Need To Know 1998-08-28

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"How can you come around ere, finking you're all flash and mighty and wasting my time. Now go and sort yerself out with the newest version of flash and shockwave or go and fuck off to another site, because I warn you, I will do, you some major fuckin' damage if you come round here again." - http://www.lockstock2barrels.com/flash.htm ...not quite the "Download Now!" button Macromedia were looking for >> HARD NEWS << but who's whose? So, we *keep* getting this NETNAMES, MICROSOFT rumour, to the point where we're beginning to smell a rat. Who could possibly stand to gain from persuading us to print it? And then the BBC start pulling out from the battle to win bbc.com from Boston Business Computing. But might there be another way they could "own" that domain? And would the licence payers mind? And what about this scribbled note here, that says that Cliff Stanford was seen sniffing around LINX2, wanting to own a chunk of the UK Internet after all? You can't even trust 'whois' anymore: we could have *sworn* their were a bunch of porn sites with addresses not unadjacent to the Progressive Networks offices, but now they've all disappeared too. Won't anyone stay still for one goddamn week? http://www.bbc.co.uk/evans/ - at least this is still here: the only fan site the beeb won't close BT has been showing off its net savvy once again, with an EASYREACH PAGER press ad showing a page of "amusing" cartoon net user stereotypes, each with a vaguely realistic email address. Perhaps too realistic, adds privacy activist MARK DZ, whose own whois antics reveal that, of the 18 domains, 12 actually exist, belonging to hopefully understanding organisations like Agency.Com, Arabia On Line, and Computing Engineers Incorporated (who must be overjoyed to be depicted as psycho@wwa.com). Still, perhaps mindful of the US Virgin Cola ad that produced 1500 replies to a "made-up" address, 3 of the other domains are unregistered, 3 more are incorrectly formed, and 3 of the real ones give "No MX record (no email possible)". What's the message here - BT email only has 50 per cent reliability? http://www.spy.org.uk/ - Dziecielewski.com still available, Mark If one thing stays constant, though, it's people. When we finally tracked down the identity of the World's Worst Internet Columnist, "SPYDER" of Time Out London, it came as no surprise to discover his past life as an ex-keyboardist for Hawkwind and creator of "Shot Down In The Night". More disturbing was the revelation that RICHARD BARRY, the World's Equal Worst Internet Journalist, once held an all-night vigil for Brandon Lee. But pipe-smoking, avuncular JACK SCHOFIELD of the Guardian, lead writer on a French skateboarding zine? Now you're scaring us. http://www.eclipse.co.uk/discus/1836.htm - *incredible* Photoshop skills too http://www.timeout.co.uk:81/TO/London/Events/Techno.html - "Astrology.net is its name - and heavenly bodies are its game" http://www.herts.ac.uk/Libtech/Libtech96/OPEN.html - Jack's on holiday right now, grinding. And ollying. And filing. >> ANTI-NEWS << berating the obvious TONY BLAIR announces anti-terrorist measures from Downing Street - behind him is copy of Spycatcher. Will he turn himself in?... JOHN ROMERO *not* dead, despite rumours and appearance... BROWSERWATCH headline: "Netscape v4.06 Is Still Available!"... STUDENTS rate Web more "in" than drinking beer, survey reveals... copyright owners now threatening NEGATIVLAND's CD pressing plants - so why don't they give 'em away as MP3s?... NYU study reveals affluent have better access to Net... The MICROSOFT BOYCOTT CAMPAIGN (http://msbc.simplenet.com/msbc/) send their newsletter from a Windows machine... MICROSOFt "lose" key bit of source code in DRDOS dispute... "Surprise plans to launch third beta" of NT, uncovers COMPUTER WEEKLY - just 8 months after Microsoft announced the decision... new-look PCW includes an exploration of Linux: article begins "Danish programmer Linus Torvalds..." >> EVENT QUEUE << goto's considered non-harmful MARTIN MILLAR's novels are packed full of lovable but schizy dolites dragging themselves upright in a half-fantasy, half-realite, Brixton. That said, he sounds a bit pissed off with living like that himself, and as fans will know from his Website, he's had a horrible time trying to flog his latest book, LOVE AND PEACE WITH MELODY PARADISE. Now it's been picked up by a publisher, and he's embarking on a book tour with characteristic grumpy cheer. The book is all about free festivals, and hippies, and travellers, and, after bundles of rejection notes, Millar would be the first to concede that it might not be any good. But you could pop by one of the readings and see whether he's right. Maybe make him a cup of tea either way. The tour starts in London on the 7pm 2/9/98 at Blackwells, Charing Cross Road, and ends on the 29/9/98 at Waterstones, Sauchiehall St, Glasgow, with all points between. http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/town/street/kbh38/ - not to be confused with Richard Miller from Time Crisis It's the time of year for the ICA's acclaimed Radio 1-style touring Roadshow: "Hello Skegness! Is everybody ready to identify, explore and critique the notions and metaphors of cyclic completion?". Well, it may as well be given the impenetrable descriptions provided by ISEA '98, the INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM FOR ELECTRONIC ARTS, 02-07/09/98. There's the "Revolution" Symposium in Liverpool (page reads like a Markoff generator fed phrases like "utopian-dystopian discourses of cybercultural futurology") and, in Manchester, the promising-sounding "Terror" Symposium. Whether you attend is a matter for your own conscience; the real debate, we feel, is how to pronounce "ISEA" without it sounding like "IKEA". Best suggestion so far: "I see", followed by a 20-second goatee-stroking pause. Then: "I see" again. http://www.isea98.org/ - not to be confused with http://www.isea.org/ >> TRACKING << making good use of the things that we find Featuring on Future Publishing coverdisc is surely the *apex* of the Summer-Linux-hypeathon. This month's PC PLUS features teutonic distrib S.u.S.e as well as plenty of gushing comments in the mag. Actually, it's not the first time "+" has featured Linux - it was on the Oct 1994 CD, then fastidiously ignored in the intervening years. For the already converted, there's some bonus warez on the CD - including an incredibly buggy Netscape beta that wouldn't normally be worth the download. http://www.polo.demon.co.uk/emporium.html - cheap CDs without the accompanying tree http://www.futurenet.com/pcplus/article.asp?ID=3531 - four years of catching up to do The street finds its own use for things, particularly when the things in question were a bit useless to start with. While the appeal of Bandai's FISH FINDER FOR GAMEBOY seems a bit limited at first, we can't wait to see what the growing legion of GB hackers will make of this ultra-cheap ultra-chirp sonar. Within just a few weeks of the Gameboy Camera and Printer release, the coders had already reverse engineered the printer protocol (allowing both screen dumping to the printer, and backup of the camera images to PC). And given that they've pretty much firmed up the C development kit, as well as the GB BASIC interpreter, and the ingenious "morse code" text editor, it shouldn't take them that long to whip up... oh, a self-steering car? Guidance system for the blind? Super Mario Doom? http://home.hiwaay.net/~jfrohwei/gameboy/ - another device for "seeing" through "clothes"? http://www.nikkei.co.jp/enews/TNW/np/tnwnp0087.html - you shall have a fishy via this little dishy http://www.bga.com/~fap7/newtonwidget - meanwhile, the Newton gets new life as a beatbox. >> MEMEPOOL << hasta la altavista http://www.spork.com ... painful browser integration implied by http://www.netcomuk.co.uk/~wwl/internal.html ... more skeleton passwords for the AWARD BIOS - "q_l27&z" ... http://YourMom.com/ ... the revenge of CP/M - http://www.herring.com/insider/1998/0825/microsoft.html ... IMAC inspired by http://www.myna.com/~zippy/adm_mac.jpg ? or http://www.dce.utah.edu/network/lks/seperated/slimac.htm ? or was it http://smokedifferent.buds.com ? (oh, and you *can* plug monitors into it - if you can find the socket)... BEASTIES BOYS release MP3s... the brighter side of launch disasters : http://www.flatoday.com/space/gshop/ ... tying in with new Lord Of The Rings movies, SIERRA to release multiplayer Middle Earth, 10000+ players - but will there be enough rings to go around?... eturn of QUAKE TALK SHOWS: http://www.planetquake.com/latenite/ SOUND BITES tooth-music lollies distributed in Japan under name "SILENT SHOUT"... maybe they've installed a backdoor for Bill Gates: http://www.microsoft.com/industry/justice/pressroom/releases/epic.stm >> GEEK MEDIA << may contain strongly-typed language TV>> wonder if they considered putting the soothing psychoanalysis of double FRASIER (10pm, Fri, C4) *after* the double horror nonsense of THE HOWLING/ STRAIT JACKET (from 11.35pm, Fri, C4)?... things get "groovier" on Sat, with rare successful TV spin-off THE BRADY BUNCH MOVIE (9pm, Sat, BBC1), another themed SOUL NIGHT (from 8.10pm, Sat, BBC2), the repeated endless wailing of THEREMIN: AN ELECTRONIC ODYSSEY (1.10am, Sat,C4), plus a couple of shows proclaiming HEY, HEY WE'RE THE MONKEES (9pm & 11.05pm, Sat, C4)... surely another one-off game show, FAMILIES AT WAR (8.15pm, Sat, BBC1), can't resuscitate Reeves & Mortimer *again*?... a different season pops up on 4, with CARRY ON CRUSING (10.30pm, Sun, C4) cruelly juxtaposed next to Gus Van Sant's gay art yawn MY OWN PRIVATE IDAHO (12.10am, Sun, C4) - most promising is warts-and-all expose CARRY ON DARKLY (9pm, Mon, C4)... it's the original proto-Tomorrow People kids who ESCAPE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN (2.10pm,Mon, BBC1), pursued by arguably the best Trek film ever, ST VI: THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY (3.45pm, Mon, BBC1)... marvel at the timing of Diana dying on a Bank Holiday, with tributes depicting "The Diana Years", "The Unseen Diana", "The Art Of Diana", "The Extraordinary And Irreplaceable Diana" and, of course, "Diana: One Year On" (still dead, apparently)... we say: stick with double bill BEAST WARS (8.20am, Mon, ITV)... cable-owning completists can enjoy the frankly ropey from-the-very-start repeats of SEINFELD (9.30pm, Tue, Paramount)... ironically, no-one foresaw that cod-prophetic IN YOUR DREAMS (8pm, Tue, C4) would get postponed after the Omagh bombing... he missed being in T2, but Michael Biehn climbs another consonant in K2 (10pm, Wed, BBC1)... Vorderman takes her revenge for being kicked off Tomorrow's World with WHAT WILL THEY THINK OF NEXT? (7.30pm, Thu, ITV)... and shame there isn't more of Rodney "subsumption architecture" Brooks or the mole-rat guy, but that's what you get when your geek obsession documentary is FAST, CHEAP AND OUT OF CONTROL (11.15pm, Thu, C4)... FILM>> someone should have reined in Robert Redford's animal weepie THE HORSE WHISPERER (imdb: romance / adventure / drama / horses / based-on-novel / tragedy / tearjerker), at least according to the website that's a crucial part of the plot: http://www.equisearch.com/horsewhisperer/story16.html ... Brit Tarantrainospotting romp LOCK, STOCK AND TWO SMOKING BARRELS (imdb:comedy / thriller) doesn't just deliver footie hard-man Vinnie Jones, but also two villains still sought for international taste-crimes: chirpy Julia Sawalha boyfriend Dexter Fletcher, and Sting... we kid you not, but almost every US review of David "House Of Games" Mamet/ Steve Martin con-trick feast THE SPANISH PRISONER (imdb: thriller / film-noir / twist-in-the-end / drama) painstakingly points out that there are, in fact, no "prisoners" in it, nor is it set in Spain... Kelsey "Frasier" Grammer and Amanda Donohoe re-team in likeable family-friendly Cyrano De Bergerac-er THE REAL HOWARD SPITZ (MPAA rated: PG "for language and mild thematic elements")... and finishing last, appropriately enough, is MR NICE GUY (imdb: action / bloopers-during-credits / comedy), aka Jackie Chan cooking up his usual stomach-flipping stunts as an example to dull TV chefs everywhere... TALES FROM THAT CITY>> Fog descends on San Francisco, closing in on the Multimedia Gulch: thwarted attendees of the cancelled ROBOT WARS conference wander the streets with their spurned, murderous machines. Members of Survival Research Laboratories seek sharper kicks at the http://www.whorechurch.org/ where, in an insane inversion, the city's strippers, dressed to the nines, perform to audiences composed of naked men. HotWired drifts rudderless with rumours that Mr Newhouse will pounce again: http://www.reel.com/, ignorant of the portents, repeats its TV ads for "Titanic", hour after baleful hour. Down in the Valley, the OPEN SOURCE gurus meet. RICHARD STALLMAN plays stern paterfamilias, opining that it's better to quit programming forever than take a penny off a proprietary company ("become a waiter instead", he suggests)). Chewing thoughtfully on his own hair, he delivers a broadside on the diabolism of those who profit by selling unfree manuals for free software. TIM O'REILLY, chairman, sponsor, and founder of O'Reilly Books, looks on charitably, a Medici inviting Savaranola for tea. JAMIE ZAWINSKI talks of his forthcoming sabbatical from Netscape (about time, too, judging from http://www.jwz.org/). ERIC S. RAYMOND mentions that he's seen a tooled-up LINUS TORVALDS shooting at an undisclosed location. "Part of a long-term plan", he smiles, planning the Free Software Militia. And the sun chases the mists away later every day; and no-one knows whether Burning Man (http://www.burningman.com/) will work its unsympathetic magic on the share option crops this year; and the city's saviours, the geeks, play games of Quake II, as if rehearsing for the end of their world. >> UNCLASSIFIED << NTK seeks work-experience-style INTERN/ RESEARCHER to assist our ever-desperate attempts to sell out to obscurely scheduled TV shows. The ideal candidate will be an embittered net.cynic with a surprisingly cogent awareness of real-world happenings, and a lively penchant for locating pertinent websites and then taking the piss out of them. Alternatively, you might just be interested in working in telly. You will be London-based, able to work for a small (but non-zero) pittance, and shockingly contemptuous of what currently passes for net journalism. To demonstrate their suitability, applicants are invited to hack the homepage of a major UK web design agency, or - what the heck - just email us at jobs@spesh.com. Do NOT attempt to contact our last intern. >> 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 "gifted social isolates"" 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 THE ILLUMINATI 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. Contact terry@spesh.com for commercial licence details. Tips, news and gossip to tips@spesh.com.