"I think that we will be able to re-create the old magazine
again, and fill a void that has been sorely missing."
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2223851,00.html
- JERRY POURNELLE: how BYTE's return fills a much-needed gap
>> HARD NEWS <<
mission to confuse
Well, a third of the time to help the DTI invent an
alternative to key escrow has passed already, and here's our
top 5 suggestions for "meeting law enforcement requirements":
5. A voluntary PICS-style "criminality" rating which users
put on their own emails, ranging from "1 - harmless" and "2 -
mildly subversive" to "4 - felony in progress". 4. A Babylon
5-esque "Psi-corps" of telepathic sensitives to extract
crypto keys directly from crooks' minds. 3. Foster perfect
socialist utopia, thus rendering concept of secrecy moot. 2.
Alternative to "Key escrow"? How about "No key escrow!"
(hehehe). and: 1. Hire that kid from Mercury Rising, or any
movie hacker that has ever said "the files are encrypted, it
might take me a few minutes...". Impressively, Tim Pearson,
head of the UK's INTERNET SERVICES PROVIDERS ASSOCIATION, has
pinned his hopes on that last option, according to a story on
Fox News - "it is unlikely criminals are going to... use
licensed encryption companies," says Tim (rightly), "so the
only alternative is to get at the messages once their PC has
unraveled them". In other words: hack into them while they're
still online. We're not convinced the commercial and civil
rights lobbies are actually going to prefer this over key
escrow - but our objection is a little more succint: isn't
this what we already pay GCHQ to do?
http://www.foxnews.com/js_index.sml?content=/scitech/030899/hackers.sml
- they could operate the MOD's satellites, too
http://www.statewatch.org/news.html
- no wonder the local loop is so expensive
In October 1997 British physicist LAURENCE GODFREY sued
Canadian student Michael Dolenga (then at Cornell University)
for libelling him online in 1995. Mr Godfrey is also suing
Demon for not removing allegedly forged messages appearing to
be from him on soc.culture.thai. We haven't heard anything on
the Demon one yet, but a UK court ruled against Dolenga last
week, ordering him to pay UKP15,000 in damages. Clearly an
important precedent in cross-border cyber-disputes etc etc,
right down to the fact that the Canadian authorities may not
enforce the judgement: "I'm not recognizing the British
court's jurisdiction and the hell with it", Dolenga
explained. It hasn't calmed the newsgroups down either: a
posting on the matter to soc.culture.canada makes remarkable
use of the phrases "Blow it out your ass", "Fuck off, eh!",
and "Smack you upside the head with a hockey stick".
http://www.ntk.net/canada/
- strangely, hardly any coverage in UK media
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_278000/278482.stm
- presumably awaiting judgement on this Demon thing
[ link to Dejanews deleted at Laurence Godfrey's request ]
Kieslowski... Kurosawa... and now STANLEY KUBRICK. Not a
great time to be a cult director whose surname begins with a
"K" but other so-called "coincidences" have had film fans'
conspiracy meters twitching. Guardian Unlimited mis-spelled
his surname (the usual sign that someone's faked their death
to enjoy Elvis-like seclusion), all traces of former "work in
progress" Artificial Intelligence were swiftly erased from
imdb.com (just like it never existed), and the timing is,
frankly, a bit coincidental (just before the release of Eyes
Wide Shut footage, and the rumoured dispute between Kubrick
and Warner Bros over its release date). Of course, all the
obituaries stress "natural causes" and Stan's good
relationship with his studio, so some theories are weirder
than others: Clockwork Orange-obsessed fans trying to secure
a UK release? A HAL-influenced face-off with an on-set
mainframe?
http://hollywood.com/news/topstories/03-10-99/html/1-1.html
- Geek, recluse, *crypto expert*? See lead story!
http://www.ntk.net/doh/kube120399.gif
- yeah, like Paul's bare feet on the front of Abbey Road
http://www.fucker.com/index_hair.html
- obvious UL; first of this week's requisite 2 "erotic" URLs
>> ANTI-NEWS <<
berating the obvious
www.vim.org "hacked", replaced with "Vim has become too big.
