Need To Know 1998-03-06

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"There is no more open market than Internet browsers. Consumers can use any Internet browser they want just by taking five seconds to download a new browser." - BILL GATES, in his Slate diary though it helps when ftp.microsoft.com is only two doors down >> HARD NEWS << made to confuse Jim "Netscape" Barksdale, Scott "Sun" McNealy and Bill "Everything Else" Gates were called to a SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE hearing this Wednesday to explain exactly what all this goddamn commotion was about. Jimmy and Scott said it was Billy who'd started it, that he'd told Michael Dell not to play with them. Also, they alleged, whenever Jimmy and Scott wanted to play, Billy always had to join in (because he owned the ball). Senator Hatch and his colleagues asked Michael whether this was true. Michael said that he just wanted to play with Billy this one time, and Billy said Michael could borrow the ball to play with Jimmy if that's what he wanted to do. Scott and Jim started shouting at Billy, saying that was a lie; further, that he was a cheat; and moreover that he was just using his ball ownership as leverage in order to establish a commanding presence in other unrelated game sectors. When asked by Senator Hatch whether they thought the government should spank anyone here who was lying, all of them went quiet and said no. The hearing was adjourned when Billy started to cry. http://www.upside.com/texis/mvm/story?id=34fdf6a40 - The "real" Gates diary. Ironically, not real at all. http://www.c-span.org/onprogak.htm#e0303 - "Real" Video and "Real" Audio of the event. http://www.nypost.com/business/217.htm - a body language expert writes: Gates has "a Princess Diana quality about him" Just how tolerant are the INTERNET WATCH FOUNDATION? That's the self-referential question that the IWF will be asking, after their announcement of a proposed rating system for UK Web sites on Wednesday. The new ratings include a special "tolerance" setting, which varies between 0 (neutral to other groups) to 4 ("Advocates action which would cause physical, psychological or economic harm or violence against the group"). Naturally, the IWF would hope that economic harm would occur to anyone who *didn't* stick their ratings tag on all their Web pages, so that gets them a four. Also intriguing is the "sex" rating, which estimates "periods, etc." as a "2", and masturbation as a "4". Startling to think that without the IWF, innocent teenagers might have stumbled across these issues. http://www.iwf.org.uk/ - Not to be confused with the Internet Wrestling Federation http://www.leeds.ac.uk/law/pgs/yaman/right-to-reply.html - Yaman gets a 4 in all our books. Baby. The Good Ship of British Government continues to sail perilously close to the Ginormous Rocks of NUMBINGLY STUPID CRYPTO LEGISLATION. This week, the DTI has been calling up everyone it knows to find out whether *any* business interest thinks key escrow is a good idea. Not a great time to do so, given that in the US, a broad coalition of companies have just launched a $15 million media campaign to publicise their opposition over there. And these dangerous radicals are? Let's see: Microsoft, Intel, Netscape, Cisco, Sun, 3Com, AOL, Adobe, Lotus, Compaq, Honeywell, Rockwell, SCO, Mastercard, Visa... looks like GCHQ is going to have problems keeping track, even *with* their private keys. http://www.computerprivacy.org/ - trusted third parties? They don't even trust each other http://www.demon.net/news/features/crypto/ - bless their "pillars of the Net community" socks [Because the crypto issue is so fast moving (and, of course, really James Bondish and exciting) NTK has set up a special mailing list so you can receive almost-daily updates. For top news on spooks, cypherpunks, those funny politicians and what you can do to help, e-mail <majordomo@lists.unfortu.net> with the message "subscribe crypto-announce". First MI5 plant wins a special prize! ] >> ANTI-NEWS << berating the obvious MS to dump IE channel bar, claims "is unpopular"... WINDOWS NT crashes: world's media horrified... Apple