Need To Know 2002-09-13

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"In some countries, you can tune the TV to 'text channels,' which are like Web pages with background music. Each displays news headlines, weather, sports scores, stock prices, and -- the most useful one for me -- the latest airline flight information." - DAVID POGUE previews exciting new European technologies for Americans http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/12/technology/circuits/12POGUE-EMAIL.html ... CEEFAX: catch the wave! >> HARD NEWS << who's kidding who? Silly season again, but instead of just running made-up press releases masquerading as news stories, we at NTK like to run Google searches masquerading as investigative journalism. Take the 5 plucky Brits who changed their names to "Turok" to promote ACCLAIM's new dinosaur shoot-em-up earlier this month. Given Acclaim's claims that "more than 10,000 people" applied for this honour, it's curious that a Google search on their names reveals at least two of the chosen winners to be jobbing actors. Of course, that could just be coincidence - except that a search for DR SIMEON CANTRELL, the alleged mastermind behind this groundbreakingly tedious marketing stunt, gets no non-Turok-related hits at all, except that he shares certain biographical details - including "a habit of challenging conventional business ideas" - with one Dr Byron Sharp, also of the Marketing Science Centre, Australia. But there can be no doubt that the (now widely-quoted) Dr Cantrell actually exists, because, as Acclaim emphasise, he has a book coming out - "Market Their Pants Off!" - a tome which appears to have the same ISBN number as "My First Knock Knock Joke Book". http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_663071.html - vs http://www.ugly.org/goberman_lheila2.html , http://www.ukscreen.com/cast/matthewg http://www.mynameisturok.com/about.htm - as "interviewed" by http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/2197292.stm http://www.marketingsciencecentre.com/people/b_sharp.html - who's there We've been told by shadowy figures in the rebellion to "lay off the EUCD" this edition (but only because there'll be bigger news next week). But in case you were getting too depressed, go ahead cheer yourself up with the very first government sponsored document to go against the crippling of fair dealing rights in the UK: "developing countries, or indeed other developed countries, should not follow the example of the DMCA in forbidding all circumvention of technological protection.", says the Commission on Intellectual Property Rights. Of course, it's about the effect of IP law on the third world and will therefore be utterly ignored, but it's nice to have some ammunition. http://www.iprcommission.org/graphic/documents.htm - chapter five's a corker >> ANTI-NEWS << berating the obvious that's the last time you mess around behind *Google*'s back: http://labs.google.com/glossary?q=whore ... no wonder he's staring: http://uk.news.yahoo.com/020911/80/d9eja.html ... unfortunate banner ads, #38213 http://www.ntk.net/2002/09/13/dohriddance.png ... can we swap it for ours? http://www.ntk.net/2002/09/13/dohsmart.png ... but what if Martha is kidnapping children for al Qaeda? http://www.savemartha.com/ ... so that's where it ended up: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=1561579930 ... who's David? http://www.ntk.net/2002/09/13/dohbleentendre.jpg ... Father Dougal, is that you? http://www.contentwatch.com/audit/ ... last place you'd want flash: http://www.genevievenaturisme.com/english/ >> EVENT QUEUE << goto's considered non-harmful Pittsburgh, Amsterdam, London - Munich! "The Science of Perl" is the theme of this year's YET ANOTHER PERL CONFERENCE:: EUROPE (from Wed, 2002-09-18, Technische Universitat Munchen, Munich, Germany, EUR 89 registration fee, does not include accommodation), featuring the likes of DAMIAN CONWAY talking about "Extreme Perl", "Perl 6" and "Quantum::Superpositions" (like he always seems to be - in this universe, anyway). But don't book your flight back too early, because the Bavarian capital is also playing host to the world's first WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP IN EXTREME IRONING (from 6pm, Fri 2002-09-20, Holzkirchen, near Munich, Germany, EUR 20), with "freestyle", "urban", "water" and "forest" contests in this Brit-invented sport which, we fear, is already having its quirkier creases and folds smoothed out by the high-powered steam of commercial sponsorship and exploitation. http://www.yapc.org/Europe/2002/ - handily, also leads into Munich Beer Festival http://www.extremeironing.com/~eib/ei/teamgb/ - GB team sponsored by Rowenta. Iron on, dudes! http://www.cobd.co.uk/yakfestpage.htm - also next weekend: retro games thing in Oxford http://www.londonopenhouse.org/ - or view internal security of London's biggest buildings >> TRACKING << sufficiently advanced technology : the gathering PSYCO, as befits the name, is scary and wrong. It's a JIT-like specialising compiler for Python (a trick hitherto widely regarded as impossible), that moves chunks of runtime variable processing seamlessly to compile time (mostly impossible), making Python code at Java to C++ speeds (highly impossible). It's also impossibly easy to install, set up, and instantly use on existing code with very little modification. It's all part of Armin Rigos's patently impossible project to prove that the more high-level code is, the faster it should run. Here's hoping he finishes the code before computer scientists with brands and pitchforks break down the castle gates. http://psyco.sf.net/ - and they said John Cocke was mad! http://groups.google.com/groups?th=d85d63a710c53607 - unsolicited praise >> MEMEPOOL << ceci n'est pas une http://www.gagpipe.com/ would a merciful God allow: http://www.geocities.com/bunderfan/ ... when bandwidth thieves attack http://www.i-r-genius.com/tony/cd.html versus http://polaris.umuc.edu/~jweldon/CD.html versus http://cgi.