Please use Emacs! Thankyou"... spam "from" CAPITAL RADIO
quotes http://www.pair.com/spook/webfaq/faqfiles/caprad.htm
... AMAZON deleting gag reviews? http://www.ntk.net/ping/ ...
"Take me to the Web of Porn Special", flirts ZDNET.CO.UK...
world to be much safer for AMERICANS by end of this month:
http://www.csmonitor.com/durable/1999/03/05/text/p7s2.html ...
WHOIS mybigstiffy.com ... EU "anti-caching" clause inserted by
copyright lobby as clearly ridiculous delaying tactic: dumb
MEPs passed it anyway... "Dreamcast 2" fooled NEXT GEN ONLINE:
http://headline.gamespot.com/news/99_03/05_vg_avatar/index.html
...new MS FUD? http://www1.bluemountain.com/home/hoax.html ...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_293000/293366.stm
new space-hotel article made from bits of old space-hotel article:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_244000/244498.stm
>> EVENT QUEUE <<
goto's considered non-harmful
Sure, every week is SCIENCE (AND ENGINEERING) WEEK here at
NTK Towers, but it's always good to see the rest of the
country struggling to come into line with our "Technology
Gestapo" worldview. Look forward to bizarre celebrations of
godless machine-worship nationwide, all with hilarious
titles: Laser Afternoon, Liverpool; A Pyrotechnics Guide to
Fireworks, Ormskirk; Action On Apple Acne!, East Malling; and
The "Adults Only" Evening, Cardiff. Londoners are
particularly well served with a "special buttock measurer" at
the Science Museum, the bongo-accompanied stage adaptation of
Surely You're Joking Mr Feynman (also in Cambridge) and,
Tuesday at the ICA, usual suspects Colin Blakemore, Jonathan
Miller and Susan Blackmore duetting with 'N Sync on their new
power ballad: "Can The Human Brain Understand The Human Brain
(And Explain My Love For You)?"
http://www.setweek.org/
- no, this isn't the other "erotic" URL
http://members.tripod.com/~mike_maran/
- too much like Who Do You Think You Are Kidding Mr Hitler?
>> TRACKING <<
look what the mouse dragged in
Many of our readers have children, though we're not sure how
(Asexual mitosis? Repeated viewings of Weird Science?). But
true nerd parents will understand the lesson of Davros,
creator of the Daleks: how can one enforce geek values into
your "next generation" technology? Well, while you made do
with discrete Logo, Lego and BASIC components, the whole
experience is now integrated into Ken Kahn's TOONTALK - a
visual object-oriented concurrent constraint logic
programming language, implemented in a virtual Lego world
using animated robots (functions), buildings (objects), birds
and nests (messages), trucks (actor spawning), bombs, and a
little mouse that hits things with a hammer. In common with
most visual languages, I have no way of explaining further
except by showing you my recursive mandelbrot robot, and
waving my hands a lot. Toontalk appears to be extensible
(there's a filing system bird), and accomplished building-
bird-nest-robot hybrids can be compiled into Java applets.
Significantly, it exhibits the essential characteristic of a
larval geek training kit - borderline incomprehensibility to
any adult. See the look of pity mixed with shame on your
child's face as you struggle to convert Tinytool's metaphors
to a "proper programming language". And feel the glow of
pride on your own. Obsolete, at last.
http://www.logo.com/download/toontalk/TTUK103.EXE
- UK version demo version; 49UKP for the whole thing
http://www.toontalk.com/
- old enough to read: old enough to read the manual
http://www.cs.dal.ca/~pcox/CS6087/June22-sol.html
- fuddy-duddies think it's not what "the kids" want
>> MEMEPOOL <<
hasta la altavista
forget Wing Commander film, new Star Wars trailer: NIGHTFALL
is "the best Quake/Quake II/Unreal movie ever made"... we
wanted the LEGO R2D2, we got: www.trainupachild.com ...
