"'Cyber brides' vulnerable to abuse..."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/3700409.stm
...while their cyber men are away for long periods trying
to destroy the gold planet Voga, cyber-leaders warned in
a statement, yesterday
>> HARD NEWS <<
Eurovision debuts
Our Java skills must be getting rusty - we missed out a
cycle of European Parliament procedure in last week's
pseudocode summary of the Software Patents process.
Following the Council of Ministers vote this week, the
patent proposals now go back to the Parliament for a
second reading. Any amendments to fix the mess will need an
absolute majority there. That's not inconceivable - many of
the original EU parliament amendments got over 50% of the
votes. But it'll be close. But then, it was close all along.
The Council of Ministers vote was only seven votes short of
going our way, after lobbying by RMS and others swayed the
juries of Poland and Spain. Even now, moves are afoot in the
Dutch parliament to have that country's Council of Ministers
pro-patent vote retrospectively changed. Lobbying is really
working: your MEP may be the next to switch.
http://mjr.towers.org.uk/proj/eurovote/
- getting the LibDems would be a start
http://wiki.ael.be/index.php/MEP-Position-Lobbying-Guide
- go on, have a word in their shellike
http://www.infiniteideasmachine.com/archive/000062.html
- also, looks like some progress on ID cards
Following a fantastic response to last week's request of
putting "NTK" in the subject line if you're mailing us, here's
something slightly more ambitious we'd really like for our
birthday. With all the RSS/ iCal stuff available now, can't
someone, somehow, aggregate together as many tech-related UK
events as is feasible in some sort of openly searchable way?
Get in touch (don't forget that "NTK" in the subject line...)
if you know of one, or are building one, or are convinced
"it'd never work, for these patently obvious reasons" - and
ultimately we'd replay the favour by regularly linking to the
one that's a) friendliest about exporting its data to other
websites or services, and b) - at least as importantly - is
piss-easy to submit things to.
http://www.lecturelist.org/
- not bad, some registration though, no export API?
http://www.upcoming.org/metro/uk/london/london/
- "No events scheduled" in London, apparently
http://undergroundlondon.com/art/
- apart from all those art galleries, obviously
>> ANTI-NEWS <<
berating the obvious
rest assured, *abnormal* services will resume as soon as
possible: http://www.ntk.net/2004/05/21/dohnorth.gif ... care
to speculate what BT's "Frequently Asked Question" might be?:
http://www.ntk.net/2004/05/21/dohfaq.gif ... big Hollywood
names bring "unique creative vision" to this recent episode:
http://www.ntk.net/2004/05/21/dohcount.gif ... bootstrap alert:
http://www.croydon.gov.uk/leisure/events/tasteritashburtonlibrary?d=20040518
... so *that's* how it is in that weird cult-like Mac family:
http://www.ntk.net/2004/05/21/dohinc.gif ... clearly not
bitter: http://www.ntk.net/2004/05/21/dohsex.gif ... Internet
Magazine - FALCO!... "appropriate banner ad placing" proudly
presents: http://www.ntk.net/2004/05/21/dohnovell.gif ,
http://www.ntk.net/2004/05/21/dohwolf.gif , credibility of New
Yorker questioned by site advertising "Electron Energised
Water": http://www.ntk.net/2004/05/21/dohelectro.gif ...
>> EVENT QUEUE <<
GOTOs considered non-harmful
The battle against (so-called!) "intellectual" "property"
rages on this week, with a last-minute appearance by RICHARD
STALLMAN on software patents *tonight* (6-7pm, Friday 2004-05-
21, Lecture Theatre 1, Cruciform Building, UCL, Gower Street,
London WC1, presumably just turn up). PROF LARRY LESSIG will
also be REDISCOVERING FREE CULTURE in Oxford next Fri (6pm,
Fri 2004-05-28, Oxford Internet Institute, Oxford OX1, free
but please pre-register by email), and preceded on Monday by
BREWSTER KAHLE offering UNIVERSAL ACCESS TO ALL KNOWLEDGE
(5pm, Mon 2004-05-24, other details the same) - but don't
worry if you can't catch Brewster then, as the Internet
Archive/ Alexa/ WAIS founder is now confirmed to speak at the
resoundingly NTK-endorsed NOTCON (doors open 11am, Sunday
2004-06-06, Imperial College Union, South Kensington, tickets
UKP4/ UKP3 concessions for students, under 18s, OAPs, the
unemployed, any bloggers not covered by one or more of the
previous categories).
http://www.fipr.org/press/040517softpat.html
- only 5 mins from the PC World on Tottenham Court Road
http://ifso.ie/news.html
- URL as promised for RMS in Dublin Monday 24th
http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/collaboration/?rq=forthcoming
- is this the building that used to be the Computer Centre?
http://www.ica.org.uk/index.cfm?articleid=13265
- almost as funny: Dave Green at ICA next Wed
http://www.notcon04.com/
- *really* need to update this site sometime
>> TRACKING <<
sufficiently advanced technology : the gathering
Most of us would like the night sky a lot more if it came
with tool tips. MicroSky is a J2MEE astrolabe that can be
jammed into your mobile phone or PDA, and will give you an
accurate portable rendering of what you'd see right now if
it wasn't pissing down with rain. You'll need a net
connection (GPRS will do nicely), because the applet
communicates with a heap big sky server running out of
Germany. Free registration for the server; endearingly empty
of either source code or promises to keep the server going.
