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        "After sentencing, Mr Tarrant issued a statement saying the 
         plot to cheat the show was a 'very cynical plan, motivated 
         by sheer greed'..."
                            http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2910119.stm
             - all other "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?" contestants 
                motivated by altruism, philanthropy, the sheer joy of 
                                                    general knowledge


                                >> HARD NEWS <<
                                invisible coups

         Good to see ANDREW ORLOWSKI of The Register get hold of
         whatever pills Thomas Greene was on before they shipped him
         back to Nam. Andrew - who, these days, can *see* the
         googlebots walking among us - says that the search engine
         corps is one step away from creating an Orwellian superstate
         where the proletariat's expressions of discontent are
         written out of history by a cabal of elite bloggers and
         their corporate overlords. Google does this in two stages.
         First by giving bloggers' stupid invented words a higher
         ranking than Andrew's ingenious made-up terminology. And 
         it's certainly true that the Register stories do seem to be
         remarkably low down in googly pagerankings. Is this because
         - as Andrew claims - "someone at Google doesn't like the
         word 'Googlewashed'"? Or is it that that "someone" penalises
         long text pages with non-descriptive headings and a <TITLE>
         tag that says "The Register" on every page? Only Google's
         sinister robot army know for sure.
         http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/30087.html
                - Google fails to index New York Times (subscription)
                              article that doesn't mention key phrase
         http://www.google.com/search?q=googlewash
                - on the other hand, does seem to be a bit blog-crazy...
         http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/30195.html
                                       - EQUALS PROOF OF A CONSPIRACY

         But what about Orlowski's other accusation - that Google
         News indexes press releases? Thanks to Orlowski's still-keen
         investigative skills, this turns out to be true: but where
         could the Google Bots have learnt that technique from? Well,
         certainly not from the fine human journos at the Register,
         whose recent article on Habeas was in no way cut and pasted
         from Habeas' own press release. As you can see for yourself,
         many of the sentences are in a different order. Oh, and to
         show journalists will never be replaced by feelingless
         machines, they've also reworded a literal quote.
         http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/30112.html
                 - Google has redefined news as press releases, while
         http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/55/30109.html
                                - the Register fears no PR flack's...
         http://www.habeas.com/about/prs.htm#fivesuits
                                      - ... accusations of plagiarism

         Perhaps, instead, they learnt it from the BBC, who this week
         ran another piece on the importance of fighting piracy with
         strong laws, quoting statistics and attitudes from the BSA
         without reasonable balance - from, say, the Malaysian pirates
         who sold a guy a copy of FrontPage and gave him the
         Chernobyl virus. Quite how a Word macro virus got mixed up
         with an executable wasn't explained. Neither was the obvious
         counterpoint to these "dangers of pirated software pieces".
         Why don't these people rip software off from a reputable ftp
         site, instead of paying for it? Remember kids, that md5 hash
         is your warez Certificate of Authenticity!
         http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2924531.stm
             - at least Google's press releases cut out the middleman
         http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/30148.html
             - in the interests of balance: The Reg on FAST does good


                                >> ANTI-NEWS <<
                             berating the obvious

         war spam forces coders to resort to using "Boolean logic": 
         http://www.ntk.net/2003/04/11/dooboo.gif ... if you don't want 
         us to run more GOOGLE GOOFS, please send something else in: 
         http://www.google.com/search?q=%22dead+or+alice%22 + "per 
         anum" vs www.google.com/search?q=anum+%22through+the+nose%22 
         ... BBC offer baffling introduction to game of GO, a game 
         apparently played with an infinite number of stones, on a 
         chequered board, until both players are so bored they give up: 
       http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/hi/world/newsid_2164000/2164580.stm
         ... GUARDIAN gets into the "inappropriate advertising" game: 
      http://media.guardian.co.uk/advertising/story/0,7492,932861,00.html
      THE INQUIRER, comedy captions: www.theinquirer.net/?article=8796 - 
         we'll take 'em all on: www.ntk.net/2003/04/11/dohhome.gif , 
         http://www.ntk.net/2003/04/11/dohqa.gif ....