PARAPPA the Toasta: http://www.psmonline.com/news/7222.html
... Chris Morris making BLUE JAM TV series for C4... secret
MERCED documentation has photo-sensitive covers that change
color on exposure to light; they can tell if you've left it
lying around... confirming concerns about BRITNEY SPEARS
video: http://www.gpforums.com/showforum.cgi?id=6582 ... VINT
CERF defends Al Gore's "I created Internet" claim; Gore
supported "High Performance Computing and Communication
initiative (HPCC/NREN)", led to Next Generation Internet
program... more bloody HAMSTERDANCE PARODIES... grassroots
campaign to get Katz to post to SLASHDOT in spoken RealAudio;
only thing that could make it funnier... RPGing for cash:
http://www.cdmag.com/Home/home.html?article=/articles/018/045/uo_ebay.html
>> GEEK MEDIA <<
get out less
TV>> impressively, noted misanthrope Woody Allen is claimed
among the celebs keeping fixed grins through the 6-hour
torment of COMIC RELIEF (from 7pm, Fri, BBC1). Highlights may
include Rowan Atkinson and Julia Sawalahalaha in a typically
hard-hitting parody of DR WHO (8pm, 8.30pm, 9.35pm);
hopefully an inappropriate Rwanda quip or two from ALAN
PARTRIDGE LIVE (9pm, BBC2); SIMON MAYO battling sleep-
deprivation-induced psychosis and hallucinations (could you
tell?) after 37 hours on air (9.45pm); and some FRENCH AND
SAUNDERS sketch about child prostitution (10.25pm). HAVE I
GOT BUZZCOCKS ALL OVER (11.10pm) sees Radio Times putting the
caption "Phill Jupitus" on what is surely a picture of Meat
Loaf - and listen up, radio fans: when former Richard Curtis
girlfriend (and Bridget Jones inventor) Helen Fielding
appeared on A BUNCH OF RED NOSES (9pm, last Tue, Radio 2),
did she mention that she took the piss out of the whole
business in her earlier, funnier novel "Cause Celeb"?...
BBC2's Vegas day (from 1.50pm, Sat, BBC2), featuring rare,
good Elvis film VIVA LAS VEGAS (3.15pm), even infects a new
Simpsons episode "Viva Ned Flanders" (6.30pm, Sun, SkyOne)...
but "Bullocks to that" says ITV with Sandra's dubious double
bill WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING (9.05pm, Sat) then Dennis Leary
co-creation STOLEN HEARTS (11.10pm)... no-one let Spielberg
near romance *or* comedy after the appalling 1941 (12.50am,
Sun, some ITV)... Peter "Truman Show" Weir shows a bit more
bite in semi-Mad-Max THE CARS THAT ATE PARIS (12.10am, Sun,
BBC1)... and forget ITV ditching News At 10 for Bond films:
C5 drops its 7pm News in favour of from-the-start reruns of
classic crimebusting Hasselhoff vehicle KNIGHT RIDER (7pm,
Mon-Fri ) - talking car meant less dialogue for non-acting
lead... yup, last week's wasn't the last of this lot of X
FILES (10pm, Wed, BBC1) - this week's is... ditto we think
THE LARRY SANDERS SHOW (11.35pm, Tue, BBC2) and penultimate
clip-show SEINFELD (10pm, Mon, SkyOne)... TOMORROW'S WORLD
MEGALAB (7pm, Wed, BBC1) gives itself an hour to solve the
mysteries of memory, beauty, and the human mind - and to
write a pop song about it online... first and best of the
Dirty Harry sequels MAGNUM FORCE (9.35pm, Thu, C5) features
Lalo Schifrin theme, as covered by Pop Will Eat Itself on
their "92 Degrees" 12-inch... while HORIZON (9.30pm, Thu,
BBC2) cunningly promotes the video/ DVD release of Armageddon
by warning of "New Asteroid Danger"...
