Need To Know 2001-12-21

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"[British] children open their gifts on Christmas afternoon, following a meal of goose or roast beef and a dessert of plum pudding..." http://encarta.msn.com/find/concise.asp?mod=1&ti=761556859&page=4 ...then ride around in their open-top Bentleys showering gifts on the poor and shouting "Hoorah!" >> HARD NEWS << legal reviews Naturally, we were stunned by a site we saw this week which purported to be the detailed log of workplace bullying, together with some pretty specific and damning accusations. Sadly, since, British law says ISPs are liable if notified of defamatory material on their servers, all it took was correspondence between a worried employer's solicitors and the hosting ISP to have the site shut down. The press release by the site creator is suitably outraged: "'[They] have shot the messenger,' says the author of the site, RICHARD ASHTON.", "'Do they not know that the Internet doesn't work like that?'" Well, maybe they don't - but we're a bit surprised by Mr Ashton's reaction. For isn't this the same Richard Ashton who was ongoing technical consultant and supporter of LAURENCE GODFREY? Lo, and was it not Godfrey's case against Demon that established the precedent that ISPs are publishers in English libel law? In other words - this *is* how the Internet works, apparently. Ashton's done what everyone else does, and has moved the site to a US host: best of luck. Sadly, as Laurence has pointed out to us in the past, we could be liable for even *linking* to libellous material, so fear of a similar libel suit really means we can't publicise Richard's new location. Justice, huh? http://127.0.0.1/ - this space intentionally left blank Worried that it's getting too late to send that seasonal deaththreat? Your Noel gift of loosely-packed icing sugar lost in the post? Armchair hoodlums the world over, twiddle your moustachios with relief: EVIL ANGELICA and her "Xmas Giveaway" hacking offer have returned. As involuntarily advertised by www.meet-victoria.com (and later by pittsburghrock.com , www.eunhyang.net , www.gibnews.com, and www.eprofessionalsinc.com ) web-defacing haxx0r Angelica will gladly replace the perfectly innocent front page of a semi-obscure domain with festive gr33tz of your own devising. Deadline is 2001-12-23, so send your requests to webhack_competition@cow-tipper.com where Angelica - as well as, we're sure, the National Crime Squad - will select the most creative and/or incriminating for further examination. Have fun, but do remember: that 4am knock on the door is not *always* Santa Claus. http://defaced.alldas.de/?attacker=EVIL+ANGELICA - you're already taking that mailbox down, aren't you another.com? Perhaps understandably, the one "titsup.com" story that THE REGISTER haven't been crowing over this week involved the layoffs of half their own writing staff. As reported in THE GUARDIAN blah blah irreverent approach blah blah advertising downturn, but it was left to relatively-gloat-free Reg-in- exile THE INQUIRER to name those made redundant, including reader's favourite Kieren McCarthy, whose work in particular we've had the honour of linking to on oh so many occasions. Tech journalism, we fear, will be an even duller place without them. Plus, with THE TIMES INTERFACE and DOTCOM TELEGRAPH (nee CONNECTED) also among this year's casualties, we've got to pray that BBC NEWS ONLINE keeps going next year, or we're going to be completely stuck for material. http://www.theinquirer.net/19120106.htm - Point-Counterpoint: Register Loses Four Journalists http://www.hamhigh.co.uk/archived/2001/1214/news/asp/newsbig.asp - vs: experts reject "Register For Gays" >> ANTI-NEWS << berating the obvious FOXTONS attack stereotype of boring, non-cross-dressing estate agents: http://www.foxtons.co.uk/shortlets/images/arnaud1.jpg , http://www.foxtons.co.uk/shortlets/images/tim1.jpg ... it's Craig *David*, dad: http://www.ntk.net/2001/12/21/dohcraig.gif ... BBC illustrations don't get much more literal than this: http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1719000/1719019.stm ... the capable JEEVES provides topical hint for US military: http://www.ntk.net/2001/12/21/dohjeeves.gif ... inappropriate *hic* banner ad: http://www.ntk.net/2001/12/21/dohalco.gif ... http://widdecombe-of-the-week.museum ... sales starting early: http://www.topixonline.com/cgi-bin/sgin0101.exe?T1=TC604C ... GeForce 2 MX 400 graphics card - fast enough for 11.7GHz CPU?: http://www.compaq.ie/products/desktops/evo/options/d300/p4_1.5.stm ... if you like [Channel 4 News], we also recommend "Edge Of Darkness": http://us.imdb.com/Title?0239164 ... run them down, using your car: http://www.ntk.net/2001/12/21/dohsf2.gif ... searching for "jugs" at DEBENHAMS http://www.debenhams.com/ vs http://catalogs.google.com/catalogs?q=bra ... >> TRACKING << sufficiently advanced technology : the gathering [ Having last week broken our vow to hand-test every Tracking we cover, tragically the whole house of cards has come tumbling down. So, while we struggle to reimplement our ethics using a strongly worded New Year's Resolution list, alllow us to slip one biased review through the breach. If only because he's been sending us tips, quotes and bile for years, if only because his plug-in makes a disturbingly fascinating screensaver even if you have no clue what you're looking at, if only because it's Newtonmas: Lloyd - this one's for (and by, and from) you: ] See Teledesic fully operational. Run Globalstar without spending any money. Deorbit Iridium's satellites, one by one. The only constellations you'll ever get to control are in SaVi 1.2, which runs under Linux and some of those unfashionable Unixes, too. Now, if someone can plot a TIE fighter and supply a Death Star texture-map, we'll be able to use all this for something people actually seem to WANT. http://savi.sourceforge.net/ - now with added lava-lamp mode http://www.geomview.org/ - set your controls for the heart of the sun http://www.ee.surrey.ac.uk/Personal/L.Wood/software/SaVi/ - it's that man again! >> MEMEPOOL << ceci n'est pas une http://www.gagpipe.com/ "Well, it looks like *somebody's* not getting any this Christmas": http://www.cihost.com/images/ebus_popup_xmas.jpg ... this week's URL pass-the-parcel: http://www.nolgo.com/ ... disclaimerville, dude: http://home.att.net/~waterses/myeck/ ... http://www.monkeon.co.uk/store/ too trendy to stock any of http://www.martian.fm/singles.htm ... and they call computer users sad: http://www.cardiffcity.com/Swans_Fan.mp3 ... *too* viral marketing?: http://www.mainframe.co.uk/christmas.mov ... http://www.violetshivers.com/John/Burgertime/Tenets.html vs http://www.uncleclive.co.uk/ ... http://www.weaselweekly.com/ vs http://www.fascinatingferrets.com/ ... hey, who needs CRYPTO?: http://www.coincidencedesign.com/q-shutdown.html ... handouts *will* be available at the end of the presentation: http://www.craphound.com/misc/doubletree.htm ... Xmas panto at Sussex University Cognitive Science Dept featured character called "the cyborg formerly known as Kevin Warwick"... oops: http://www.dailyrotten.com/articles/archive/189387.html vs https://badtrans.monkeybrains.net/search.html?table=res&search=gov.uk >> GEEK MEDIA << get out less TV>> in the absence of any real celebrities, the BBC goes a bundle on impressions of them instead, in ALISTAIR MCGOWAN'S BIG IMPRESSION (11.15pm, Fri; 7.40pm, Tue, BBC1) plus Dame Edna's NIGHT OF A THOUSAND FACES (9.25pm, Sat, BBC1)... "Rabblemock Ha-Ha Time" returns in the unamusing disguises of the TRIGGER HAPPY CHRISTMAS TV SPECIAL (9.30pm, Fri; 10.40pm, Sat; 9.05pm, Mon, C4) followed next Fri by who-cares docuspoof BEING DOM JOLY (11.20pm, Fri, C4)... but some of the films are quite good, including against-type De Niro nerdfest THE KING OF COMEDY (11.5pm, Fri, BBC2), maths-prodigy man-weepie GOOD WILL HUNTING (9.25pm, Sat, BBC2), and topical desert shoot-em- up LAWRENCE OF ARABIA (1.40pm, Sun, C4)... Sunday night is particularly poor, however, featuring historo-yawn ELIZABETH (9pm, Sun, C4), Terry Gilliam time-travel tedium TWELVE MONKEYS (9pm, Sun, BBC2) and more o' Robert De Niro in sub- "Mission Impossible" romp RONIN (10.30pm, Sun, BBC1)... households celebrating a more "non-traditional" Christmas Eve can pick from quickfire Jackie Chan kickabout RUSH HOUR (8.30pm, Mon, BBC1), the sophisticated live-action South-Park humour of BASEKETBALL (10.35pm, Mon, C4), or ITV's bafflingly regular early-morning showing of TIM BURTON'S THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS (1.15am, Mon, ITV)... on Christmas Day, we'd still go for THE GREAT ESCAPE (3.10pm, Tue, ITV) over Pixar's overrated TOY STORY (4.40pm, Tue, BBC1)... and, indeed, Peter "Lord Of The Rings" Jackson's BRAINDEAD (1.40am, Tue, C4), in a