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In the Q&A you did soon after "Triumph of the Nerds", (Q&A dated June 1996,) someone asked:

I loved you show. You mentioned at the end that a company is going to be changing the future of personal gaming. I was wondering what the name of the company. Sincerely, Anonymous

To which you responded:

Sorry, that's a secret until September.

So... Now is it safe to tell us who this miracle company was? (And if they succeeded? ;-)

Thanks to an AC's post about the pre-nerds faq, I have negated a couple of my more pressing questions, but anyway, to get on with the questions.

I know that you feel that maintaining a valid history of events in the technology world is an important goal of your life. (Or at least I was lead to believe this by most of your work, save Plane Crazy). You mention some of the raw information that you have recieved in your newest pulpit article. However, you don't include links, or information on how to receive access to these historical records.

Do you have any plans to make available the raw materials you have received, either on the web, or in libraries, for scholarship, both by historians of today and tomorrow?

I understand that your shows do a reasonable job of attempting to digest this information for popular consumption, but there are always going to be people who are interested in the actual documentation of this history. Especially, when you mention a rare account of the beginnings of AOL, (Only 12 copies made!) but there seems to be no place where this information is being archived, or being made publicly available. I mean, even your own private machine collection is extreemly interesting. I'm lucky enough to have access to some of these ancient machines at a computer store near my university, but now, it's becomming more and more difficult to get access to them.

Don Armstrong -".naidnE elttiL etah I"

Thanks to an AC's post about the pre-nerds faq, I have negated a couple of my more pressing questions, but anyway, to get on with the questions.

I know that you feel that maintaining a valid history of events in the technology world is an important goal of your life. (Or at least I was lead to believe this by most of your work, save Plane Crazy). You mention some of the raw information that you have recieved in your newest pulpit article. However, you don't include links, or information on how to receive access to these historical records.

Do you have any plans to make available the raw materials you have received, either on the web, or in libraries, for scholarship, both by historians of today and tomorrow?

I understand that your shows do a reasonable job of attempting to digest this information for popular consumption, but there are always going to be people who are interested in the actual documentation of this history. Especially, when you mention a rare account of the beginnings of AOL, (Only 12 copies made!) but there seems to be no place where this information is being archived, or being made publicly available. I mean, even your own private machine collection is extreemly interesting. I'm lucky enough to have access to some of these ancient machines at a computer store near my university, but now, it's becomming more and more difficult to get access to them.

Don Armstrong -".naidnE elttiL etah I"

"But I have my own theory about Carnivore. From a network architecture standpoint, the best location for Carnivore is right after the ISP's router. This puts Carnivore in the path of every packet entering or leaving the ISP. It's also a major reason why ISPs might not want to install Carnivore boxes -- it's the network's point of greatest vulnerability. In this position, Carnivore can act as a listening and recording device, OR IT CAN ACT AS A SWITCH. If we ever hear a proposal from the FBI in which it plans to install Carnivores at all 6000 ISPs in the U.S., we'll be giving the government the power to do something it can't do right now." "Shut the Internet down."

This this article (also by cringley)

New game in town

It seems a lot of the questions so far could be answered by reading a 1996 PBS interview with Cringely on the PBS website.

For example, there are several people who want to know what the X stands for. His answer from the 1996 interview was: "X stands for Xavier, my mother's maiden name."


Help

It seems a lot of the questions so far could be answered by reading a 1996 PBS interview with Cringely on the PBS website.

For example, there are several people who want to know what the X stands for. His answer from the 1996 interview was: "X stands for Xavier, my mother's maiden name."


Help

After viewing your program I can truley say that it was "insanely great"! As a dedicated Mac user who must occasionally serve time on a DOS machine slogging Windows95, I especially enjoyed the opportunity to learn more about Steve Jobs. However, all the computer stuff aside, I really only have two questions:
1. Is that incredibly cool '66 T-bird convertible yours?
2. What middle name could possibly begin with the letter "X"? Thank you for producing such an outstanding program...I'll certainly read the book at my earliest convenience!
Jon Holland
Mesquite, Texas

RXC> Yes, the '66 T-Bird is mine. It's a rare Q-code model with the 428 cubic inch V-8. 1966 was the only year they offered a 428 in the convertible and fewer than 600 were made. Mine has every option except the 8-track.
X stands for Xavier, my mother's maiden name.
---

here. Interesting reading. Let's try not to have this interview be a complete duplication.

He actually answers this very question in his article this week.

http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pu lpit/pulpit20000727.html

The answer is no. To quote:

It was six bucks an hour...Who knew they would be successful? I sure didn't.

