nine-page piece.Article: http://216.128.67.116/pdf/davies.pdf
Atlantic: http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2003/09/
Global Privacy and Human Rights Report
EPIC and UK Privacy International have just released their sixth annual Privacy and Human Rights survey of 55 countries. The report notes a major shift in privacy policies around the world. Using the events of Sept. 11 as justification, "governments have seized the response to the threat of terrorism to enhance their powers, affecting many fundamental human rights, including privacy." The report notes that "the novelty is the speed in which these policies gained acceptance" despite an increased public opposition to such police powers.http://www.privacyinternational.org/survey/phr2003/
Right now, in the US, around 10,000 webcams observe public places. If that number surprises you or makes you worried, you'll probably welcome the efforts of Carnegie Mellon University's Data Privacy Lab to map them all. Part of the lab's surveillance of surveillances effort, the SOS Camera Watch aims to make sure nothing is hidden, to raise awareness of the potential for invasion of privacy, to provoke discussion, and stimulate formulation of policies governing such cameras. Right now, the project has a huge backlog of data awaiting entry and only a few hundred actual links at the site. We expect that number to grow quickly. Most of the existing links provide still shots or video from cameras connected with universities and research organizations. Some cameras at jails have been shut down as a result of lawsuits. Some locations let you control the camera yourself, although you may have to queue for the privilege of doing so. Find out where Big Brother is watching and what he's seeing.
http://privacy.cs.cmu.edu/dataprivacy/projects/camwatch/
Vince Briel wants to send you a brand new Apple I computer. It's a neat trick since the machines have not been manufactured by Apple in several decades. Briel is an old computer buff who wanted to build and sell replicas of the legendary Apple I, one of the very first personal computers. He rebuilt the electronics with modern components that corresponded closely to the originals and went to Apple for permission to use the original ROM software. Getting no response, he did the next reasonable thing - he asked the programmer, Steve Wozniack, for permission. Woz was more than happy to help Briel and noted that he distributed the design long before he hooked up with Steve Jobs and founded Apple Computers. There's no word from Apple about any of this yet, so Briel is for now taking orders for new Apple Is on his Replica I Web site. Wired has more.
Wired: http://www.wired.com/news/mac/0,2125,60329,00.html
Replica I: http://www.applefritter.com/apple1/members/replica1/index.htm
The Experiment Ends: George Hotelling Sells His iTunes Song
As you recall (NSD 9.34), George Hotelling first tried to resell a song he bought from Apple's iTunes Music Store last week on eBay to test the legality of reselling electronic music. eBay shut his auction down, but Apple equivocated over the legality of reselling. An Apple official said it was impractical and left it at that. Hotelling did manage to sell the song, for 50 cents, but he admits it was impractical because he actually had to transfer his iTunes account to the buyer. He has documented the experience in his weblog.NSD 9.24: http://www.netsurf.com/nsd/sub/v09/nsd.09.34.html#BS2
Hotelling: http://george.hotelling.net/90percent/geekery/impractical.php
We live for headlines like that. Adrian Lamo, 22, is a mild celebrity in hacking circles for his habit of breaking into high-profile sites, alerting the sites, then helping them fix the holes. He fancies himself a white-hat hacker, and by all accounts he really does help big sites like Yahoo, WorldCom, and Blogger fix the holes he finds. He's even earned some praise from them in the process. The FBI sought him on a sealed warrant, and Lamo arranged with his attorney to turn himself in after getting the FBI to make public the charges against him. The FBI wants him for a high-profile public hack of the New York Times last year, which apparently did not amuse the paper. He is quoted as saying "I have always said that actions have consequences, and this is something that I was always aware might happen. I don't intend to deny anything that I have done, but I do intend to defend myself vigorously." SecurityFocus has more, including a discussion forum, while Wired has news of his turning himself in.
