BREAKING SURF
| Snam: Social Networking Spam |
| Netsurfer Recommendations |
| Music-Mixing Adventure Game |
| A Canadian in Grand Theft Auto 3 |
| Average IQ and 2000 State Electoral Results |
| The Bug Nebula |
| Bad Scrabble Hands |
| Live-Action Badger Badger Badger |
| ASCII Hot or Not |
| Semacode: Linking Real Space with the Web |
| AudioPaint: Pictures as Soundscapes |
| Taken by Operation Take One for the Country |
| US Prescription Drug Prices |
| BOOK REVIEWS |
| LETTERS TO THE EDITOR |
| Contact and Subscription Information |
| Credits |
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BREAKING SURF
US Army Report on Iraqi Prisoner Abuse
You can hardly escape the big story of the moment, the documented abuse of prisoners in American detention facilities in Iraq. The story seems to have popped out into the news out of nowhere, but in fact allegations of such abuse have been circulating in the bowels of the US military for several months. One early analysis, one of what will undoubtedly be many investigations, is this report from the US Army, archived by MSNBC. The report specifically investigates the actions of the 800th Military Police Brigade, in charge of Abu Ghraib Prison. Many of the current press reports are based on the findings in this document, and since such press reports are by necessity less than complete, those interested in what the US Army itself reported will want to read the full text of the official version.http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4894001/
If you're a patriotic American, so the reasoning goes, you practice ignorance of the soldiers killed in Iraq. Your government doesn't willingly release photos of returning dead and you don't publicize the names of the fallen. Well, ABC broadcaster Ted Koppel doesn't buy that. On the night of Apr. 30, he read the names and showed photographs of the more than 500 US servicemen killed in combat and 200 dead in accidents in Iraq since the start of the invasion of Iraq. Koppel has received much criticism ever since he announced his controversial plans. Koppel's critics accuse him of making a political statement or of a crass grab for ratings, which he vehemently denies. ABC says it's all about showing respect. Still, Sinclair Broadcasting refused to run the program on its eight ABC stations, although ABC managed to find ways around that boycott in most cases. In an interview at Poynter Online, Koppel explains why he decided to do this and why he's upset that after more than 24 years on the air, people could think he'd stoop to chasing ratings. ABC offers Koppel's list of names online with brief details but no pictures.
Poynter Online: http://www.poynter.org/content/content_view.asp?id=64904
ABC: http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/Primetime/IRAQ_Casualties.html
2003 saw the least terrorist activity of any year since 1969, claims the US State Department's "Patterns of Global Terrorism 2003". Given what we heard during the 9-11 Commission hearings, the report seems curiously confident. We aren't sure how to measure effectiveness at battling terrorists and this report was prepared before the Mar. 11 Madrid bombings, so we might have to wait for the 2004 report to see if the decline in terrorism is sustained. Regardless, the report's definitions of who is a terrorist and what counts as terrorism make for good reading. Especially illuminating is the discussion of Saudi Arabia in the counterterrorism movement, with little discussion of the role the Saudi government has played in promoting Islamic extremism at home and abroad.
http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/pgtrpt/2003/
There are few things as awesome in the solar system as Saturn, with its complex rings and large entourage of satellites, 31 at last count. July 1, NASA's Cassini-Huygens spacecraft will approach Saturn from below the ring plane, penetrate the gap between the F and G rings, then fire its thrusters for 96 minutes. A successful burn will lock it in orbit around Saturn, ready for four years of observation and testing. The ambitious mission will attempt to land instruments, via the Huygens Probe, on the surface of Titan for the first time. The second largest moon in the solar system, larger than our own moon and Mercury, Titan is unique among moons in having clouds and an atmosphere, and is a compelling target for astroscientists. The spacecraft bristles with instruments, 12 on board the Cassini Orbiter and another six on Huygens. To keep us up to date on the status of this important mission, NASA has a new site with links for educators, kids, planetariums, and the media. NASA has also released a beautiful photo Cassini recently took of Saturn.