Then again, you might argue that one can have a lasting effect without enjoying "success", but I will leave that debate to the Amiga enthusiasts...

I've been following this column for a while. Cringely is an interesting guy, and he has certainly been around the industry. Though periodically his essays strike me as a bit ego-centric, he also can also provide some amazing insight. He really can draw together seperate pieces of tech news in a meaningful fashion.

Also, he's been around long enough that he can pull out interesting industry anecdotes. My favorite was his description of Def Con 1. You know: back when it really was a hacker (pardon: "cracker") convention. Very interesting reading.

In summary, I highly recommend this guys column...

--Lenny

Who/what do you think are the three individuals / companies / technologies whose importance has been most overlooked?

Your column on Homer Sarasohn prompted this question.

Apparently, down-under the government is trying to pass a law that allows the ASIO (the australian version of the CIA) to let some G-men crackers break into any web site that breaks the law in order to shut them down.

Ostensibly, this is to prevent porn -- but the person quoted by Cringley feels that it is the government snuggling up to Rupert Murdoch to keep video off the net.

Don't know about that... but its still worth a read. Check it out at: here

Suddenly, the FBI seems all warm and fuzzy....

One NASA engineer from Houston said during the interview that NASA version of life support system would be big and expensive while Russian had some smart ways to achieve same results with less time and money.

As we all know the gamble didn't pan out so well due to the Russian economic crisis. Service Module was funded by Russian goverment instead of contracted by NASA (a.k.a. American Tax dollar), so when Russian economy hit bottom, Service Module got delayed by lack of fund (among other reasons).

Just contribute what I know since there are some people here a little uptight about Russian involvement, reminded me of certain Republican congressmen and senators.

There wouldn't be any huge parent companies anymore (at least temporarily). We would all get our news from smaller, independent outlets.

We would all get our news from smaller, independent outlets. We would, of course, have to decide for ourselves on the credibility of said news outlets. That in and of itself is a scary thought, we would have to make an important decision with information that we would have to go out and gather ourselves.

The foundation of today's news media is organizations like United Press International, BBC News, National Public Radio News, the Associated Press, the New York Times. These are all outstanding news organizations.

The Washington Post (a pretty good paper) owns Newsweek, an alright magazine, though its website is now hosted by MSNBC.

US News and World Report is also pretty good.

Skipping the rest of the good newspapers and the plethora of great magazines around the country (as well as the really bad ones) we get to Corporate Media. Time isn't really bad per se, but knowing what we know about Time Warner (I am an employee of the company) I personally stay away.

I stay away from all U.S. television news sources for reliable information, except for the excellent Newshour with Jim Lehrer and C-SPAN, both independent media. The former rocks, and I live in the neighborhood where Lehrer grew up; the latter isn't really news but has very informative content on current issues.

Okay! I hope I have convinced everyone that you don't have to worry about your news source if you know where to go. Even if Time Warner bought up half of these news souces somehow, it could never get them all. Also remember that if good journalists realize they are working for a company with a deteriorating reputation, they jump ship.

But that is also the danger: this quality, that is a natural one which our species has relied on to achieve great things, is capable of being exploited by people who understand it (whether consciously or otherwise), for ends that may be directly opposed to the interests of the larger society in which the group is operating. Raising a barn is one thing, and hard to argue with; forcing a PC manufacturer to pay you based on PCs sold, whether or not it includes your product, is quite another.

Microsoft's groupthink is considered particularly dangerous, with good reason - it has directly led to their success and dominant position, which is a threat to the success of other people and organizations. It is almost certainly not coincidental that Microsoft's particular brand of groupthink is unusually competitive, arrogant and insular, since that is what has helped them achieve their dominant position.

Further, Microsoft's groupthink didn't arise naturally and organically, the way something like Slashdot arguably did. Slashdot posters don't depend on Slashdot for their livelihood, so the same level of control can't be applied to them. CmdrTaco can't send out directives telling Slashdottians how to think - they would be subject to the usual discussion, flames, and apathy. (That's not to say that Linux/Open Source/FSF doctrine doesn't spread via the usual propangandistic techniques, through cult leaders like RMS, ESR and the great Taco himself. It's just that this particular propaganda happens to be Good and Right :O)

But Microsoft's groupthink is a direct result of deliberate and conscious actions taken by its top executives, actions taken to maximize the success of their group, often at the expense of other groups and individuals, to the point of violating laws designed to constrain such behavior. I think Roblimo is correct in assuming that not all companies act so overtly, but Microsoft is, not coincidentally, a counter-example.

>Think carefully before you decide that this somehow doesn't
>apply to you. Try to look objectively at your company.

