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            "The immediate threat from the Millennium Bomb is bigger
           than BSE, global warming and AIDs combined. Irresponsible
                                        reporting is very unhelpful"
                   - ROB GUENIER, executive director, Taskforce 2000
                wild overexaggeration isn't exactly clearing the air


                               >> HARD NEWS <<
                                  soft shoes

         It's been a bi-polar month for crypto fans, with this week
         heavy on the manic curve. Remember the SAFE bill, the US
         legislative proposal intended to allow strong crypto to be
         exported from the US to former evil foreign potentates,
         like Britain and Germany? Well, some Congress wiseguys have
         been crippling the bill by inserting clauses that would not
         only stop export, but oblige crypto companies to put in a
         back-door for the US security services. Not everyone
         agreed, though, and now there are four versions of the same
         bill kicking around Congress. Incredibly, the US have even
         more government committees than we do, so the chances of
         this being sorted out in the next year are zilch. Indeed,
         the only clear statement about the issue to come out of
         Washington so far was from a bunch of local hackers, who
         this week demonstrated the dangers of forbidding strong
         crypto by cracking the Whitehouse staff's pagers. Well, at
         least they had a chance of finding out what's the hell's
         going on...
         http://www.inch.com/~esoteric/pam_suggestion/formal.html
         - check out the Air Force 1 lost luggage.  Not like that in
                                                   the movie, is it?
         http://www.cdt.org/crypto/
                                   - the hell is going on, explained

         No chance of discovering such clarity here. Amongst the weird
         governmental spooking going on this week was an apparent volte
         face by the DTI, who are currently sorting out the UK's own
         approach to strong crypto. DTI officials have, over the last
         few months, carefully listened to various groups moan about
         their original plan, which was to hand over everyone's secret
         keys to banks and telecommunication companies. Since then, of
         course, a new government has been elected - on a manifesto that
         stated its intent not to legislate on this issue. So it was
         weird to hear DTI officials at last week's Cambridge conference
         on white collar crime start implying that the legislation will
         go ahead anyway. Why the (no) change? Surely not because of the
         security services continuing eagerness to get hold of those
         lovely, lovely keys?
         http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/users/fapp2/15thISEC/programme.html
           - just what colour collar do civil servants wear, anyway?
         http://www.dti.gov.uk/pubs         those proposals. *Again*
         http://www.leeds.ac.uk/law/pgs/yaman/ukpriva.htm
         - more po-faced data - do we have to be funny about everything?

         One thing - kind of - is for sure: spook or not, somebody
         tried to squelch the Campaign For Internet Freedom's site
         this week. EASYNET, who hosted - then killed - the site,
         initially implied to Internet Freedom's Chris Ellison that
         the Anti-Terrorist Squad had demanded that it die - perhaps
         for the site's inclusion of the Basque separatist journal
         Euskal Herria in its anti-censorship section. Easynet later
         modified the story somewhat, claiming that they were just
         "cleaning up their servers" (someone has *very* bad
         handwriting). Then they said that IF could stay up for
         another 2.5 months, until it found another site. Then they
         stopped talking, and started coughing and pointing at a
         concealed microphone in the corner of the room. Then all
         these black helicopters flew over.
         http://www.netfreedom.org  like they could make it go away?
         http://www.easynet.co.uk
         - maybe Easynet didn't want any negative publicity because...

         Investors in said ISP got to taste the Silicon Valley high
         life this Tuesday, when stocks in EASYNET GROUP leaped from
         13p to 84.25p. The reason? Easynet received an
         International Simple Resale license from the DTI - the same
         license that allows baby telcos to offer low-cost calls on
         international numbers. So is Easynet going to diversify
         into a chain of those dodgy "call India for cheap" shops?
         Err, maybe. Or maybe what's getting the traders excited is
         that Easynet can now set up its own domestic phone switch -
         and gets a cash credit on every call made via another telco
         to its exchange (say, all those dial-up Net customers). And
         the longer people spend calling Easynet POPs, the more
         money they make. Net access for #0 a month, anyone?
         http://www.easynetgroup.net/
         - too busy celebrating to put out a press release, huh, guys?


                               >> ANTI-NEWS <<
                             berating the obvious

         "Banner Ads Are Annoying", reveals DOUGLAS RUSHKOFF...
         CONNECT to cease publishing... "Infants Have Keen Memory
         For Learning Words", psychologists uncover... PLAYSTATION
         PLUS "relaunching".. Julia Roberts to appear in FOUR
         WEDDINGS sequel... Economists "still can't measure any
         productivity gain" from billions spent on IT... mobile
         phones cause "lapses in concentration"... Mute relaunches
         in handy new 2000AD-style format... CD-ROM TODAY merging
         with PC GUIDE... British Interactive Broadcasting boss
         plans to "overtake Internet use within 18 months"... Larry
         Ellison demo backfires when NC application freezes, entire
         network crashes... "Intel suspected of unfair practice", PC
         PRO guesses wildly...  SHIFT CONTROL to end publication...
         NZ hero teenager didn't "solve" Y2K bug after all...