SecurityFocus: http://www.securityfocus.com/news/6888
Wired: http://wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,60365,00.html
P2P Software Companies Pay 12-Year-Old's RIAA Settlement Bill
If you've paid attention to all those RIAA subpoena stories you already know that the association hit a 12-year-old girl with one of those file-sharer lawsuits. The story generated almost tabloid-like headlines. Ultimately, the girl's mom agreed to pay $2,000 to the RIAA to make the whole thing go away. Now comes news that P2P United, a peer-to-peer (P2P) industry trade group that includes Grokster, StreamCast Networks, Limewire and other file-trading software companies, agreed to pay her settlement fees. These RIAA stories are just getting more and more ridiculous. Who'd have thought that the music industry would sue 12-year-olds who actually want their product? CNET has more.http://cnet.com.com/2100-1027_3-5074227.html
A US federal judge has ruled that software that associates a company's pop-up ads with the Web site of a competitor is legal. Truck rental company U-Haul sued software-maker WhenU after it found out that WhenU's programs popped up a rival's ads whenever users browsed the U-Haul site. WhenU's software is usually installed by users when they install free screensavers or games. The judge ruled that WhenU did not do anything wrong, since the users had freely agreed - by boilerplate license agreement, at least - to install the software. U-Haul may appeal the ruling. Of course, all this has little effect on our sage readers since you are already blocking pop-up ads, right? Wired has a brief story.
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,60347,00.html
Project Cybersyn, the Chilean "Socialist Internet"
In the early 1970s, Chile was in the midst of a revolutionary upheaval under the Marxist government of Salvador Allende. In this heady ideological atmosphere, Chile employed an Englishman named Stafford Beer to, in his words, "implant" an electronic "nervous system" in Chilean society. The idea was to link workers and the factories inherited by Allende's planners in a national interactive communications network that would harvest economic data from the farthest corners of the country in a control room in Santiago. The Guardian, in its story about this Project Cybersyn, calls it "a sort of socialist internet" years ahead of its time. After the CIA overthrew the Allende government in a coup, the ambitious project was largely forgotten. You may also wish to check out a rather busy Beer biography.Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/chile/story/0,13755,1037547,00.html
Beer: http://www.wagmusic.demon.co.uk/vanilla/staffordbeer.htm
Lists of rich people always provide such vicarious fun, letting us throw imaginary tomatoes or dream what it would be like to be so wealthy. Fortune's 40 Under 40 is particularly envy-inducing. Silicon Valley's finances may be the subject of vigorous discussion but dotcommers still dominate this list of those under 40 years of age, at least at the top end. Alas, we only get to see the first ten for free - the rest is available only to subscribers - but each name is linked to a short bio which in turn links to related articles. Michael Dell is in a class of his own here, safely ensconced way at the top with nobody else even close. Only age (he's 38) seems likely to eventually knock him off the top spot in this compilation. Just exactly what does one do with wealth like that, we wonder, although it's not a problem most of us will ever have to contend with. Rounding out this package is a game that involves guessing the youngest of seven pairs of celebrities and sidebar links to other financial lists. All in all, there's a lot here for free, but also more for those who wish to pay.
http://www.fortune.com/fortune/40under40/richest/
New/Old Heinlein Novel to Be Published
Who says dead men don't write? Robert Heinlein, one of the founders of modern science fiction in the mid-20th century, died in 1988. The author of such famous tales as "The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress", "Starship Troopers", and the classic "Stranger in a Strange Land", was a prodigious writer. He originally wrote a recently discovered work, "For Us, the Living", before he was a published author. Had that been all he ever wrote, he would have remained unpublished, as no one has ever set that book in print. One surviving copy recently turned up, and "For Us, the Living" will finally appear in bookstores in November. The book was considered too racy to publish in the late 1930s. Given that Heinlein's later novels are replete with sex and discussions of gender identity, one wonders just what is in this volume. The Heinlein Society has some information, and you can pre-order a copy from Amazon below and see for yourself.Heinlein Society: http://www.heinleinsociety.org/newsFUTL.html
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/074325998X/netsurferdigest
Jenny Everywhere - Open-Source Superhero
A new superhero has been born in Canada. Unlike Batman, she's not copyrighted, and won't be. The creators of Jenny Everywhere, known as the Shifter, have released her into the public domain, and anybody can use the character in comics, videos, or whatever without paying a royalty fee or asking permission. The Shifter can find herself anywhere, but anyone who uses her must follow one rule: you can employ her in your medium, but you have no claim to copyright. Beyond that, the creators suggest some guidelines to follow, if only to assure consistency, but by no means demand it. If you think you've got artistic and story talent, don't let the Shifter grow moldy. Exclaim has the scoop on her creation.Jenny Everywhere: http://www.queergranny.com/jennyeverywhere/
Exclaim: http://www.exclaim.ca/index.asp?layid=22&csid1=1821
US Pursues Case Against Typo-Squatter
Have you ever mistyped a domain name and found yourself at a Web site you really don't want to see? Quite possibly, you wandered onto a site owned by typo-squatter John Zuccarini, who, for example, directs those looking for "teltubbies" (a misspelled "teletubbies") to Hanky Panky College. The US government is about to pin Zuccarini to the wall with the Protect Act of 2003, which passed earlier this year and which, among other things, makes it a criminal offense to misdirect netsurfers, especially kids, to pornographic content. The Department of Justice has arrested Zuccarini for violating this new law. Zuccarini faces up to four years in jail and substantial fines. We suspect Zuccarini's lawyers will contest the law on free speech grounds, but their client is not going to generate a great deal of sympathy. He has been sued over 60 times for cybersquatting. A Wired article gives some good background on the case. In the meantime, watch out for typos.Wired: http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,60307,00.html
Protect Act: http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pr/2003/April/03_ag_266.htm
In an apparent effort to seek comfort, if not safety, in numbers, over 150 spammers have joined an online solace and tactics organization called the Bulk Club. Launched six months ago or so, the site charges $20 per month for access, and spammers apparently have the wherewithal to pony up that kind of change. For the investment, members get access to a message board, spam software, articles relating to spamming, and, ominously, 300,000 fresh e-mail addresses each week. Wired has a brief article about the place.