ditches NEWTON; owners plan protest march: look forward to seeing those placard spellings... Worst URL of the week: http://www.citibankprivatebankphotoprize.co.uk/ ... MACROMEDIA publicity gets desperate: www.sludgereport.com ... Top model Honor Fraser uses TIMES INTERFACE "for all her computer news" - Guardian... "POINTCAST In No Rush For IPO"... JULIAN LLOYD WEBBER says media ignores classical music "unless semi-naked bimbo violinists" are involved... How many programmers does BIB have? How about "three"?... Net Cited As Avenue For Computer Crime, uncovers WIRED... COMPUTER CHANNEL relaunches as .TV, preserves commitment to boring rubbish... Microsoft hate us, PSION moans... >> EVENT QUEUE << goto's considered non-harmful STOP WHATEVER YOU ARE DOING AND LISTEN TO US. We've decided, against everyone else's better judgement, to do another NTK Live. Yes, that's right: Forty minutes of realtime geek news, amusing funnies, upsettingly personal confessions and slap-dash vitriol, served up in front of a live cybercafe audience, then compressed into crackly RealMedia for your online enjoyment. We'll have more details next week (when we've written some of it), but in the meantime, make a space in your lives for THE WEBSHACK, 15 DEAN STREET, LONDON, 6.30pm, on Monday 16/3/98. And until then: lay down on the floor, listen to the beta show, and keep calm. http://www.ntk.net/live/ - 500 audio streams of gibberish "It was the year 2020. Dr Nicholas Wee of the Singapore Robotics Research Institute was adding the finishing touches to his human-like robot." That's the most informative thing you get if you AltaVista for "Jupitus" - as in Phill, as in Never Mind The Buzzcocks, but also as in READY JEDI GO, his stand-up Star Wars spoof which has just started touring the UK. It sounds like all the gags you've ever made about the Holy Trilogy - using the Jedi mind- trick to order drinks etc - plus (one imagines) numerous imitations of Chewbacca. But we've warmed to the Jabba-like Jupitus since discovering his previous incarnation as Porky The Punk Poet, who once supported Billy Bragg and drew illustrated lyrics for him and Attila The Stockbroker. Check local search engines (or even newspapers and magazines) for details - or you could always stick with the adventures of Pinpin, Gopi, and Dr Nicholas Wee. http://iagent.iti.gov.sg:5000/cgi-bin/child_frame1b - "Aliens from spaceship Jupitus!" cried Patrick. "I am not insured enough!" It's embarrassing to admit Blue Peter reviewed this a month before we did, but we finally sent someone down to Croydon to see DEVIOUS DEVICES, and ... they like. A group of automata inspired by "twentieth century objects" that were selected by Terry Gilliam (who is, one assumes, too cranked on the Fear and Loathing set to do much else), the pieces include work by Ralph Steadman and Keith Newstead. The best bit, our correspondent writes, are "some rather scary wee men walking in a circle". Until 4/6/98, at the Croydon Clocktower, then touring to Wolverhampton, Manchester, Birmingham, Newport and Hollyhead. http://www.croydon.gov.uk/cr-exhib.htm - this place is turning into the National Geek Museum http://www.cabaret.co.uk/newstead.html - "one of them mysteriously transforms into an alien" http://www0.bbc.co.uk/bluepeter/recently/january98.html - check here for tour dates. The shame! >> TRACKING << -404 Somehow we doubt that Tomorrow's World magazine - or any of the other blokey gadget mags - could ever capture the insane soldering-on spirit of Britain's ultimate low-tech newsletter, the BULL ELECTRICAL CATALOGUE. Regular NTK tipster Moose has drawn our attention to their latest knock-off end-of-line bargain, Chieftain Tank Lasers (9 watts, 900nm infra-red, 5 mile range, now down to 200 quid "despite some pretty heavy visits from the military police"). Now almost-fully online, the Sussex-based danger merchants also offer their solution to the banning of the Video Sender home TV transmitter (sell it in kit form), plus hydroponics, steam engines, circuit diagrams for paranormal devices, and live worms. In today's safety- conscious consumer world, it's good to see a company whose corporate history