I agree, no-one is immune to groupthink. That doesn't mean one can't be aware of it, and distinguish between good and bad examples of it.

There's some fun stuff about the engineering of groupthink in Part Two of the PBS series, Triumph of the Nerds. Some examples from the above-linked page:

IBM's song #74, circa 1959, sung by the salesmen: "IBM, happy men, smiling all the way, oh what fun it is to sell our products our products night and day. IBM Watson men, partners of TJ. In his service to mankind - that's why we are so gay." I'm sure some readers will think this a joke!

And from Charles Simonyi, variously Chief Programmer / Architect at Microsoft: "It was easier to to to create a new culture with people who are fresh out of school rather than people who came from, from from eh other companies and and and other cultures. You can rely on it you can predict it you can measure it you can optimise it you can make a machine out of it.

And finally, from one of Microsoft's own pages: Microsoft: a View From Inside: "Microsoft looks forward to the day when various annoying defects of reality as we know it shall have been overcome."

I think what worries some people is that they might be considered a defect in Microsoft's Brave New Reality...

They realized that they were not competing with the computer but with PAPER!

The document analogy may take quite a while to replace. It has, after all, been with us since the time of clay tablets...

/joeyo

Actually that was the "caterpillar drive" which was supposedly capable of near-silent propulsion.
An interesting site for submarine technology, etc.. is over at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/subsecrets/

Robert Cringely has an interesting perspective on this issue at PBS. The real question, as he points out is "Why does the FBI need a box?" since they could do what they purport they want to do by some simple changes in an ISP's router.

Maybe he's figured out what it's really for, in his latest article, Meet Eater.

His reasoning leads him to this:

"In this position, Carnivore can act as a listening and recording device, OR IT CAN ACT AS A SWITCH. If we ever hear a proposal from the FBI in which it plans to install Carnivores at all 6000 ISPs in the U.S., we'll be giving the government the power to do something it can't do right now.
"Shut the Internet down."

...people actually watch that show and care!
I can't believe that our society has degenerated into this. The show is scripted from start to finish...Oh there may not be any lines written but do you really think that the people that are left on the island are really capable of surviving on a desert island? Give me a break! This kind of programming is the reason i don't watch that much television any more.

Where is the meaningful programming? My children have to grow up watching this carp? (yes I misspelled crap, I did it on purpose so don't feel the need to tell me.)

P.S. I watch and support the PBS (Public Broadcasting Stations www.pbs.org , they air Red Dwarf. Although Red Dwarf may not be the most enlightening program it is a hell of a lot better that Survivor or that stupid "Big Brother")

Seeing as how I mentioned it Let me say a few words about the show "Big Brother".......What the Hell is this!!!!! Are we really that sad? do we really need to watch some less than interesting people every moment of their day? As if we don't have enough trouble from the real "Big Brother"!

This show is enlightening because it demonstrates how much additional time we actually do have because of technology. And what the vast majority of us do with that extra time is (drumroll please)... watch TV!

Now, that being said, I don't disagree with the article. Employeers do seem to be demanding more and more of our leisure time. And I don't think some of the demands are justified. But, if you're good at what you do, you are golden. There's a technology labor shortage - a big one. As long as this exists, those who are technically capable can either:

1. Set up reasonable boundaries without fear of reprisal, by refusing to dedicate all of your time to your employer.
2. Become co-conspirators in the drainage of their time by never setting any boundary on what is or isn't reasonable.

That being said, let's all go out and demand that we only work 60 hour weeks so that we can have some time to catch up on the Simpsons!

• Claiming the existence of an agency with "twice the manpower and [official] budget of the CIA" prior to Bamford's book would get you labeled as a loon -- even at MIT, where the NSA actively recruited.
• Among those in the US intel community who didn't work with Echelon-type intel, there was a fair degree of skepticism about the scope, value, or even continued existence of UKUSA.

Hawkins pointed out that places of the world which haven't yet deployed traditional communications infrastructure (I think he was specifically refering to Africa and parts of Asia) probably never would!!!

/joeyo

Cernan's book is written from the perscpective of the astronaut (obviously) battling the NASA brass, the difficult training and the various tribulations (he covers all the lows and highs) of being one of the most high profile people in America in the 60s and 70s.

I think it'd be an interesting contrast to "Failure..." because of the diversity of perspective - kinda like reading the two competing books on Mitnick's time on the lam. Kranz's perspective likely differs dramatically from that of fighter pilot Cernan.