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/index.cfm
Every year, Tasmanian shy albatrosses migrate from three small Australian islands to South Africa. Many of them don't make it. Longline fishing, thousands of baited hooks dragged behind boats, kills a large number of these large birds and threatens them with extinction. In a clever publicity effort, the Tasmanian Conservation Foundation and the Tasmania state government have teamed with online bookmaker Ladbrokes.com to bring the plight of the shy albatross to public attention, generate money for seabird conservation, and do some science on the side. Ladbrokes.com paid to outfit 18 shy albatrosses with satellite transmitters to track their progress and gave the equipped birds catchy names. At Ladbrokes.com, you can bet on which of the 18 will get to South Africa first, or on other variables of the journey. All profit will be donated to seabird conservation. The Web site gives terse background about the birds and all the tools to make your bets. Great idea, all around.
http://www.ladbrokes.com/bigbirdrace/
A wiki, in case you've dozed off, is a Web site that lets users add and edit online content in real time. Most wikis revel in controversy and opinionated exchanges, but Wikipedia, the largest wiki, is an exception. Wikipedia strives to be an open-source encyclopedia and aims to adopt a neutral stance on most issues. Since its January 2001 launch, it has accumulated some 500,000 articles, and it has about 1,200 regular contributors who write in 30 languages. The nine members of Wikipedia's Arbitration Committee try to impose some semblance of order on the chaos. The committee is like a Magnificent Nine, trying desperately to clean up town but spread purty thin among the many saloons full of lubricated card players and women of a certain reputation. Nothing stops anyone from overwriting existing Wikipedia articles and some folks do so - Wikipedia can be and has been vandalized. The administrators block an offender's IP address after two incidents. Salon has a useful overview of the whole wiki phenomenon that wonders whether Wikipedia succeeds as a true wiki, given its size and somewhat organized moderation.
http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2004/04/27/wikipedia/
Rice University Looks at Intercollegiate Sports
Rice University is known for many things: computer science, the buckyball molecule, the 2003 NCAA Division I baseball championship, and more. Its academic reputation rivals the best universities on the planet. What you may not know is that Rice is tiny - it has fewer than 3,000 undergrads and 2,000 grad students. The place of athletic teams and scholarship athletes at the academically elite university has long been debated. The Rice Board of Trustees has just released a report on the issue. Rice ranks first in the nation in athletic expenditure per student and its athletic teams cost a $10 million deficit, mostly due to football. The report states that nearly all Division I football teams cause deficits. Furthermore, scholarship athletes at Rice do not perform as well academically as the rest of the student body, although non-scholarship athletes do - again, the effect is most prevalent in football. The report makes fascinating reading not for the Rice situation so much as for the analysis of the costs and benefits that are relevant across a spectrum of American universities. Although the report makes no firm conclusion, it looks like football's days at Rice are numbered. A drop to Division III would kill a fine baseball program as well.http://www.rice.edu/athleticstudy
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC; it regulates broadcast radio and TV stations in the US) has levied some hefty indecency fines against the wildly popular radio personality Howard Stern, who regularly talks about sex on his show. But the FCC has rather pointedly overlooked similar talk on other radio and TV programs. In October 2003, saintly daytime TV diva Oprah did a show on teenagers and their colorful sexual habits. When Stern's free-speech-loving supporters found out about that, they decided to use the opportunity to make a point about the perceived bias of the FCC. Witness the results of a largely successful stunt to point out the selective enforcement policies of the commission. It received some 1,600 letters complaining about the "Oprah" show. Given that they came from Stern fans, most of the letters are, shall we say, entertaining. The Smoking Gun has copies which thoroughly explain the phrase "tossed salad".
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/0504044oprah1.html
Open-Source Breeding Competes with GM Technology
Wired's this month features an article on genetically modified (GM) foods. Many folks fail to recognize that nearly every bit of food consumed today is genetically modified. Some of these modifications took lots of time to develop, as promising traits were selectively bred into varieties - not all genetic modification is accomplished with gene splicing. The Wired article opens with the tale of the GM tomato known as the Flavr Savr, whose genome contained an engineered gene to inhibit spoilage, and how it led to the downfall of the company that created it. Nevertheless, Monsanto, which has a virtual monopoly on gene transfer technology, still eagerly pursues GM products in its labs. On the other hand, as plant genetics are mapped, it is becoming possible to crossbreed plants and develop varieties with amazing speed. Welcome to the world of open-source breeding. With access to a good database, anyone with a good idea can bring it to fruition. Good food, and no patent fees.http://wired.com/wired/archive/12.05/food.html
Raising Chickens for Fun and Profit
Kuro5hin is best known for its discussions of Net-related culture and technology, but a recent article points out the benefits of raising chickens for eggs and meat. If you have any space at all, you might want to check it out. Chickens are inexpensive to acquire and maintain, and there's nothing like fresh eggs. You can get fancy and raise Araucanas, which lay colored eggs - you'll have no worries about dyeing them in advance of the Easter ovileporid. The economic-minded will note that brown eggs fetch a higher price than white ones (we neither know why, nor care). The thing is, you can produce what you want, and you can do it inexpensively. The page is probably worth the read even for just the comments appended to the article, if raising chickens isn't your bag.http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/4/29/11295/0278/
French Laundry Triumphs Again!