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2050970860 ... http://uk1.farnell.com/Search/search-main23.jhtml?CATID1=24&CATID2=1051 - always out of bloody stock.. won't someone please http://www.thinkofthechildren.co.uk/ ... hang around the "safety" page on http://www.wtc2002.com/ and it'll tastefully play Twin Peak's "Falling" ... http://www.iggle.com/images/sanrio/hk40k.jpg Life, http://uk.news.yahoo.com/020907/80/d92ih.html meet Onion: http://www.theonion.com/onion3710/hamster_thrown.html ... worst. sigs. ever: http://bitey.net/slashdot-sigs/ ... great edition of ROSS "OUTSIDE SCOOP" TRUEMAN, as he touchingly explains why Posh Spice would "never allow her children to be taken": http://www.popgossip.fsnet.co.uk/mainpage.html ... >> GEEK MEDIA << get out less TV>> the - somewhat ineffectual - torture of Jennifer Garner takes up most of the pilot episode of ALIAS (5.30pm, Sat, C4), Demi Moore gets a bit of a rough ride in Ridley Scott designer boot camp odyssey GI JANE (9.15pm, Sat, C4) - but Michael Douglas has had just about as much as he can take, in one of Joel Schumacher's nearly 1-in-5 surprisingly good films, FALLING DOWN (11pm, Sat, BBC1)... the ever-annoying Lisa Rogers is the new co-host of SCRAPHEAP CHALLENGE (5.25pm, Sun, C4)... don't hold your breath for the "This man has no dick" line in the edited-for-language cut of GHOSTBUSTERS (6.55pm, Sun, C5)... and, as the continuity announcer suggested at the end of Tuesday's showing, there's another chance to "catch any bits you missed" in Spielberg's 3-hour SAVING PRIVATE RYAN (9pm, Sun, C5) - though make sure you set the video for magnificent Denise Richards/ Neve Campbell/ Bill Murray modern-day noir WILD THINGS (10pm, Sun, C4)... dance music docu BETTER LIVING THROUGH CIRCUITRY (12midnight, Sun, C4) features DJ Spooky, Roni Size, US "big-beat" idiots The Crystal Method... Ross "Eastenders" Kemp hosts grittier-than- usual SAS-training reality gameshow ULTIMATE FORCE (9pm, Mon & Wed, ITV)... Amy "NYPD Blue" Brenneman is, presumably, a judge, in ingeniously titled US drama JUDGING AMY (1.45pm, Mon-Fri, C4)... and DESPATCHES: SEX ON THE STREET (9pm, Mon, C4) heralds the start of C4's "Prostitution - The Laws Don't Work" season - though surely it would be quicker if C4 just told us which laws *do* still work, and why... one obvious gag about the BBC's CRACKING CRIME night (from 7pm, Wed, BBC1): http://www.martian.fm/cracking_crime.htm ... Mel Gibson takes a rather more pro-active approach to the problem in RANSOM (9pm, Wed, C5)... and hopefully REPUTATIONS (9pm, Thu, BBC2) will ask the obvious Uri Geller question: if his psychic powers are so amazing, why do they only manifest themselves in ways that resemble simple conjuring tricks - instead of, say, actually having some worthwhile real-world effect?... FILM>> jittery Mel Gibson triumphs over god-awful B-movie dialogue, heavy-handed M Night Shyamalan philosophising and a - surprisingly restrained - "Home Alone" Culkin sibling in spooky "Close Encounters Of The Agricultural Kind" containment sci-fi SIGNS ( http://www.capalert.com/capreports/signs.htm : toilet humor by child; constant threat of the unseen with several individual instances of amplified threat; child demanding his "vote" outweighs his father's authority)... after "10 Things I Hate About You" and "Hamlet 2000", Julia Stiles continues her teen Shakespeare remakes in high-school hate-em-up O[THELLO] ( http://www.cndb.com/movie.html?title=O : Creative camerawork means we don't see Stiles naked but it's implied and she does look naked, as we see multiple angles of her and a lot of flesh, but no "flesh" of importance to reveal that she is, indeed, naked)... even without the interracial aspect, the road to romance can still be a rocky one, posits Afro-American battle-of-the-sexes TWO CAN PLAY [AT] THAT GAME ( http://www.capalert.com/capreports/twocanplay.htm : [Vivica A Fox] modulates the frequency of her shields to reflect the advances right back at the [Morris Chestnut]/[Anthony Anderson] pair)... and it's no easier for God-fearin' all- white folks in Mandy Moore teen tosh weepie A WALK TO REMEMBER ( http://www.screenit.com/movies/2002/a_walk_to_remember.html : [Lauren German] and others digitally manipulate a photo and put [Moore]'s face on the body of a scantily clad woman; Phrases: "Jedi master of bullsh*t", "I've got to take a massive piss")... >> 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. Registered at the Post Office as a "Lunch Hour Thriller" http://www.fhm.com/reporter/100bestsites/frames.asp NEED TO KNOW THEY STOLE OUR REVOLUTION. NOW WE'RE STEALING IT BACK. Archive - http://www.ntk.net/ Unsubscribe? Mail ntknow-unsubscribe@lists.ntk.net Subscribe? Mail ntknow-subscribe@lists.ntk.net NTK now is supported by UNFORTU.NET, and by you: http://www.geekstyle.co.uk/ (K) 2002 Special Projects. Copying is fine, but include URL: http://www.ntk.net/ Tips, news and gossip to tips@spesh.com All communication is for publication, unless you beg. Press releases from naive PR people to pr@spesh.com Remember: Your work email may be monitored if sending sensitive material. Sending >500KB attachments is forbidden by the Geneva Convention. Your country may be at risk if you fail to comply.