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        "[X-Box 2] also will have about 256 megabytes of dynamic 
         random access memory. But Microsoft will upgrade that to 512 
         *gigabytes* if Sony puts in more..."
          - San Jose Mercury reports proportionate response from MS
                          http://www.ntk.net/2004/02/06/dohgiga.gif
         ...Sony to counter with claims of "infinity" memory in PS3, 
             vague threat that "their dad" may also become involved


                               >> HARD NEWS <<
                               not what accrues

         In accordance with NTK prophecy: the BBC's Scambusters TV show 
         was a somewhat toothless investigation where they played dumb 
         pranks on Nigerian fraudsters and didn't really delve into the 
         mechanics of pyramid-style schemes. Which is a shame, because 
         the latter are really taking off thanks to the net's rapid 
         spread of information and increasing acceptability of online 
         payment systems. Search for "iPod" by price on eBay.co.uk, and 
         you get a lot of "40GB for UKP20" offers, many linking to those 
         sites where you pay your money to get onto a list (sometimes 
         called a "matrix"), and apparently receive your gadget after a 
         certain number of other people join up, who then get theirs 
         after their quota join, and so on. The way they're classically
         structured, however, means the number of new bargain-hunters 
         required to chip in increases linearly for each additional 
         joiner (try it with letters of the alphabet to check), so even 
         a favourable-looking 4:1 joiner:payout ratio means that, say, 
         the 10th member will be waiting for 33 others to sign up 
         before getting anything (or, more likely, everyone gives up). 
         We don't know what makes us angrier: the lack of mathematical 
         common-sense here, or the callous targeting of potential iPod 
         purchasers - by definition, an unusually suggestible and 
         vulnerable segment of society.
         http://qwer.org/ebayUKiPodsByPrice.html
               - probably a violation of eBay (and PayPal's) T&C's?
         http://www.bbc.co.uk/watchdog/scambusters/programme_1.shtml
              - best tip: "If it sounds too good to be true, it is"

         EMERGING TECH, that other not-a-weird-pyramid-selling
         recruitment-cult-honest, is about to start in San Diego. As
         usual, a sizeable squadron of British waifs and strays will
         be coming over, with nothing but their talk clutched in one
         hand and a dream of a better life (or at least somewhere
         where people don't laugh when they say "blogorator"). To
         combat any adjustment problems you may have, the NTK Halfway
         House will be running its traditional cynicism and
         bitterness outlet sessions offsite at Em3rg1ng L0ft, our
         local shanty-town for those unable to afford proper
         accommodation. Party on Wednesday, we suspect. And for those
         of you who can't afford Emerging Tech, but are seriously
         considering a standby hop to San Francisco to sleep on
         floors and go to CodeCon, there is talk of lightning-talk
         roundup of the previous conference on the evening of Monday
         16th. More info if it happens next week.
         http://www.commonhouse.net/wiki/em3rg1ngl0ft
                              - tea and refreshing lack of sympathy

         Once again, we really hope we're not single-handedly
         propping up the .name business with these ironic purchases.
         "I am now the proud owner of http://thisdomain.hasno.name/",
         writes NICK CLARK, "Still, 24USD for 1 year's registration.
         Am I being ripped off?" Excluding our commission, we think
         you'll find that's actually quite reasonable. Others have
         been vicariously enjoying the registrations of others -
         "whois sex.sex.name has a lot of dongs in it!" crows ANDY
         PRYKE (who really should know better than to go for the
         "funny surname" taunt). But it's DORIAN MOORE who takes the
         winning biscuit with his slow decline to the very bottom of
         the barrel: "After realising I could have someone.elses.name ,
         I just had to have every.ones.name. Then I decided that, 
         finally, all.you.name/are/belong/to/us was where this was
         heading". Horrifically inevitable - but when you start 
         messing with namespace, especially the .name namespace of 
         names, this is what you reap.
         http://www.nic.names/
           - they should have known: RealNames never stood a chance


                                >> ANTI-NEWS <<
                             berating the obvious

         yeah, but if you think about - houses are bigger nowadays: 
         http://www.ntk.net/2004/02/06/doh1in3.gif ... mixed sales 
         messages: http://www.ntk.net/2004/02/06/dohsat.gif ... mixed 
         feelings about new baby?: www.ntk.net/2004/02/06/dohrose.gif 
         ... Widdecombe of the Week: http://tinyurl.com/2sfup ... 
         return of the abstract web illustrations (moderately NSFW): 
www.avn.com/?Primary_Navigation=Articles&Action=View_Article&Content_ID=72431
         ... Frontpage redefining web standards of "clean code", while 
         you wait: http://www.ntk.net/2004/02/06/dohfrot.gif ... what 
         they could've won: http://www.ntk.net/2004/02/06/dohbully.gif 
         ... Co-op cynicism: http://www.ntk.net/2004/02/06/dohemp.jpg 
         ... plus this month's Google goofs musically-themed special: 
         http://www.google.com/search?q=%22singer+dongwriter%22 , 
         Codplay, pooyphonic, mutilmedia (ie, jpegs of piercings etc), 
http://www.google.com/search?q=%22send+it+along%22+%22tears+of+a+clown%22 ...