http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,60224,00.html
Brits Plan to Bare Bums at Bush
When President George Bush shows up in Portland, Ore. - often referred to as "little Beirut" - protestors come out and riot in the streets. Some folks in the UK have a much better approach. Armed with the suspicion that Bush will visit the UK later this year, they are organizing in advance a flash mob, with the emphasis on "flash". The flash-mobbers plan to drop trou and moon the President. Their Bare Your Bum at the Bush campaign has a small Web site. The strategy would be amusing, no matter whom it was directed toward - it brings back fond memories of collegial camaraderie. But when the target is a Bush, well...the entendre makes even us blush.http://www.bloggerheads.com/can_weblogs/bush_bum.asp
Google Offers Blogger Pro's Features for Free
Until now, Blogger has been offering two tiers of service. You could start and run your own blog with a fairly simple set of features for free, but if you wanted more advanced features - better editing tools, syndication, e-mail posting, and others - you had to pay $35/year for the Blogger Pro service. Evan Williams, co-founder of Blogger, has announced that Google, which recently acquired Blogger, has released Blogger Pro's features to all Blogger subscribers for free. Paid-up Blogger Pro subscribers can opt for either a Blogger sweatshirt or a pro-rated refund of their subscription - offer good until October 1.http://new.blogger.com/feature_giveaway/pro_email.pyra
ONLINE CULTURE
Dave Kelly maps bloggers (and others) to 16 different personality types on his PTypes Weblog metablog (a blog about blogs). Bloggers of blogs linked in the left column of his metablog seem to have rated themselves while Kelly posts his own running commentary and evaluations to the right. The rating system is better explained at Kelly's other site, PTypes - the Four Temperaments, which also holds the self-test. The analysis has a bit of a "Let me tell you what personality type Einstein was" feel to it. Although we can guess from outward signs, there's no way to test Einstein's brain to tell us how his thought process works and validate an assessor's guess. Until these folks take tests for themselves, Kelly's evaluation remains a parlor game, but it is interesting to take the test for yourself and then read the blogs of others who claim to be the same category as you.PTypes Weblog: http://ptypes.pitas.com/
PTypes - the Four Temperaments: http://www.geocities.com/ptypes/index.html
E-Mail Addresses: To Obfuscate or Not to Obfuscate?
That is the question, and it came up after Declan McCullagh proposed hiding the e-mail addresses in the archives of his long-running Politech mailing list. McCullagh suggested that the archiving software should obscure the e-mail addresses of the posters in order to prevent spammers from grabbing them. John Gilmore responded with another question: "Why have you fallen into the all-too-common fallacy of thinking that if email addresses aren't published anywhere, that will help 'solve' the problem of unwanted communications?...Have we reached a Brave New World in which we all start rewriting online history to suit today's prejudices?" Gilmore went on to argue that he doesn't want his communications to be "obfuscated" in the historical record. It's a philosophically appealing argument, but will it withstand the relentless onslaught of spam in the real world?http://politechbot.com/p-05052.html
ISP Firewalling: Opt-In or Opt-Out?