                               >> EVENT QUEUE <<
                         goto's considered non-harmful

         Annoyingly, next week's scheduled LINUX USER EXPO 2003 has now 
         been postponed to the end of June, otherwise we could have 
         juxtaposed it with this weekend's FORTEAN TIMES UNCOVENTION 
         (from 10am, Sat & Sun 2003-04-12/13, Commonwealth Centre, 
         Kensington, London W8, from UKP10 per day) in order to make 
         our now-traditional gags about "Linux wildmen" and their 
         sacred ritual of the "comparing of the distros". Still, if you 
         prefer to witness your weirdness in its natural habitat, so to 
         speak, you can always join the marching sub-contingent KAZOOS 
         AGAINST THE WAR (meeting 11.30am to march at 12noon, tomorrow 
         Sat 2003-04-12, Royal Festival Hall bar, London, free, but 
         bring a kazoo and, if you can, wear red). And if you've 
         somehow managed to lose that friend of yours running the 
         London Marathon, then why not drop by and catch NTK's own 
         "Dave Green" at CYBERSALON's second DIGITAL ART AND NET 
         ACTIVISM CYBERSUNDAY (from 6pm, Sun 2003-04-13, Freedom bar 
         below, 60-66 Wardour Street, London W1, UKP2), ostensibly 
         speaking about this new-fangled "Open Source" but almost 
         certainly touching on the good old days of warez and serialz 
         along the way. 
         http://www.cybersalon.org/
               - plus Digital Activism evening at the ICA this Monday
         http://www.stopwar.org.uk/
            - if that statue stunt was staged, why'd it take so long?
http://www.unconvention2003.com/html%20pages/visitors/v-speakers.htm
               - featuring Ghostwatch, Buffy & Forteana, Ken Campbell
         http://www.linuxuser.co.uk/expo/
                       - gotta love those lossy jpegs on the nav menu


                                >> TRACKING <<
               sufficiently advanced technology : the gathering

         Continuing our ongoing theme of reviewing half-finished
         Python IDE components in the hope that someone will stitch
         them together into something usable, BICYCLE REPAIR MAN is
         everything you need for a neat refactoring editor. All, that
         is, except for the editor bit: which BRM sensibly leaves to
         Emacs, Idle or Vim. Little wires lead from your chosen
         editor to Python routines for smartly renaming classes and
         methods, extract methods and find definitions and
         references. Stuff like inlining and extracting variables are
         in CVS with more to come. If the idea of some huge monolith
         of an IDE like Eclipse scares the bejesus out of you, but
         you find bolting chunks on to your existing environment
         positively calming, BRM is worth looking at. If only to
         fiddle with endlessly: the true goal of all IDEs.
         http://bicyclerepair.sourceforge.net/
        - as if there wasn't enough Monty Python quoting in the world
         http://isbn.nu/0201485672
                - you always have to buy one book for these XP things

http://weblog.infoworld.com/udell/stories/2002/12/11/librarylookup.html
                                      - or support your local library


                                >> MEMEPOOL <<
                ceci n'est pas une http://www.gagpipe.com/

         ultraniche slash: http://www.michaelkelly.fsnet.co.uk/karl.htm 
         ... puppet regime: http://makeashorterlink.com/?N15812D24 
         ... groovy young person's guide to buying your first home: 
         http://www.portlandmercury.com/current/feature.html ... TITLE 
         tag announces "WEBSITE GOOD", huge downloads beg to differ: 
         http://www.matthew-arnold.surrey.sch.uk/ ... that "Schott's 
         Original Miscellany" book clearly has a lot to answer for: 
         http://www.vitaminq.blogspot.com/ ... this week's unfortunate 
         product name: http://www.biovea.net/item.jhtml?PRID=1185607 
         ... ROCHESTER INSTITUTE OF SCIENCE unveils limited robotics 
         programme: http://www.cis.rit.edu/~jerry/Image/lego/ed209.html 
         ... digital projector chain to use Windows Media Player 9: 
         http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/030403/sfth027_1.html - premier 
         performance likely to be: http://www.imdb.com/Title?0106438 
         ... naked Ebay guy at last manages to locate his dressing gown: 
         http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3411877471 ...