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

         Not going to ETCON? Well, here's a chance to enjoy yourself 
         while all those touchy-feely social software hippies are out 
         of the country - Strange Attractor will be channeling a new 
         kind of DARK ENERGY through regular Russell Square venue The 
         Horse Hospital (from 7pm, next Tue 2004-02-10, UKP6), in the 
         form of a "Mindclash" between "Techgnosis" author Erik Davis 
         and Fortean-flavoured writer Ken Hollings, plus a showing of 
         1950s UK scifi film "Fire Maidens from Outer Space". The event 
         may also mark the debut of the organiser's first "Journal of 
         *Un*popular Culture" - and, before you ask: no, you *don't* 
         get in for free if you turn up dressed as Garth Merenghi.
         http://www.strangeattractor.co.uk/talks.html
           - vs "Greetings, Pilgrim": http://www.garthmarenghi.com/
         http://www.memetank.net/mt/archives/000154.html
                - speaking of slightly-behind-schedule magazines...


                                >> TRACKING <<
               sufficiently advanced technology : the gathering

         After purchasing a webcam, one's mind naturally alights to
         one application. Then when you realise dancing naked with a
         hat on in front of three strangers makes you feel... soiled,
         one quickly moves on to experimenting with pattern
         recognition. PYMORPH is a fascinating bundle of image
         processing hacks that will help you with the latter (and
         maybe the former). Running with Python on Windows (and, 
         with some .EXE zipfile dismantling, Unix), it's a toolkit 
         of routines for "image segmentation, non-linear filtering,
         pattern recognition and image analysis". Like much code 
         that drops fully-formed from academia, most of it looks
         incomprehensibly like crashed saucer technology. But what's
         nice about Pymorph is how many explanatory demos are
         included that visually step you through the magic of the
         algorithms: "mmdchickparts" shows you how Pymorph can
         automatically classify chicken bones. "mmdcookies" visually
         separates broken biscuits from nice round ones. And for
         those of you still looking for WMDs and the like,
         "mmdairport" detects runways in satellite imagery. Just
         playing around with the demos is enough to give you ideas.
         And not those bad sick ideas you're trying to escape from,
         either.
         http://www.mmorph.com/pymorph/morph/mmdemos/index.html
                                             - start with the demos


                                >> MEMEPOOL <<
                contains a source of http://snackspot.org/

         same old joke, always liked it: http://www.nice-tits.org/ ... 
         "Kevin Bacon" experts - do not be taken in by "6 Degrees of 
         Bevin Kaye" con: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1508744/ ... 
         new "one of these not safe for work like the others" (sigh): 
         http://images.google.com/images?q=peapod ... "back way" 
         machine, more like!: http://web.archive.org/web/*/goatse.cx 
         ... "Raargh!": http://www.dea.gov/pubs/intel/01008/raver.gif 
         ... top tip: create the impression that you're carrying out
         background Google searches while on the phone by laboriously 
         spelling out key phrases then interjecting random facts into 
         the conversation... A66 - highway to the "Danger Zone": 
         http://www.streetmap.co.uk/newmap.srf?x=376959&y=519160&z=5 
         ... how homepages used to sound before blogs spoiled it all: 
         http://www.edu.lahti.fi/~lloikkan/ ... Mozilla build goes one 
         better than Microsoft, deletes all non-Mozilla applications: 
         http://www.mozillazine.org/talkback.html?article=4264 ... 