Should your ISP block certain communication ports by default? Much of the security mayhem these days comes from hackers and worms that exploit open communications ports on ordinary users' computers. It is within the power of ISPs to close off those ports, but should they do this by default? One argument holds that clueless users should be protected and their incoming traffic on rarely used ports should be firewalled off - most will never even know it let alone miss it. The clueful ones can ask the ISP to unblock their ports. The opposing argument is that the ISP should never mess with traffic and should only provide an unfiltered communication channel. As soon as you allow ISPs to mess with your traffic, you are effectively handing them a mechanism for censoring what you get. Having to request an unblocking port also opens a window for an ISP to charge a fee, and allows poor customer service another place to nest. The technical community is deeply split over the issue, as Slashdot's heated discussion reveals. Chances are, the marketplace will ultimately decide the issue as users are given a choice of ISP policies.http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/09/07/2343254
ONLINE TRAVEL
Tour New York City like you never have before. Forgotten NY is a tribute to lost and forgotten places in the Big Apple. Webmaster Kevin Walsh's online homage takes the visitor on a virtual expedition of architectural accents and nooks and crannies obscured within the city. Explore abandoned hospitals, old theatres, and decrepit cemeteries. Next, review the architectural facade of another era through street lamps, street surfaces, and ancient signs. For a truly remarkable look at this extraordinary city, stop by the "You'd Never Believe You're in NYC" pages. Here you'll discover a look at the greener side of New York, including parks, airfields, and lakes. If, after all this virtual sightseeing, you're still looking for more, check out the Forgottentours page for a look at group excursions by fans of the site who wanted a first-hand view of New York's forgotten spots.http://www.forgotten-ny.com/
Ford and General Motors may want you to identify Detroit as the center of the automotive world, but a lot of former residents consider the Motor City a drag. It's easy to see why at Forgotten Detroit, a photographic mausoleum and painstaking tribute to a city "known for one of the most stunning collections of pre-depression architecture in the world." Boosters of the metropolis that all but crushed public transportation in America point to the city's urban redevelopment, but let's face it: who wants to live there? Detroit is a classic example of abandonment and decay. Check out the rubble and gang grafitti at, say, Michigan Central Depot. Photographer and site developer David Kohrman, a senior at Western Michigan University who studies public history, documents this monumental hulk with 62 photos of a kind foreign to glitzy marketing brochures and civic ad campaigns. Kohrman believes Detroit "is recovering from its 40-year decline" and asks whether its manifold ruins should be restored or demolished. He favors restoration. Our Midwestern reviewer, who grew up in a suburb of smog-ridden Motown, considers demolition a smarter move by far.
http://www.forgottendetroit.com/
Some people just can't get enough of Disney. This graphics-intensive site helps out with its primary purpose, a focus on postcards from Disneyland, and other sections on Walt Disney the man and his art. The site owner touts the site as the only place on the Web dedicated exclusively to Disney postcards - even though it obviously is not so exclusive - and admits to being an avid collector with 585 postcards in his collection. We'll forgive the misspoken boast. Whether you're interested in vintage Disney or fresh crops of Disneyland postcards, you'll find something worth a look.
http://www.disneylandpostcards.com/
ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT
"Nukie", the Worst Movie of All Time
Dreck, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. There does however seem to be a consensus among all who have seen the 1993 SF flick "Nukie" that the movie does indeed suck like nothing else before or since - and not in an enjoyable way, like "Plan 9 from Outer Space". The eponymous hero is a snot-nosed E.T. lookalike with none of the charm of Spielberg's character, who happens upon Earth while travelling the universe with his similarly hideous brother Miko. Miko falls into the clutches of evil human scientists who get busy with the anal probe, while Nukie crash lands on the plains of Africa where he is befriended by two children from the local, and crassly culturally stereotyped, tribe. The plot, such as it is, revolves around Nukie's attempts to save his brother, and we won't spoil it for those dumb enough to actually try and track this turkey down and watch it. The better bet, given that this movie most certainly does not fall into the so-bad-it's-good category of film, is to read how others have responded to the work, as follows. X-Entertainment even provides clips.IMDB: http://imdb.com/Details?0107715
X-Entertainment: http://www.x-entertainment.com/articles/0785/
Something Awful: http://www.somethingawful.com/articles.php?a=421
Stomp Tokyo: http://www.stomptokyo.com/movies/n/nukie.html
B-Notes: http://www.jabootu.com/acolytes/bnotes/nukie.htm
Even in the hardscrabble times of the third millennium BCE, people found room for art. And that's what's presented here. The Metropolitan Museum of Art put this site up to complement an exhibit than ran until the middle of August 2003. The art is pretty cool, without question, but the cities and the photos thereof - that's rather an unexpected treat. As a result, we have a site that not only art-lovers can enjoy; people interested in history and photography will find a draw here as well. What important find lies in the desert a hundred miles south of Baghdad? This place will tell.