We couldn't pass up a headline that good, so we stole it from Restaurant Magazine. French Laundry is the number-one eatery on their list of the world's top 50 restaurants, and it's the second year running that chef Thomas Keller's Yountville, Calif. spot has garnered the top position. This may be a good thing, or it may not. We haven't visited most of the 50 lauded restos, but number 16 on the list is London's St. John, which is famed for fascinating dishes such as squirrel with offal on toast. The runner up to French Laundry is The Fat Duck, located west of London in Bray, where such dishes as snail porridge and smoked bacon and egg ice cream were first invented and fed to diners. Perhaps opening a Road Kill Cafe could be a brilliant move, but peruse these Web sites before you invest.Restaurant Magazine: http://www.restaurantmagazine.co.uk/?ref=/news.asp&id=903
French Laundry: http://www.frenchlaundry.com/tfl/frenchlaundry.htm
St. John: http://www.stjohnrestaurant.co.uk/
The Fat Duck: http://www.fatduck.co.uk/
Imagine you could make the physical world in which you live part of your video game. That's the idea behind NetAttack. The underlying rationale is so obvious, it's amazing someone hasn't thought of this already. Rather than simply develop gamer's pallor in a dark basement or office, participants in this mixed-reality gaming actually go outside to play. The local environment is the game space. As you move within it, the NetAttack game adapts to the terrain. Although NetAttack is a game you can play, it is really a test bed for augmented-reality hardware and software. Once this stuff gets cheaper and faster. you'll be able to play Doom at the shopping mall or in the woods. Capture the Flag is never going to be the same again. ERCIM News has a brief article.
NetAttack: http://www.fit.fraunhofer.de/projekte/netattack/index_en.xml
ERCIM News: http://www.ercim.org/publication/Ercim_News/enw57/lindt.html
Remember Internet2 - bigger, faster, and stronger than the regular Internet and designed for research? Like the original Internet, Internet2 is developing first as a network of universities, and American college students have adopted Internet2 for file sharing. A new file-sharing network called i2Hub takes advantage of Internet2 to allow users to share files with the open-source Direct Connect software. Only individuals at certain universities can access Internet2 and i2Hub. CNET lays out the issues rather clearly, the most important of which is that file-sharing may hurt this blossoming resource. If you want to check out the network and have the right connections, download the tools at i2Hub.
i2Hub: http://www.i2hub.com/
CNET: http://news.com.com/2100-1027_3-5202107.html
So, you weren't invited to beta-test Google's new e-mail service, Gmail? Don't sulk, you can pay for the opportunity on eBay! Gmail offered beta testers the opportunity to invite one person to join testing the new and controversial free e-mail system. Rather than invite friends, some Gmailers decided to auction the gift. At press time, eBay had 272 active and 647 completed auctions. The high bid was $262, although other invitations have been won for a tenth that price. It's cheaper than one share of the impending Google stock, most likely, but we think it's still too much. CNET has seven short paragraphs. Go to eBay and do a search for "Gmail" to bid.