                              >> EVENT QUEUE <<
                          celebrate your inner geek

         We're *so* worthy this week. If you're hanging out in
         Brighton this week, you could pop in and say hello to
         Communities Online, who are hosting a fringe Labour Party
         Conference event on their campaign to secure funding for a
         subsidised network infrastructure for community projects.
         As well as a general discussion, there will also be reports
         from Trimdon Digital Village, the community networking
         project in Tony Blair's constituency. The event is at 1pm
         on Sunday 28/09/97 at Stakis Brighton Hotel.
         http://www.communities.org.uk/events/welcome.html#anchor1216673
                               - come on people - it's for the kids!

         Andrew Ross (American Studies, NYU) is sticking it to the
         Californian libertarian hegemony next week at - guess where
         - the ICA. He'll be speaking on "Jobs in Cyberspace", and
         trotting out all the old, well-worn, yet actually rather
         accurate critiques of Web-coding sweatshop labour. It's on
         at 11am on Saturday 26/9/97, so he's sure to get *loads* of
         people who've been up until 3am Friday fixing broken code
         on the client's bloody idiot-childfool site.
         http://www.factory.org/nettime/archive/0810.html
                  - never trust a pundit who can't format plaintext.


                                >> TRACKING <<
                   Web site come by this way two moons past

         Okay, worthiness over. Here's a utility that pulls
         passwords from a Windows 95 machine. REVELATION is 15KB
         long, pulls the passwords from the cache, and exposes this
         whole "storing passwords in memory as plaintext" nightmare
         we've been on about before. Many security analysts have
         been using it as a way of showing Windoze users the
         benefits of NT's secure systems. Right. Excuse me while we
         choke on our cola.
         http://www.snadboy.com/  can we have our fix now, Mr Gates?

         The REALAUDIO 5 BETA hits the already punch-drunk Net
         listeners next week, promising "even nearer CD quality over
         28.8". Well, we'll believe *that* when we hear it. Oh, and
         something calling itself "THE INTERNET EXPLORER - VERSION
         4.0" is being released by Microsoft in a characteristically
         tasteful and low-key manner. Apparently it's a utility for
         PC users who feel their machines run too fast. Look out
         mentions of it on TV, radio, food, drink, and
         subcutaneously tattooed onto the inside of your eyelids as
         you sleep.
         http://www.real.com             battling those bad MP3 boys
         http://www.microsoft.com can *anyone* get on this site anymore?

         DR HERMANS' new Web site offers the online purchase of
         bongs, pipes, seeds, and "smoking paraphernalia" in the UK.
         Hmm. This isn't some sort of drug thing that we're missing
         out on, is it?
         http://www.hermans.co.uk       bet he's not a real doctor


                                >> MEMEPOOL <<
                              hasta la altavista

         XXX Prize offers $1 million to first sub-orbital sex act...
         Are there really 100,000 copies of Peter Gabriel's Eve
         lying in a warehouse?... keep cool, Cyberjunky et al...
         Jenni off of Jennicam to launch weekly streaming video
         show... MicroAnvika's hold music... Bill Jillians is
         back... Demon's IP number sneaked into "Hackers"...
         www.osk.threewebnet.or.jp/~vacuum05/goods.html ...  Steve
         Bennett, Kevin Warwick - MEDIA WHORES... the Army used the
         Welsh to carry codes in the War... the Campaign Against "
         double-you-double-you-double-you-dot"...
         www.spesh.com/thoughts.txt ... the handbag contained
         cocaine... "Teach yourself COBOL in 21 days" hits tech
         bestseller list: Y2K hero teens suspected... Mir to use
         docking program from Elite... Congrats, Dave Garaffa... so
         what does Compaq need a $4 billion credit line for?...
         "Like a cheapo knock-off Maglite with dead batteries in"...
         Telehouse is on the Greenwich Meridian (and a nexus of
         celtic laylines)