http://www.metmuseum.org/explore/First_Cities/firstcities_main.htm
Pictures and Cultures of Native Americans
The Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley offers an online exhibition of European images of Native Americans. This library is one of those places you never seem to hear about, but it's a huge repository of history of the American west. When it comes to documenting American Indian culture, it is second to none, and you can find enough illustrations, photos, and early interpretives here to satisfy any appetite. Quick question: where did baseball come from? From information presented in this exhibit, it looks like native culture had a profound influence on the game as it developed in the US. It's quite possible that those native cultures hold more influence in everyday life than you might have first imagined.http://bancroft.berkeley.edu/Exhibits/nativeamericans/portrayals.html
Remember that strangely elegant script on the ring and elsewhere in the "The Lord of the Rings" series of books and now movies? It's an invented Elvish writing called Tengwar, and if you want to reproduce it on your Web site, business memo, or wedding ring, this is the guide for you. The fonts themselves are available here as freeware and installing them should not require the skills of a white wizard. You can even download a macro to slot into Microsoft Word and make using the font even simpler. All you have to work out is where to find an elf who can read your e-mail, and to get Arwen's address, of course. Should we search for ".middleearth" or ".elf"?
http://www.sci.fi/~alboin/tengwartutorial.htm
The Rocky Fellowship Palantir Show
For those not in the know, "slash" is fiction written by fans of books, films, or TV shows that invents relationships, generally same-sex ones, between fictional characters. Kirk's relationship with Spock, for example, which was strictly platonic and professional in "Star Trek", is a favourite slash pairing for writers exploring a romantic or even X-rated theme. The Rocky Fellowship Palantir Show, the work of a Tolkien fangirl, is crossover slash, where "The Lord of the Rings" characters inhabit the world of the "Rocky Horror Picture Show". She has taken the script for Rocky Horror and "Middle Earthed it." Frodo and company sing their way through Richard O'Brien's raunchy musical and all sorts of odd slash pairings abound - Frodo/Sam (okay, not so odd, that one), Pippin/Boromir, and Aragorn/anything with a pulse. Great fun for Tolkien and Rocky Horror fans alike, though we're sad to report that there's no action for Gandalf the Gay.http://ringwench.bravepages.com/rocky.html
Short-attention-span critiques.
http://www.fwfr.com/
BOOKS & E-ZINES
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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.
For more selections, check out: Netsurfer Books: http://www.netsurf.com/nsb/ Netsurfer Library: http://www.netsurf.com/nsl/ |
The Tournament
Tales Before Tolkien: The Roots of Modern Fantasy
Robota
Windows XP Unwiredhttp://turningtables.blogspot.com/
Breaking the "The Baroque Cycle" Code
Neal Stephenson uses some mysterious characters in a Flash intro screen on a site that promotes his forthcoming book, "The Baroque Cycle". Todd Garrison recounts in vivid detail the convolutions his brain went through to get to solve what they mean. Unfortunately, Todd leaves the reader hanging as to whether or not he was the first person to successfully translate the coded message on the site, but you can visit Neal Stephenson's message on "The Baroque Cycle" site to find out. Pre-order the book at Amazon so that we can eat tonight.Cracking the Code: http://www.substream.com/crackingthecode.html
The Baroque Cycle: http://www.baroquecycle.com/
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0380977427/netsurferdigest/
SURFING SCIENCE
Natural numbers are the positive integers. Karl Palmen has developed a system of coloring the natural numbers using eight colors. From there, he has developed several interesting theories involving various relationships and the colors they become in his system. This is fairly technical math, and definitely not for the math-challenged set. The site begins with Palmen's rules for coloring numbers. The next, and by far the largest, section has a many fascinating examples of his theories at work. Some are perfectly clear and obvious, and some require substantial study. It's quite easy to get hooked on Palmen's theories. The final section of the site poses several challenges to mathematicians - homework, if you will.http://www.hermetic.ch/misc/numcol.htm
Discover a virtual portal dedicated to one of the planet's most misunderstood flying creatures, the bat. The Bat Crew, as this band of batty enthusiasts is known, endeavors to protect the bat populations of the world and to educate the public regarding the ecological importance of these often-feared nocturnal aerialists. This online bat sanctuary boasts a plethora of information for the curious visitor. Browse pages dedicated to conservation and rescue, including tips on how to humanely remove an uninvited bat from your dwelling. You'll find loads of tips and tricks on co-existing with bats in your neighborhood. There's also plenty of fun stuff for the kids on this site. Learn how to draw your own bat or make your own bat doll by stopping by the Fun for Kids pages. An excellent resource for teachers, students and bat enthusiasts alike, the Bat Crew site is informative, entertaining, and easy to navigate.