CNET: http://news.com.com/2100-1023-5203162.html
eBay: http://www.ebay.com/
Is Google really the fastest way to get the facts, and get them right? The Guardian decided to test the question by pitting Google against the old-fashioned library and social networking via phone. The testers asked a bunch of questions, all appallingly Brit-centric, and timed the responses they got from Google, their phone contacts, and the library. You can read how it played out. Not to spoil any surprises, but Google didn't always come in first.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/news/0,12597,1210455,00.html
PayPal Introduces Web Services API
PayPal joins the ranks of Google and Amazon in offering an application programming interface (API) for interaction with its service. In its initial form, PayPal's API allows you to search transactions, get details of transactions, refund transactions, and transfer funds to various recipients. The services are based on standard SOAP and WSDL technologies. PayPal has launched a PayPal Developer Central (PPDC) site where you can sign up for a free account and get all the details about the API, as well as set up a test environment. PPDC: https://developer.paypal.com/Press release: http://www.shareholder.com/paypal/releaseDetail.cfm?ReleaseID=134353
ONLINE CULTURE
The term "snam" was apparently coined by Kenneth Norton, director of product management at Yahoo. It is defined as the unwanted e-mail generated by social-networking sites such as Friendster, Orkut, and Tribe. Whenever you sign up for such a network, you are encouraged to contact as many people as possible and ask them to join. You're also exposed to other members of the club. Non-members who associate with social networkers suffer the occasional e-mail solicitation to join, but members may also be swept with a torrent of snam. Fellow members you don't know start sending you e-mail because your address happens to be in some third or fourth party's address book or community, and the sender just has to let you know that there's going to be discussion of a hipwader fetish. Some people may revel in this, but many find all this back and forth is just so much snam. Scott Kirsner at Fast Company unleashes the term and credits Norton. He also drops some statistics about one social networking site, LinkedIn: 50% of the snam involves hiring; 30% involves business partnerships; and 20% is people looking for experts or trying to reconnect with former colleagues and friends.http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/81/techsupport.html
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Ugly Americans: The True Story of the Ivy League Cowboys Who Raided the Asian Markets for Millions
Maps of Time: An Introduction to Big History
The Plutonium Blonde
The Algorithmic Beauty of Sea ShellsSURFING SITES
Gertrude Bell was a woman of many passions. She took a first in history at Oxford University in an era when few women even attended university and she was a renowned mountaineer, but she is best known for her political expertise in the Middle East. She traveled extensively in the region, first as a tourist and an archeologist, then as an intelligence agent, and finally as a diplomat. Ultimately, she created the borders of the new state of Iraq and installed Faisal I as its king. The University of Newcastle has gathered more than 1,600 documents relating to her life, including her photographs of tribes and sites in the Arab world, her candid letters home to her family, and the detailed diaries she wrote between the ages of nine and 49. The diary entries on the eve of World War I reveal a more innocent world of garden parties and staying with friends intermingled with speculation about the politics of the time. Unfortunately, the diary does not cover her own involvement in the politics of Persia, although her letters do.http://www.gerty.ncl.ac.uk/home/index.htm
Ancient and Just Plain Old Egypt
Eternal Egypt brings together over 5,000 years of Egyptian civilization in a comprehensive online compilation. Perhaps one of the most extensive online compendia of Egyptology we've seen, this site is a gold mine of information on one of the most intriguing of ancient civilizations. You can start a tour of the site in many ways, including the Connections method that lets visitors explore the relationship between artifacts, personalities, and places. Other methods of exploration include Timeline, Map, and a Multimedia option that includes animations, webcams, and interactive pictures. For those who wish to pursue a more personal look at Ancient Egypt, this site lists numerous noteworthy museums and sites. Eternal Egypt is an excellent resource for educators and students, and all its guests will be transported millennia back to the time of Pharaohs.http://www.eternalegypt.org/EternalEgyptWebsiteWeb/HomeServlet
This summer sees the Olympic Games returning to their birthplace in Athens, and Archaeology Magazine is looking at the original Olympiad, why Greeks competed at the games, and the place of women in the ancient competitions. There's trivia galore to be mined here. Did you know that the ancient running tracks were rectangular? It must have been tough at the corners. The five rings of the modern Olympic flag were created by Pierre de Coubertin in 1913, although a film prop left behind in a stadium at Delphi in 1936 has led many folks to assume the rings are an ancient symbol. Even the wonderful spectacle of the Olympic flame being carried through countries and finally lighting a beacon at the host arena is a modern invention. So what about the women? Well, married ones were barred from the ancient games, but the younger women had their own races elsewhere. Can't distract the menfolk, you know.
http://www.archaeology.org/online/features/olympics/index.html
Combining the best online technology with history resources, the Center for History and New Media (CHNM) at George Mason University is an outstanding starting point for scholars, students, and the general public. Among the CHMN's many features is its World History Sources section, "the best online primary source archives in world history" the Web has to offer. We agree with the self-assessment. These superior Web sites are organized by region or by period and you can run a full, detailed search as well. But wait, there's also an exhaustive section on using and evaluating various genres and media for use in historical research, eight multimedia case studies that demonstrate how scholars analyze and use historical documents, and a useful Teaching Sources section, with a series of practical guides on the classroom use of historical sources by veteran history teachers. Our history-loving reviewer spent hours here. This is a must-have bookmark if the past is your profession or passion.