breezily lists their bizarre misjudgements, mishaps and brushes with the law - including at least one fatality. http://www.bull-electrical.com/ - so, does Weird Stuff Warehouse have lasers? Off a TANK? We've covered it before (NTK 23/1/98), but the *proper* MacOS 8.1 for UK users was finally sneaked onto the servers this week. Don't forget to get the new runtime for Java (because it's sooo good), and the PowerPC Disk Tools image (because your one is now out of date) say those crazy first adopter types, who as we speak are trying to work out how to get the old filing system back. Probably. http://www.apple.com/macos/macos8.1/ - 16 megs - or two seconds if you're Bill ftp://ftp.info.euro.apple.com/Apple.Support.Area/ ...etc - you find it, if you're so keen >> MEMEPOOL << hasta la altavista Mr Jobs? We finally got the handwriting recognition working! http://www.paragraph.com/javapad/JavPad.html ... T.R.O.O.P.E.R.S - http://theforce.net/troops/ ... DAX to leave DS9 ... Watch *this* go out of date: http://datapult.com/domains.html ... maybe DISTRIBUTED.NET should turn to spamming: www.dcs.ex.ac.uk/~aba/hashcash/ ... Terri Pearson, Neil McRae - who *isn't* leaving DEMON this week?... There *is* such a thing as a free launch: http://195.50.90.75/wavtv/ ... We neither condone nor condemn http://satan.idsoftware.com/psteed/ ... Nor http://billywildhack.com/ ... RTE shows memorial FATHER TED - replaces "One Foot In The Grave"... SOUTH PARK hits Sky at end of March... "In cyberspace, no-one can hear you scream. Unless they have at least RealAudio 3.0" - or one of these? www.mpman.com/ ... NASA turbocodes... Studies in "intelligence": www.odci.gov/csi/studies/95unclas/lea.html ... MYST guys split : you must try and fit them back together again to continue... And how long is that lunar water going to last then? ... hidden messages in DIGITALMINDSTREAM?... EUROPE ONLINE to - return?... "What IS this?"... polite URLs: http://www.infoplease.com ... REBOOT is dead! Long live WAR PLANET and WEIRD-OHS! ... >> GEEK MEDIA << electronic *fun* transfer TV >> NTK exclusive backstage gossip: cute actress Trevyn McDowell from COMEDY NATION (12.15am, Fri, BBC2) - also the wife in the UK version of Mad About You - is apparently "a huge sci-fi fan", particularly of Frank Herbert's Dune... oh, and those cheeky guys back in a surprise two-episode run of THE ADAM AND JOE SHOW (11.05pm, Fri, C4) are - allegedly - really into Star Wars... Trek episodes never got quite as bad as Gene Roddenberry's women-ruled romp PLANET EARTH (1am, Fri, BBC1) - but it's a close-run thing... two eponymous theme evenings battle it out on Sat, with BBC2's "My Name Is Michael Caine" (9pm-2.10am) answering C4's "Who Do You Think You Are, Stirling Moss?" (9pm-2.25am)... which leaves ITV's "Grand Prix Night With Murray Walker" (10.15pm-5.10am) to feature two of Murray's lesser-known films: Clint Eastwood actioner THE ROOKIE and THE DIRTY DOZEN: THE DEADLY MISSION... seems like his old Moviedrome slot is now the only place you'll see Alex Cox output HIGHWAY PATROLMAN (11.45pm, Sun, BBC2)... while Nam chopper epic APOCALYPSE NOW (10pm, Sun, C4) is of course based - as everyone knows - on the literary classic Three Men In A Boat... Adam Hart-Davis takes his personal demons up-river in an oar-propelled submarine in LOCAL HEROES (8pm, Mon, BBC2)... but has yet to tackle truly terrifying inventions like the *enormous hair* sported by Fenella George, co-presenter of the now quite bizarre THE NET (11.15pm, Mon, BBC2)... best "reality TV" docu ever? zoo- and-village meanderthon LION COUNTRY (3pm, Mon-Fri, BBC1)... BBC2's new "Late Arrivals" series on motherhood hits complications when NEXT OF KIN (9.50pm, Tue, BBC2) profiles Zoe Ball - and her dad, Johnny... Harry Enfield crams his career into half an hour in FIRST ON FOUR (10pm, Wed, C4)... a lethal virus threatens to jump species in OUTBREAK (9pm, Wed, ITV) - and, no, Dustin Hoffman doesn't play the monkey... plus: Picard's assimilated, and (even worse?) Riker assumes command - The Best Of Both Worlds may be the only episode of STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION (6pm, Wed, BBC2) to be titled