http://www.batcrew.com/
The speed of light is the limit to travel so far as we know. You can't exceed the speed of light. Period, right? Well, consider gravity. Gravity, whatever it really is, appears to affect mass considerably faster than lightspeed. For example, planetary orbits in the Solar System are determined not by the apparent visual positions of the sun and planets, but by their scientifically determined actual positions. Also, consider black holes. If not even light is fast enough to escape the event horizon, how does gravity? Tom Van Flandern, an astronomer, has written a lengthy and technical essay on the phenomenon. We don't claim to understand it all, but what we do understand intrigues us. If gravity acts faster than light, then in theory so can the transmission of information. There's lots left to discover, kids.
http://www.metaresearch.org/cosmology/speed_of_gravity.asp
Its name may make it sound like some way-out grassroots organization of reactionary Trekkies fed up with physics, but American Antigravity highlights legitimate research to develop a "propulsion system that provides thrust without expelling mass." You don't have to read a lot of science fiction or engineering journals to recognize many of the buzzwords (such as gravity control, space elevator, and ion wind) that populate this large documentary site. To be sure, it's primarily for geeks - those out to prove that someday our descendants will benefit from inventions such as Mark Tomion's Stardrive Device, known to the US Patent Office as the Electrodynamic Field Generator. How about background on superconductors, reversible fuel cells, or homebuilt lasers? There's a lot of neat technostuff here, as well as links to sites such as the Space Elevator Store. Hang on to your credit cards! If you have Windows Media Player 9, the free Lifter Video Archive will help you get up to speed, for a tantalizing moment, on airflow and thruster testing, high acceleration, and other research into the human quest for maximum efficient velocity.
http://americanantigravity.com/index.html
Sky-Darkness Predictor for Astronomers
If you're one of the many Earthlings who look at the night sky for glimpses of celestial phenomena, you'll want to be sure to visit this site. The Clear Sky Clock provides astronomy enthusiasts with a helpful tool that predicts local sky darkness and peak viewing times. The Clear Sky Clock models weather and other factors to come up with a 48-hour prediction of the best times to gaze upward. To display results for your area, simply search for your place of origin or nearest locale from the listed sites - most of North America is included. Instructions on using the Clear Sky Clock are located below the clock itself. Other resources include topographical, star, and light-pollution maps. Amateur astronomers can really appreciate this sort of thing.http://cleardarksky.com/csk/
SOFTWARE
Skype: Peer-to-Peer Internet Phone Software
Kazaa co-founders Janus Friis and Niklas Zennstrom aim to shake up the phone industry much as they have the music industry with their file-trading software. Their technology has done away with the expense and centralization of traditional voice over IP Internet phone companies. Phone calls are routed by peer-client nodes. The phone directory is also decentralized. Other features include end-to-end encryption and a bone-simple user interface. According to Skype, in only 12 days of availability, it pushed more than 110,000 downloads and had more than 6,500 users online simultaneously. Note that the software (for Windows 2000 and XP only) is still in beta testing phase, but it does work.http://skype.com/
New Source Code Comparison Algorithm and Software
Free-software advocate Eric S. Raymond's latest software is Comparator, a program for quickly finding common sections in two or more source-code trees. The program, loosely based on DNA-mapping technology, works by "first chopping the specified trees into overlapping shreds (by default three lines long) and computing the MD5 hash of each shred. The resulting list of shreds is examined and all unique hashes are thrown out." What you get out the other end is a listing of lines with duplicate hashes and thus a listing of identical code segments in the two source trees. Raymond is said to have developed Comparator in order to test SCO's claims to ownership of certain parts of the Linux code. The fast algorithm also nicely lets you compare two hashes without having to see the original source code, an advantage obviously applicable to legal situations in which a company might wish to prove that code has been copied without disclosing the actual code. eWeek has the story and you can also download the source to Comparator.eWeek: http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,4149,1258642,00.asp
Comparator: http://www.catb.org/~esr/comparator/