http://chnm.gmu.edu/whm/whmdocuments.html
Cool Designer/Programmer Toys and Blog
Some people like to talk techie. Other people think they know their design skills. The combination of the two is rare enough to make it worth celebrating. Brendan Dawes uses his interactive design blog to discuss stuff like new programming tools and toys, where to find free Wi-Fi signals in Manchester, and how to use the MAX and Jitter software to create nifty, delayed video streams. He has also created a feature called Cinema Redux, in which individual frames of a feature film are presented as a mosaic-style image for comparison with other films. The outcome is a visual thumbnail of the film editor's skill and preferences. Dawes's Headshop section is a fun playground stuffed with what can be accomplished with a computer, an imagination, and some multimedia. Those who believe all retro-kitsch is good should check out the download section to kit out their desktop machines with 1970s-style shag-pile backgrounds.http://www.brendandawes.com/
P.T. Barnum's American Museum, in New York City, quickly became one of the most visited places in America during the mid-1800s. The American Social History Project chronicles the Lost Museum, starting with a Flash introduction that's brief but fascinating. Much of the site is Flash-based, so you'll need broadband or a large drive to access the material seamlessly. It's worth it, if you're into history, Barnum lore, or just cool stuff. One really neat feature allows you to do a virtual tour by mouse. When you find an item of interest - say, the Feejee Mermaid - click on Archive to get a succinct description of the item and its/his/her history. The Feejee Mermaid was one of Barnum's most popular hoaxes. There were many more. It'll take considerable time to mouse your way through the museum, but there's no admission charge - a fact we doubt Barnum would have appreciated.
http://www.lostmuseum.cuny.edu/
Penguins, Get Yer Penguins Here
What could be more cuddly than a pet penguin, so long as you can ignore the smell of dead fish? This penguin purveyor's pages proffer a plausible array of penguins at prices practically too good to be true. Make that actually too good to be true. Penguin Warehouse does forget to mention that these are social pets, and to make your personal penguin truly content, you should order at least 100 and preferably far more companion penguins for your designated penguin pet. Smarter than dogs, for the most part, and much friendlier (and obviously also smarter) than cats, penguins are theoretically the ideal pets. Once you get a couple for your kids and get a local microclimate just right, your penguins should become a self-sustaining resource. We don't know if you can eat the eggs or meat, but somebody at Kuro5hin might. Do check out Penguin Warehouse, the self-proclaimed leading online vendor of penguins. At worst, you'll come away with a higher respect for penguins and a lower respect for people.http://www.penguinwarehouse.com/
Many kids over the last three decades have been lucky enough to play with a Spirograph, that cool toy that lets you draw perfect symmetrical circular patterns with various circles of plastic with pre-punched pencil holes. Sam Cancilla, who runs Sam's Toybox, has nine of them, which gives you some idea of the big-time toy collector he is. Sam's Toybox serves as something of - well, a virtual toybox that lets Cancilla share his toys with the online public. He shows off his latest acquisitions and lets visitors reminisce with him about the toys of their youth. With a Web site, he doesn't have to warn us to look but not touch. Searing Spirograph-envy aside, we thoroughly enjoyed indulging in this nostalgia-fest. If you want to be a serious toy collector (and we urge you to look at the photo of Cancilla's computer room before you commit to that), heed Cancilla's tips to the budding neophyte on how to set about collecting. He even supplies links to current eBay auctions of toys like those in his collection.
http://www.samstoybox.com/
Are you old enough to remember board games? They're what kids and families played before video and computer games. The Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections at Cornell University's Kroch Library has put together an exhibit called Pastimes and Paradigms: Games We Play. The exhibit focuses on older games and investigates the evolution of board games since 1800. It includes a wide variety of antique and contemporary games as well as rare books on rules, strategies, and recreation. There are even gambling punchboards, and a selection of games inspired by television programming.
http://rmc.library.cornell.edu/games/
Johannes van den Heuvel is a 36-year-old e-strategist from Amsterdam with an obsessive passion for single-malt Scotch whisky. Since his first taste of the water of life a dozen years ago, he has sampled around 2,000 different types of single malt, and something tells us he won't stop there. His Web site, the appropriately named Maltmadness, is divided into three main sections. The mAlmanac gives a brief but thorough beginners' guide to single malt and provides information about distilleries and whisky-producing regions in Scotland. The Big Black Book is a more subjective guide to the subject matter in which van den Heuvel chronicles the results of his liver-punishingly extensive tastings and makes recommendations. The third section, the Liquid Log, hosts a blog of van den Heuvel's malty adventures. He writes entertainingly and with the genuine authority of a man with an amazing breadth of knowledge and a matching passion for his subject matter. We're just amazed he can find his computer.