                               >> GEEK MEDIA <<
                                watch more tv

         TV >> If only Nick Hancock was a guest in this new series
         of SHOOTING STARS (9.30pm, Fri, BBC2) then you could watch
         wacky, off-beat, increasingly similar "Bloke Quiz" shows 3
         or 4 times a week... still, maybe you don't even need to
         switch the TV on, according to the claims of "remote
         viewing" researchers in STRANGE BUT TRUE? (8.30pm, Fri,
         ITV)... hardly seems like 6 months since the last Spice
         Girls single, but that's more than enough reason to run
         thinly disguised promo film SPICE UP YOUR LIFE (5.45pm,
         Sat, ITV)... the title character in sassy new animation
         DARIA (2.30pm, Sat, C5) is *nothing like* Janeane Garofalo,
         so why does everyone reckon that she is?... in his
         otherwise excellent novel Distress, sci-fi author Greg Egan
         dismisses Yahoo Serious's YOUNG EINSTEIN (12.45am, Sat, LWT
         + some regions) as the work of "professional Australians" -
         but he doesn't speak for everyone... STEPHEN HAWKING'S
         UNIVERSE (7.20pm, Sun, BBC2) asks if the dark side really
         *is* more powerful, while the subsequent OUTER LIMITS
         series seems to have been replaced by the even more
         Twilight-Zone-ish ALAN CLARK'S HISTORY OF THE TORY PARTY...
         making Tomorrow's World look interesting, EQUINOX (9pm,
         Mon, C4) examines - wait for it - icebergs, and DECISIVE
         WEAPONS (8pm, Mon, BBC2) sounds like it's struggling with
         "the story of anti-submarine warfare and short-wave
         radar"... on the track Burn Hollywood Burn (from Fear Of A
         Black Planet), Public Enemy succinctly describe DRIVING
         MISS DAISY (9pm, Wed, C4) as "shit"... oh, and Aussie drama
         WALKABOUT (9pm, Thu, C4) features a performance from a
         young Jenny Agutter; does she get her kit off? what do
         *you* think?

         MOVIES >> CONTACT (imdb: "sci-fi / drama / faith / atheist
         / scientists / astronomy / father-daughter / alien-contact
         / prime-numbers ") is appallingly acted, has some daft
         sentimental moments plus an ending that's almost not 2001-
         ish enough, yet - thanks mainly to a different twist to the
         book (www.spesh.com/contact.html) - is arguably *the best
         geek film of the year*... alternatively, don't let that
         Hamish Macbeth guy, Damon Albarn or yet another failed-
         heist plot put you off FACE (imdb: drama / gangs) - still,
         probably more laughs than the usual Canadian gloom from
         Atom "Exotica" Egoyan in THE SWEET HEREAFTER (imdb: drama /
         road accident / lawyers / dead kids - alright, I'm making
         it up now...)

         BOOKS >> Now that Amazon's revamped and all those dull
         Updike clones have checked out, it's time for *you* to
         check out the latest batch of US-only book releases.
         Straight in at the heart of the NTK demographic is Richard
         Handley's THE METAPHYSICS OF STAR TREK (ISBN: 0465091245) -
         a sub-Hofstadter muse on identity, time-paradoxes and that
         old is-Data-isn't-Data-human dichotomy. Logic-choppers will
         love to debate whether this is, in fact, the same book as
         THE MEANING OF STAR TREK (ISBN: 0385484372)... IRC's
         Eggdrop, CancelMOOSE and - most bizarrely - Hunt the Wumpus
         are part of the rich tapestry of Andrew LEONARD'S BOTS: THE
         ORIGIN OF A NEW SPECIES (ISBN: 1888869054), but somehow he
         pulls it off in a storming read... For the committed
         americanophobe, we recommend Jim Goad's scouring defence of
         Poor White Trash in THE REDNECK MANIFESTO (ISBN:
         0684831139) - not quite up to his Answer Me! Days, but
         worth checking out on Amazon for the table of contents
         alone. And it'll pass the time while you await with
         something close to stark terror pomo-funster Mark Leyner's
         new opus, THE TETHERBALLS OF BOUGAINVILLE (ISBN:
         0517701014), billed by the author as his "first 100 percent
         BONA FIDE NOVEL--story, characters, everything!". Wh-wh-
         what, *everything*?


                               >> CORRIGENDA <<
         Look, we did say we were slacking off during the MiniNTK
         interregnum, didn't we? Thanks to Joseph Gallivan for
         pointing out that our "US campsites to pay $1 per camper
         for campsong rights" story was, and we quote, "bollocks".
         The correct figure was $1, for all rights, for everyone;
         somewhat different. NTK regrets the error. Also, we picked
         up an mistake in the US Delphi/Mindspring deal snipe -
         Mindspring didn't get all the Delphi customer base: just
         the dial-up guys. All 1,100 of them. NTK regrets this error
         a bit less, because that's *such* a pathetic figure (thanks
         to Robert Seidman for both story and correction). Also, in
         last week's issue, in the sentence promising an exciting
         competition next week, "next week" should be amended to
         read "the week after next", the word "exciting" should be
         replaced with "long overdue", and the word "promise" should
         be altered to "hope in vain".


                              >> SMALL PRINT <<

      Need to Know is a useful and interesting UK digest of things that
        happened last week or might happen next week. You can read it
      on Friday afternoon or print it out then take it home if you have
    nothing better to do. It is compiled by NTK from stuff they get sent.
       It is registered at the Post Office as "on a mission from God".

                                 NEED TO KNOW
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