double-bill with Clive Barker's HELLRAISER (12midnight, Tue, C4), over ponderous Paltrow parallel-reality SLIDING DOORS (10.55pm, Tue, BBC1)... the BBC's commitment to CGI continues with an utterly convincing "Bob Hoskins" exploring THE LOST WORLD (6.25pm, Tue & Wed, BBC1) and animated Woody Allen anthropomorphism ANTZ (5.15pm, Wed, BBC1)... and Julia "Press Gang" Sawalha nips out of Sky's curiously unpublicised TIME GENTLEMEN PLEASE (10pm, Mon, Sky1) to stand in for Caroline Quentin in JONATHAN CREEK (9.05pm, Wed, BBC1) - which, if only they replaced Alan Davies as well, would be nigh-on perfect... FILM>> basically, the scenery is like a three-hour holiday to New Zealand, with some dudes playing a particularly cliched Warhammer campaign in front of it - probably exactly what you were hoping for from THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING (http://www.screenit.com/ : a comment is made about what certain characters smoke in their pipes being "weed"; magic, sorcery and the like [...] occurs and/or is practiced by some characters; kids could be enticed to imitate all of the fighting and action that occurs in the film)... a decent supporting cast help make up for Kate Beckinsale grinning like a lunatic in fatalistic John Cusack rom com SERENDIPITY (http://www.capalert.com/capreports/serendipity.htm : homosexual jokes, insult, suggestion; extremely short skirt; much faith in fate and destiny)... or it's Vinnie "Swordfish" Jones, Danny "Human Traffic" Dyer and Sally "Smack The Pony" Phillips - together at last! - in unintentionally homoerotic Burt Reynolds remake THE MEAN MACHINE (http://www.bbfc.co.uk/ : passed '15' for strong language and moderate violence) - and not, it appears, based around the 2000AD/Judge Dredd character of the same name... RED BOOK AUDIO>> and kicking off our special tribute edition to pioneering soundalike-warez enthusiast George Harrison http://www.copyrightwebsite.com/audio/harrison/harrison.asp , we're not sure which '80s ambient track the CHEMICAL BROTHERS' "Star Guitar" reminds us of, but the view-from-a-train video, directed by Michel "Let Forever Be" Gondry, is fantastic... furthermore, reader RO BITCHARSE alleges that the intro to "Rebel Girl" by BIKINI KILL "is exactly the same" as "I Am The Resurrection" by THE STONE ROSES, prophesying that "Kathleen Hanna would kick Ian Brown's scrawny little arse if they ever came to blows over it"... and over by the Top 40 section, BEN MOOR muses that S-CLUB 7's "Have You Ever" starts "an awful lot" like THE CARPENTERS' "Top Of The World", and that TYMES 4's "She Got Game" is "exactly the same song" as DREEM's "He Loves You Not" - "even down to the same video. Nearly"... among readers' own efforts, SHELDON SOUTHWORTH felt compelled to warn the world of his seasonally-themed remixes over at http://www.diffusiononline.net/ , including GREG LAKE's "I Believe In Father Christmas 2001" and "a semi-official Clangers one on the way in the New Year", while "Hey Hey 16K" guy MJ HIBBETT http://www.mjhibbett.com/ continued to remind us of a modern-day Half Man Half Biscuit - but with a genuine grasp of pathos and melody - on his new "Milk And Baubles" EP, which features an undocumented acoustic cover of EMINEM's "Stan"... which brings us to this month's round-up of "Ads That Sound Like Songs That Sound Like Other Songs That Sound Like Videogames, Or Something". NICK DRAGE wondered if the use of RESIDENT EVIL sound effects in MTV's recent ads for extremepie.com created "the right mental links" in the viewer, as MARTIN PARKER questioned the appropriateness of the ISLEY BROTHERS' "Harvest For The World" ("surely a plea to us decadent Westerners to try to end world hunger", he argued, with lyrics like "Half of us are satisfied, half of us in need") in the TV campaign for "sub-pub grub" chain Harvester. "Screw you, Starvin' Marvin," he paraphrases, "I'm going for the all-you-can-eat special". And, to end on a Christmassy note, one of our own current ad-music favourites: if it's too loud for the bloke in the bar to hear that the girl wants to order a Baileys, then *what the hell* is she talking to her friends about beforehand?... >> 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 "we said NTK *above* tvgohome" ("Top 10 websites of the year", The Face, p102) 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) 2001 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.