http://www.maltmadness.com/
If food costs are giving you headaches and your credit card can't take anymore, it might be time to start cooking on the cheap, using tips you find at Cheap Cooking to help you cut your grocery bill. The site's offerings include shopping hints, money-saving tips, and even a downloadable grocery list. Impulse buying will be a thing of the past if you try these delicious recipes that prove that cheap food does not mean tasteless or unhealthy food. The site's recipes are simple enough for even the novice cook and the rules of good value mean that you don't have to track down a Tibetan deli just to get the perfect spice for your stir-fry. In fact, following the site's advice is an experiment worth trying even if you don't need to save money. In a thoroughly appropriate move, a portion of the profits from the sale of an associated e-book will be donated to feeding the homeless.
http://www.cheapcooking.com/
Chances are, even if you're somehow not a fan of "Futurama", you've heard the voice talent of Billy West. Seen any commercials with the red M&M? That candy-coated guy is part of West's repertoire. In addition to the M&M and the "Futurama" voices of Fry, Zoidberg, the Professor, and Zapp Brannigan (and more), West did both Ren and Stimpy and is the current voice of Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd, and other Warner Bros. classics. Check out his Internet Movie Database (IMDb) page for a complete list. West appears to update his own Web site himself, and he's surprisingly prolific on his message boards. There are very few frequently asked questions, however, considering how obsessive cartoon fans can be. We bet he hears the same questions every day and just hasn't posted them in a more permanent format yet.
West: http://www.billywest.com/
IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0921942/
Explore the National Library and Archives of Canada's online tribute to Canadian superheroes, Guardians of the North. Here, you'll discover the nine most noteworthy costumed heroes to embody Canadian heroism and patriotism. No, Dudley Do-Right is not among them. You'll be treated to an overview of these illustrated champions - beginning with the emergence of such characters as Nelvana, Johnny Canuck, and Canada Jack during World War II - and the artists who brought them to life. Further exploration showcases other comic book personalities such as Capitaine Kebec, Northguard, and Captain Canuck. While some of the superpowers these characters possess are comic-book staples, other, inherently Canadian powers include the ability to travel the speed of light on a giant ray of the Aurora Borealis. While Canadian superheroes may have sidestepped international fame, they certainly embodied the spirit of the Great White North and remain an integral part of Canadian history.
http://www.collectionscanada.ca/superheroes/index-e.html
Amusement Ride Accidents and Safety
Before you head to an amusement park to hop on a roller coaster, it might be prudent to stop by for a quick visit to Amusement Ride Accident Reports and News. The site touts itself as the world's most comprehensive source for reports on amusement-ride accidents and safety, and it seems to be regularly updated. When we last cruised through, the top chatter involved a bill proposed in the US Congress to prohibit people under 18 years of age from operating such rides. This link-infested site is likely to consume a great deal of your time, even if all you do is look through the weird accident reports. You might even miss out on the trip to the amusement park. You might say that we just saved your life. No, no, no - don't try to ply us with wet, sloppy kisses of thanks. We're just doing our job. You can thank us best by resubscribing.http://members.aol.com/rides911/accidents.htm
FLOTSAM & JETSAM
Luke Whittaker has put together this cool Flash game called A Break in the Road that asks you to take sounds recorded off the virtual street and mix them into a tune. The best part is that Whittaker wraps a story around the process, making it something more than the parts individually. The intro is long but worth it. The game is longer, and even more worth it, on broadband anyway.http://www.lukewhittaker.co.uk/breakintheroad/
A Canadian in Grand Theft Auto 3
Jim Munroe has a great video of a Canadian tourist's visit to Grand Theft Auto 3, worth checking out just for the amusing audio. But don't stop there. From excerpts of stories to a guide to creating and publishing independent media to an insightful rant against Rupert Murdoch and Media Kings in general, this is a content-rich location. Should you choose to visit, pack a lunch.http://nomediakings.org/vidz/novel_amusements_goes_dvd.html
Average IQ and 2000 State Electoral Results
The American Assembler took state IQ data from the book "IQ and the Wealth of Nations" and correlated it with state results of 2000's presidential election. Don't get too excited. The concept of a single number as a measure of intelligence isn't particularly well supported these days, but we bet that this will be blog fodder anyway.American Assembler: http://americanassembler.com/features/iq_state_averages.htm
"IQ and the Wealth of Nations": http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/027597510X/netsurferdigest
Check out this eye candy from Hubble. In addition to the visuals, what makes this one noteworthy is the heady mix of one of the hottest stars known (250,000 degrees C) and ice floating about in the dust clouds. Impressive.