So the sky may fall yet.
http://www.upto.org/microsky/
- scornful astronomers mail us with better apps at usual address
http://skyserver.sdss.org/
- not that skyserver - but we bet they're connected
>> MEMEPOOL <<
contains a source of http://snackspot.org/
Older people from black and minority ethnic communities feel
they have been "researched to death", intensive research finds:
http://www.jrf.org.uk/knowledge/findings/socialcare/564.asp
... maintaining the cosmic balance after last week's vi-
emulating Word macros: http://rath.ca/Misc/VBacs/ ... even
in a community which flies in the face of contemporary
social mores, certain standards of behaviour must still
be maintained: http://www.modernprimitive.com.au/main2.html
... misinterpretable URLS of the month: http://www.bitart.com/ ,
http://www.oddsexchange.com/ , http://www.knobgallery.com ,
http://www.piersandmorgan.co.uk/ + perhaps not the best name:
http://www.culture.gov.uk/global/press_notices/archive_2004/dcms54_2004.htm
... http://www.bbc.co.uk/wonderland/ - after police operation of the
same name?: http://www.ntk.net/index.cgi?b=01998-09-18&l=29#l
... which distinctive piece of movie poster typography are
you?: http://lists.inanutshell.us/form/1.html ...
>> GEEK MEDIA <<
get out less
TV>> here's hoping the implausibly self-mythologising HOW
"FRIENDS" CHANGED THE WORLD (9pm, Sat, C4) examines the theory
that the whole show is basically just a dumbed-down version of
"Seinfeld", monstrous parents and all... daft made-for-TV
nukes-vs-earthquake two-parter 10.5 (7.15pm, Sat, C4) appears
to be running as a handy spoiler for C5's "Survival Sunday",
of which Michael Bay's character-actor-fest ARMAGEDDON (8pm,
Sun, C5) is the arguable highlight... though fortunately you
can skip the dodgy ending to see Billy Bob Thornton reappear
in offbeat air-traffic control romantic rival comedy PUSHING
TIN (10.35pm, Sun, BBC1)... there's more non-verbal nonsense
in BODY TALK: SEX (8pm, Mon, C4)... a no-holds-barred look at
domain-ownership disputes is promised in THE SEX.COM STORY
(11.20pm, Mon, C5)... and Wednesday night is Space Night on
C5, in the form of the - stretching the literal definition of
"Escape"? - ESCAPE FROM APOLLO 13 (7.30pm, Wed, C5), THE
BRITISH UFO FILE (8pm, Wed, C5), plus "Did it blow up the
space shuttle?" docu MEGALIGHTNING: STRANGER THAN FICTION
(9pm, Wed, C5)...
FILM>> it's "Gladiator" meets "The Return Of The King" - and
not in a good way - in interminable Wolfgang Petersen air-sea
trademark TROY ( http://www.capalert.com/capreports/troy.htm :
deceit leading to hundreds of deaths; perverted gloating with
victim's body; much talk of servitude to and faith in false
gods; a man exposing his full nudity to a woman; man and woman
in bed together, repeatedly)... so not a very wide release for
the curios smuggled out in its giant blockbuster-shaped shadow,
including the semi-autobiographical quirky-even-by-Almodovar-
standards Spanish religious abuse BAD EDUCATION (imdb:
education/ school)... plus "Wayne's World" meets "This Is
Spinal Tap" - albeit with most of the jokes taken out - in
low-budget Canadian headbanger buddie-movie mockumentary FUBAR
( http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0302585/trivia : The word "fuck"
is said 274 times)...
AVAILABLE IN A WIDE RANGE OF BLACK>> yes, this is a bit slack
by even our extraordinary standards, but we finally got round
to printing one of the very first t-shirt design entries we
ever received - the "You Have *No* Idea" slogan, one of many
submitted by GORILLA SALAD certainly not much more than 3 and
a half years ago: http://tv.cream.org/gorilla/ntkt/ . They/it
receive the standard UKP2 for each shirt sold, assuming they
come up with a more acceptable method of payment than "Post
the coins through Christopher Ecclestone's letterbox", or
simply "Put it on a horse!". Also at http://www.ntkmart.co.uk/
this month: a very simple "Loading..." disclaimer designed by
the minimalists over at PC EXTREME magazine, and possibly the
last of the "Hey Hey 16K" design recently popularised by the
cult b3ta animation http://www2.b3ta.com/heyhey16k/ , the
success of which apparently prompted "++Ungood;" designer
LLOYD WOOD to start composing his own Orwellian promo song (to
the same tune): "We'd like to help you with your thoughtcrime/
We'd like to help you with your thoughtcrime/ Double-plus-
ungood - hey!/ What is 2+2 today?" - and so forth... still,
our extremely high aesthetic standards have not deterred the
rest of you from continuing to send in entries, from MATTHEW
PETTY's http://www.petty.me.uk/images/paunch_tshirt.png to an
entire wardrobe suggested by MAT SIMPSON - highlights of which
include http://homepage.mac.com/matsimpson/.Pictures/ntk2.jpg
and http://homepage.mac.com/matsimpson/.Pictures/ntk4.jpg .
And text-only submissions need be no barrier to obscurity, as
perhaps illustrated by JASMINE STRONG's "Emmanuel Goatse" idea
(with "We have always been at war with Eastasia" on the back,
"for preference"), plus BOB JORDAN's self-referential "Just
one of the many things I have bought off the internet while
drunk" - a slogan he came up with on after, you've guessed it,
buying a shirt off our website. While drunk. Obviously...
>> 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
"less of the 'sometimes', if you don't mind!"
http://b3ta.com/features/valentine-raffle-2004/
NEED TO KNOW
THEY STOLE OUR REVOLUTION. NOW WE'RE STEALING IT BACK.
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