FILM>> "Other animals / that kill their own species: / lions,
chimps, dogs, ants" is the largely uninformative haiku review
http://www.wunderland.com/WTS/Ginohn/poetry/HMR.htm for
critic-hated Robin Williams big-US-box-office sick Comic
Relief tie-in PATCH ADAMS (imdb: doctor-patient / medical-
school / mental-institution / mental-patient / medical /
students / based-on-true-story / compassion / doctor). Yup,
it's an even schmaltzier "Live Patients Society", with a
rather selective "true story" basis: whatever the real Adams
was expelled from medical school for, it wasn't "excessive
happiness"; last year he was accused of mismanaging funds for
his Gesundheit Institute (Entertainment Weekly, 1999-01-15,
p7)... SFW's Reese Witherspoon, Tobey Maguire are reunited in
f/x heavy preachy moral-relativism fable PLEASANTVILLE (imdb:
teen / small-town / masturbation-scene / fantasy / 1950s /
1990s / innocence / tv / basketball / bowling / high-school /
painting / bathtub / remote-control / intolerance / colors /
rain / fascism / books) - a Truman Show remake with that
black-and-white/ colour trick from pop videos. Blah blah
power of the individual blah blah freedom vs oppression -
annoys http://www.hollywoodjesus.com/pleasantville.htm
though, so can't be all bad... strong performances (and a
hint of organ-legging) triumph over hackneyed plot in Oscar-
friendly older-woman-teams-with-street-orphan road weepie
CENTRAL STATION (imdb: Brazilian)... so if you can find it
(and want something super-weird), take a trip to Steven
Soderbergh's self-starring largely unreleased dentally
disturbed word-game SCHIZOPOLIS (imdb: experimental /
surreal) - shades of Eraserhead / Dark Star comedy from the
Out Of Sight / Sex Lies And Videotape man...
PUDDING CORNER>> pains us to say it, but CADBURY'S JESTIVES
(an astonishing UKP1.09) are still nicer than MCVITE'S
CARAMELS (69p) - clearly based on Burton's Toffee Pops, but
oddly oversweetened... the world hasn't gone completely mad,
though, as CADBURY'S JAFFA CUBES, the "first individually
packed chocolate covered cake snack in bite size portions"
(33p for pack of 5) are stale-tasting 1950s-style sponge, and
a poor spoiler for the imminent launch of MCVITIE'S JAFFA
CAKES in resealable tube (89p for 15 vs 78p for 12 in a
box)... in supermarkets, SAINSBURY'S John Cleese campaign was
an expensive failure, ICELAND'S in-store "Feel The Deal"
posters will invite customers to "eat what they want and give
the empty wrapper in at the till", and seen in TESCO: "St
Patrick's Day March 17th" - on a display of Heinz spaghetti
in tomato sauce... penetration of SPACE DUST continues into
all sectors, with SAINSBURY'S CUSTARD DELIGHT WITH POPPING
SPACE ROCKS (59p), followed by upcoming NESTLE ZOOM lolly
going up against the TREBOR REFRESHERS fizzy fruity milk ice
(35p)... in direct contravention of the laws of nature
outlined in Soda Stream instructions, two new "fizzy milk"
drinks have the UK tingling: EHRMANN'S ALMI DRINK - believed
to be Germany's first carbonated yoghurt drink (blended with
apple juice); and the Swiss RIVELLA - a slightly sparkling
herb-flavoured Lucozade-alike "based on milk serum"
(43p/can). Just don't pour them on JURASSIC BREAKFAST:
http://www.quaker-dinoeggs.com/ ... sticking with (non-
effervescent) dairy, reader ANDY HOWARD wishes they'd go back
to NESTLE MAXI-MOOZE (6 tubes of condensed milk "Bursting
with Energy", ie 28.2g of sugar per 50g total: "I've taken to
carrying a couple of these around in my pockets for a quick
sugar fix when out and about") - instead of the "more
ambitious" MINI-MOOZE (12 x 35g packs of fluid with curious
strawberry, vanilla and chocolate flavours). Haven't been
able to replicate this ourselves, largely due to difficulties
finding them in Sainsbury's: would they be with the ONKEN
FRUFOO FORMAGE FRAIS (now comes with "six collectable
chicks", a direct competitor to Anchor SoSoft's "small cuddly
cows") - or the NESTLE SQUIZZO'S?...
>> 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 "Slight Of The Week"
(http://www.disobey.com/netslaves)
NINFOMANIA.COM "LINK TO US" APPEAL UPDATE
Target: 10,500 hits on AltaVista
0 TOTALISER 10,500
|.---------------------------------------------------------------------|
^-current total: 7 ...current shortfall: 10,493
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