http://www.spacetelescope.org/news/html/heic0407.html
What words can you make out of "UUIAIUI"? Or how about "YEEEEEED"? You get the idea, and all of these are real in-game disasters. As for Scrabble - well, you can thank Alfred Butts for inventing it.
Bad Hands: http://www.heybro.com/badscrabble/index.html
Butts: http://www.hasbro.com/scrabble/pl/page.history/dn/home.cfm
Live-Action Badger Badger Badger
You may have come across the occasional oblique reference to Badger Badger Badger in NSD, but if you insist on forcefeeding, here it is again, but only as a means to introduce a live-action take on the same. Although the fastest loading clip is in Ireland, we suspect from the accented French the perpetrators are in Quebec.Badger Badger Badger: http://www.badgerbadgerbadger.com/
Live-Action: http://www.netsoc.tcd.ie/~villiros/pics/badgerbadger.MPG
Before PCs had graphic capabilities, our forefathers traded their online photos (i.e. porn) as ASCII graphics. ASCII Hot or Not marries the old ASCII graphics with the new "Hot or Not" meme in one irresistible package.
http://ascii.hotornot.com/
SOFTWARE
Semacode: Linking Real Space with the Web
Remember the CueCat? It was a handheld scanner that read barcodes in ads so that readers could easily visit the Web sites. It died a quick death. Semacode is the same idea, but has more promise. You use a standard camphone to read the semacode block, which encodes a URL. With software, your phone decodes the picture, presents the URL, and fetches the Web page. Semacode is a convergence of several standard technologies in a nicely bundled package. Its applications include mapping ("you are here"), localization services (find the nearest bathroom, Wi-Fi spot, or, better yet, a combo), ticket sales from event posters, multilingual translations, and so on. Any place that needs to provide more info in the real world can benefit. If you own a Symbian/Series 60 phone you can download the software and play around with it. Semacode is just too good an idea and it shouldn't go the way of the CueCat. Credit Simon Woodside with this one.http://semacode.org/
AudioPaint: Pictures as Soundscapes
Imagine interpreting a digital image as a big grid of frequency by time. Each pixel's vertical position can be thought of as the frequency of an oscillator while its horizontal position corresponds to time. A pixel's color can determine amplitude, brighter being louder. There are a half-dozen other parameters that you can set this way, and with the right software you can generate a sound file from a picture. The right software is AudioPaint. The software needs to process a lot of data, so it doesn't work in real time, but it generates a sound you can save as a .wav file or import into a sequencer. The program can read JPEG, GIF and BMP files. It's freeware for Windows.http://www.nicolasfournel.com/audiopaint.htm
CORRECTIONS
Taken by Operation Take One for the Country
It sounds like plaintive whining, and maybe it is, but we had had second thoughts before presenting you with Operation Take One for the Country in last week's issue (NSD 10.17). It sure sounded like something that could be across the border of reality, but only ever so slightly. Alas, somebody other than us acted on that hunch, and came up with some decent evidence that the site is indeed a hoax meant only to amuse - and sell T-shirts. The Web site and T-shirts still speak for themselves, but we were too dumb to understand what they were saying. Actually, the Web site does not speak at all anymore - it is no longer accessible. A Single Southern Guy in America busted the hoax, although his blog does not display properly in all browsers. As for the Operation, well, despite the hoax it's still a great idea, don't you think?Single Southern Guy: http://www.singlesouthernguy.com/archives/000598.html
NSD 10.17: http://www.netsurf.com/nsd/sub/v10/nsd.10.17.html#BS6
We weren't quite as clear as we should have been in covering the US government's drug price search. As the URL indicates, the site is meant primarily for Medicare users. You can search for drug prices without Medicare coverage, but the site is set up to relay drug prices under health-care coverage plans rather than as a shopping engine. It's still handy, though. Hit the Quick Search link to go right to prices to be found in your ZIP Code.
http://www.medicare.gov/AssistancePrograms/home.asp