from the Borg's point of view... MOVIES >> a smart script, a bright cast, and one of those rare likeable performances by Robin Williams: GOOD WILL HUNTING (imdb: orphan / mathematics / genius / therapy / drama / vulgarity / pyschology / friendship / math) is the deeply harrowing, amusing, and uplifting fable for the belligerent underachieving child prodigy in us all - though, as one NTK previewer put it: "Too much love story and not enough combinatorial mathematics for my liking. See if you can spot the unlikely looking equations on the boards (like 123^5 + 657^5 - 10 etc.) - as if theoretical mathematicians are going to say 'Well, that equation looks right, let's just try putting some numbers into it to make sure.'"... elsewhere, Morgan Freeman dignifies a semi- average serial killer thriller in which the kidnapper never actually gets to KISS THE GIRLS (MPAA rated: R for "terror, violence and language")... and another of those weird Brit actor double-bills (the third in a month), with Rupert Graves in post-WWI era It's The (Virginia) Woolf! adaptation MRS DALLOWAY (MPAA rated: PG-13 for "emotional elements and brief nudity")... plus disappointingly failed play-adaptation BENT (imdb: war / drama / gay / WWII), which only succeeds in putting the "camp" back into "concentration camp"... EDIBLES >> OPAL FRUITS "made to make your mouth water"? Well, perhaps they meant "slaver with fury" following their daft US-friendly renaming as STARBURSTS - as predicted way back in NTK 19/09/97... this month's why-didn't-I-think-of- that goes to RUMBLERS - 60g of dried breakfast cereal in a dual-payload plastic package with 125ml of fresh semi- skimmed milk. Expensive at 80p or more, but worth it just for the astonishing self-assembly spoon... frenzied speciation continues in the choc bar market - the ROLO SMOOTH (aka the "New name for Rolo Bar"), huge blocks of CADBURY'S CARAMEL, the BIG CRUNCHIE - plus mint, orange, and giant-sized variants of everything that wasn't originally mint, orange or giant-sized before (how long before the Limited Edition King-Size Minty Terry's Chocolate Orange?) Pics of most at http://www.jakeh.demon.co.uk/collection.html (but where's the "Dark And White" MARS BAR?)... dullest innovation: the 6 tiny Hubba-Bubba-ish pieces in a pack of WRIGLEY'S ORBIT FOR CHILDREN - presumably aimed at youngsters unprepared for the thrills of a full-strength adult-rated sugar-free chew experience (connoisseurs, fear not - it still "contains a source of Phenylalanine"; excessive consumption may still produce "laxative effects")... Trebor's EXTRA STRONG MINT diversification has its fans, this reviewer unfortunately not one of them - although the HURRICANE provides one of the zingier aftertastes on the shelf right now... back with breakfast, a lot of fingers burned by the shock redesign of POP TARTS (in deep blue to complement the roll-out of Kellogg's Squares in newsagents?) and the simultaneous flavour slimdown/ expansion: raspberry and blueberry are now, officially, *toast*, replaced by Strawberry Sensation, Watermelon Splash, Berry Bonanza, Brown Sugar Spice, and - rather less alliteratively - Chocotastic... product name of the month (spotted in Sainsburys): MR FUNNY'S RUNNY HONEY, a "Mr Men" tie-in spread that improves on old *unfunny* runny honey by adding the great extra taste of orange, blackcurrant, or strawberry. What next - Mr Bump's Mumpy Lumps? Mr Silly's Willy Chilli? oh, never mind... - ben@spesh.com >> 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 "AGENTS/WHORES/SLAVES/HIRED ASSASSINS/WITCHES AND/OR TELEPATHICALLY-CONTROLLED WITCH'S CATS" <http://www.webspawner.com/users/scandal/> NEED TO KNOW THEY STOLE OUR REVOLUTION. NOW WE'RE STEALING IT BACK. Archive - http://www.ntk.net/ Excuses - http://www.spesh.com/ntk/ Unsubscribe? Mail majordomo@unfortu.net with 'unsubscribe ntknow'. Subscribe? Mail majordomo@unfortu.net with 'subscribe ntknow'. NTK now is helped by VIRGIN NET, VENUS INTERNET and UNFORTU.NET. They worry about us, but we don't worry about them. (K) 1998 Special Projects. Non-business copying is fine, but retain SMALL PRINT. 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