                                >> GEEK MEDIA <<
                  what, *another* http://www.tvgohome.com/ ?

         TV>> as the sports section of The Columbus Ledger-Enquirer 
         astutely observes, ALI G IN DA USAIII (10pm, Fri, C4) "has 
         several alter egos - a British wannabe rapper, a clueless 
         reporter from Khazakstan and [flamboyant TV reporter] Bruno": 
     http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/mld/ledgerenquirer/sports/5515487.htm 
         ... will C4 screen THE DAM BUSTERS (4.10pm, Sat, C4) uncut?: 
       http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,7493,504037,00.html
         - showing in conjunction with simulator-recreation DAMBUSTERS 
         (9pm, Mon, C4), itself up against Presidential aerial actioner 
         AIR FORCE ONE (9pm, Mon, C5)... and 25 YEARS OF SMASH HITS 
         (9pm, Sat, C4) examines "how the magazine has influenced the 
         music industry" - and not in a good way?... Peter Biskind's 
         '70s-movie-biz hagiography is adapted into talking-heads docu 
         EASY RIDERS, RAGING BULLS (9pm, Sat, BBC4)... the incomparable 
         Bill Murray is on fine form in gross-out Amish 10-pin-bowling 
         odyssey KINGPIN (10pm, Sun, C4)... and there's more nudity 
         from Radha "Pitch Black" Mitchell than from Ally Sheedy in 
         lesbian "Trainspotting" HIGH ART (1.55am, Sun, C4)... the 
         contestants try to keep up with the helicopter's inexorable 
         progress on the all-new gloebtrotting TREASURE HUNT (6pm, Mon-
         Fri, BBC2)... C5 targets a slightly older demographic with its 
         followup to "99 Things To Do Before You're 30", 99 THINGS TO 
         DO BEFORE YOU DIE (11.25pm, Mon, C5)... and Adam and Joe add 
         their voiceover expertise to SHOCK VIDEO (11.55pm, Mon, C5), a 
         reversioning of the HBO clip show which used to be shown on E4: 
         http://www.fortunecity.com/lavender/scarface/753/latest2.html 
         ... THE REAL BLAIR WITCH (10pm, Tue, C4) doesn't appear to be 
         a belated mockumentary promo for the DVD release of the movie, 
         but maybe that's just what "they" want you to think... despite 
         a lot of press saying that's when they've scheduled Donal 
         MacIntyre's investigation of credit card fraud, most of the 
         listings have C5 showing BROKEN ARROW (9pm, Wed, C5)... 
         HORIZON: GOD ON THE BRAIN (9pm, Thu, BBC2) attempts the 
         theoretically impossible - inducing an electromagnetic 
         religious experience in the mind of arch-atheist Richard 
         Dawkins... while the "Danny Wallace" protagonist of kung-fu 
         buddy actioner THE CORRUPTOR (10pm, Thu, C4) isn't the Dave 
         Gorman sidekick who now appears to specialise in the appalling
         genre of concocting pointless challenges then writing books 
         about them: http://www.dannywallace.com/joinme.html ... 
         