                                >> GEEK MEDIA <<
                                  get out less

         TV>> Armando Ianucci risks falling back on the old "Because 
         that's what the civil service *are really like*" in BRITAIN'S 
         BEST SITCOM: YES MINISTER (7pm, Sun, BBC2)... a column in this 
         week's Radio Times intriguingly argues that bowel cancer is 
         never going to rival AIDS as the subject of star-studded TV 
         events like ANGELS IN AMERICA (9pm, Sat, C4)... though neither 
         ailment seems exotic enough to satisfy C5's medical curiosity, 
         evinced in a double-bill of THE WOMAN WITH THE 14-STONE TUMOUR 
         (8pm, Sun, C5) and THE WOMAN WITH THE MYSTERIOUS BRAIN 
         (8.30pm, Sun, C5)... every time we use one of those syringe-
         based inkjet-refilling kits, we never tire of recreating Sarah 
         Connor's "Open it or he'll be dead before he hits the floor" 
         scene from TERMINATOR 2 (9pm, Sun, C5)... TRAITOR (6pm, Mon-
         Fri, BBC2) is the latest attempt to create a Prisoner's 
         Dilemma-style game show... and ULTIMATE ATTACK HELICOPTERS 
         (8pm, Mon, C5) is to be retitled for the international market 
         as "The USA's Most Expensive Flying Targets For Rocket-
         Propelled Grenades"... Brunel must create a brass exoskeleton 
         to counter Stephenson's galvanic railgun in steampunk drama-
         docu MEN OF IRON (9pm, Mon, C4)... the trailers are using 
         Orbital's "The Box" rather than Andrew Lloyd Webber's chart 
         hit version of the game theme for the story of TETRIS: FROM 
         RUSSIA WITH LOVE (9pm, Mon, BBC4), part of a "Computer Night" 
         that also includes HARD DRIVE HEAVEN: THE HISTORY OF THE HOME 
         COMPUTER (10pm, Mon, BBC4) and perhaps a glimpse of Steven 
         Poole's furrowed brow in TRIGGER HAPPY: THE INVINCIBLE RISE OF 
         THE COMPUTER GAME (10.30pm, Mon, BBC4)... SOMEBODY'S DAUGHTER, 
         SOMEBODY'S SON (10.35pm, Mon, BBC1) implies that having Peter 
         Sellers as a dad was like living with a real-life Inspector 
         Clouseau... Victoria "Harry" Harrison's mentoring tips for 
         this week's "rock chick" FAKING IT (9pm, Tue, C4) presumably 
         include releasing a a lame cover version, some dire sub-
         "Tranvision Vamp" self-penned numbers, then disappearing 
         completely from the public consciousness except for a token 
         "Never Mind The Buzzcocks" appearance in about 5 year's time 
         http://www.h-a-r-r-y.com/index2.htm ... and, after a terrible 
         BBC4 version of his Perrier-winning show, hopes aren't high 
         for Demetri Martin's COMEDY LAB (11.05pm, Tue, C4)... Linda 
         "Freaks and Geeks/ Scooby Doo" Cardellini joins the cast of ER 
         (10pm, Wed, C4) ... a tech-support guy is transformed into a 
         bionic NSA agent in nano-nonsense JAKE 2.0 (8pm, Thu, Sky 
         One)... Sandra Bullock becomes a hard-bitten beauty queen in 
         Shatner nerd-makeover amusement MISS CONGENIALITY (8pm, Thu, 
         C5)... and Jack Bauer leaves the CTU Counter Terrorist Unit to 
         join what he mistakenly believes to be its British equivalent 
         - the Broadcasting Entertainment Cinematograph and Theatre 
         Union BECTU - in the new, more light-hearted series of 24 
         (9pm, Thu, Sky One)...
         
         FILM>> yes, it's got an interesting indie cast, and it's a bit 
         like Lee and Herring's "cool teacher" sketch crossed with 
         "Dead Poets Society", but everything else turns out just a 
         little bit thin in predictable Jack Black vehicle SCHOOL OF 
         ROCK ( http://www.capalert.com/capreports/schoolofrock.htm : 
         violation of school procedure; urination; there is great power 
         in expression through music, but abuse of that power by modern 
         artists is the problem)... age appears to be no barrier to 
         romance between Jack Nicholson, Diane Keaton and Keanu Reeves 
         in sitcom-style sassy OAP frolic SOMETHING'S GOTTA GIVE 
       ( http://www.screenit.com/movies/2003/something's_gotta_give.html : 
         [Amanda Peet] first removes her top to reveal her in a 
         camisole or similar lingerie; we see a brief shot of 
         [Keaton's] bare breasts as well as a full shot of her with one 
         hand/arm over her chest and the other covering her crotch as 
         she races away)... while the limited releases offer you 
         bonkers European cinema homage THE DREAMERS ( imdb: 1960s/ 
         brother-sister-relationship/ friendship/ paris-france)... or 
         an equally romanticised view of the East End, with Luke Goss, 
         Steven Berkoff, Leslie "Dirty Den" Grantham and his former TV 
         wife Anita Dobson in retro gangster romp CHARLIE (press ads 
         unfortunately make it look like the former Bros singer is 
         fronting a "hip to street slang" anti-drugs campaign)...
                           

                               >> 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
                  "two minutes on Dave Gorman's mouth tractor"
                           http://www.antics.org.uk/          

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