         FILM>> early publicity had Henry Naylor reprising his original 
         "Bough" from the Barclaycard ads, a role in which he now seems 
         to have been replaced by fellow Cambridge Footlights 1990 
         alumnus Ben Miller in lame Mr Bean spy spoof JOHNNY ENGLISH 
         ( http://www.bbfc.co.uk/ : contains mild language and comic 
         violence)... Easter brings the voices of Haley Joel Osment, 
         John Goodman and Phil Collins - together at last! - in wildly 
         unnecessary "Bear Necessities" retread THE JUNGLE BOOK 2 
         ( http://www.capalert.com/capreports/junglebook2.htm : lies, 
         repeatedly; strong implication of a character's death by 
         another character; defiance of mother's call)... as S-Club n-1 
         play mindless automatons - which shouldn't be too much of a 
         stretch, on the evidence of their TV show - in their thought-
         provoking musical comedy on the ethics of cloning, SEEING 
         DOUBLE ( http://www.bbfc.co.uk/ : contains mild sex references 
         and one use of mild language)... 
         
         BONERS: CORRECTIONS, CLARIFICATIONS, AND "INCORRECTLY REGARDED 
         AS GOOFS">> well spotted to BEN MOOR for noting that, despite 
         the ominous predictions of NTK 2003-03-21, "the British prime 
         minister is the UK's head of government rather than head of 
         state"; to reader MIKE, for remembering that the traditional 
         construction should be "Someone set *up us* the...", rather 
         than the "Someone set us up" we chose to dabble with in the 
         same issue; and to super-pedants LLOYD WOOD and PAUL BLEZARD, 
         who both crowed over the accidental substitution of "tying" 
         for "trying" in NTK 2003-03-28, Blezard going on to query a 
         previous usage of "publically" instead of "publicly" plus a 
         subsequent mention of "Henry VII" (should have been "VIII"). 
         Yet our greatest sympathy was reserved for GUY DAVIDSON, who 
         was sufficiently misled by NTK's 2003-01-31 confusion of 
         "Smiths" vocalist Morrissey with Homebase spokesman Neil 
         Morrissey to excitedly email his wife, only to get "a forlorn 
         message" back from her, presumably correcting the error and 
         leading him to forgo any hopes of "pie and mash" that evening 
         ... entering yet more complex territory, reader CHESS 
         theorised that NTK 2003-03-07's news link entitled "Georgia 
         senators ANGRY about musical! Georgia senators SMASH!" had 
         probably been submitted to us because the actual events 
         ("South Pacific" being slammed for "justifying intermarriage 
         of different races") apparently "happened fifty years ago", 
         though the site "forgot the '50 Years Ago' banner on the web 
         page": http://talkingpointsmemo.com/feb0304.html#022803142pm 
         (hey, we take our jokes any way we can find them). And, on a 
         point of house style, ADAM NEALIS incorrectly regarded NTK 
         2003-02-21's use of "PIN number" as a goof because, he 
         expands: "PIN = Personal Identification Number, therefore PIN 
         number = Personal Identification Number number, which sounds 
         ludicrous". To be honest, Adam, we - and the alt.usage.english 
         FAQ http://www.english-usage.com/faq.html#fxrepeat (caution, 
         large file) - don't have a problem with this, or HIV virus, or 
         MIDI interface, or whatever (though admittedly "interface" is 
         being used there in two slightly different ways)... and 
         finally, in the wake of NTK's 2003-03-28 sighting of the 
         "Spazz" wheelchair http://www.sportaid.com/page16.htm , ALF 
         EATON "thought we might like" the Guardian's recent correction 
      http://www.guardian.co.uk/corrections/story/0,3604,908199,00.html
         wherein a mole was described as having "weird, spazzy, claws" 
         - a use of "spazzy" described as "totally contrary to the 
         Guardian's approach to disability". Too right it's 
         inappropriate - surely they're more "flid-like", or "fliddy"?:
         http://www.playgroundlaw.com/perl/browse.pl?sid=286 ...


                               >> 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
                            "fun loving, criminal"
                   http://www.ntk.net/2003/04/11/dohdg.gif      

                                 NEED TO KNOW
            THEY STOLE OUR REVOLUTION. NOW WE'RE STEALING IT BACK.
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