This may be the ultimate in nerdy things to admit, but I don't read books that much. My father actually called me from a book signing somewhere to ask me if I wanted a copy of Cernan's book. After I got by the "Who the hell is Gene Cernan?" part (he was on Apollo 10 and Apollo 17 - the last trip to the Moon), I said sure, thinking I'd stuff it on a shelf somewhere. After reading the opening chapters thinking "I'll never finish this," I did plow right through it.

Anyway, to stay on topic, it would be a good contrast to this book. (And, no I don't work for Cernan or any publishing companies.)
==
"This is the nineties. You don't just go around punching people. You have to say something cool first."

Formal wars between India and Pakistan:

• 1948, Pakistan troops enter Kashmir in the guise of tribals. Kashmir signs instrument of accession with India. Indian troops drive out Pakistani forces.
• 1965, Pakistan troops invade Kutchh, hoping to take advantage of Indian state in disarray after its 1962 war with China. India opens second front in Punjab and almost captures Lahore. Agrees to U.N. sponsored cease-fire.
• 1971, India helps with the liberation of Bangladesh from Pakistan after 1 million Bangladeshis are massacred and more than 10 million cross the border into India.

Non-declared wars:

• 1989-present, Pakistan trains and arms ``freedom fighters'' who are conducting a proxy war in Kashmir. Documented by U.S. State Department studies, among others.
• 1990's, Indian and Pakistan troops face off on the Siachin Glacier(at a height of over 20,000 ft). Both face enormous cost and the cold claims more casualties than bullets.
• 1999, Flashback to 1948, ``Kashmiri separatists''(that later turn out to be mostly Pakistani troops) cross the border into areas of Kashmir just before the snows melt on the mountains. Indian troops flush them out at great human cost because they are limited to not striking targets beyond the "Line of Control"(demarcated through a bilateral agreement in 1972).

PBS interview by Jim Lehrer about 1999 conflict plus some background.

I have a bunch of more references if anyone is interested.

Here I have a whole bunch of links to further information about wearable computers and "enhanced reality" for anyone interested:

• A Brief History Of Wearable Computing
• Affective Computing
• BBC News: Japan Eyes Wearable PC
• Charmed Technology
• CNET.com: 10 Technologies That Will Take Over - #8
• CNN: Excuse Me, Is That A Monitor On Your Head?
• CNN: MIT 'Cyborgs' Bridge Gap Between Man And Machine
• CNN: Turn On, Jack In, And Geek Out With Wearable PC
• CNN: Wearable Systems May Cut Labor, Save Time
• CNN: Xybernaut Now Has Linux For Wearable PCs
• CNN Poll: Do You Want A Wearable Computer?
• Computer For The 21st Century, The
• ComputerWorld: Wearable Computers - Digitally Attired
• Context-Aware Computing
• CTHEORY: Body Delirium
• DisplayWear Incorporated
• Extreme Computing
• Handykey, Inc. Wearable Computing Page
• Houston Chronicle: Future Phones Home, The
• ICBorg
• Intelligent Information Filters And Enhanced Reality, by Alexander Chislenko
• ISWC- International Symposium on Wearable Computers
• Marvin Elizondo's Wearable Computing Page
• MicroOptical
• MIT-IDEO Wearables Intro
• NetWork Fusion: Armani, Karan, Xybernaut? 02/01/999
• PBS: Scientific American Frontiers Transcripts - Inventing The Future (Aired Fall 1996)
• PC World News: Wearable PC To Debut At Comdex
• PopSci.com Headlines: CyberFashions
• Slashdot Articles: Wearable PCs Under Linux
• Smart Rooms
• TechWearable
• TekGear
• Wearable Computer
• Wearable Computing Intro Page
• Wearable Computing Portal
• Wearable Computing Resource Page
• WearableGear.com
• Wearables Central
• Wearables WebCrawler Search Engine
• Wearables Webring
• WearableTech Corp.
• Wired News: Annotated Reality
• Wired News: Intel Chips In On Future Devices
• Wired News: Waiting For Wearable Wearables
• Wraith Projects
• Xybernaut

Impossible means no one's done it yet.

I've recently learned about Genetic Algorithms (GA) in my quest to win $15,000 from The Code Book and Simon Singh's Cipher Challenge (eGroup here). One of the stages is a deft Playfair Cipher, which have historically proven difficult to solve by hand. Using a genetic algorithm, I was able to solve the cipher in just 28 generations.

What's amazing to me is that here I have just 500 lines of code that know nothing about ciphers, Playfairs and codebreaking, yet using a simple mutation and scoring function was able to break a relatively difficult cipher.

For those that don't know, a Playfair cipher puts the English alphabet into a 5x5 grid (minus 'j') and uses pairs of letters to select other letters from the grid. Instead of a 26-letter substitution cipher, codebreakers are now faced with a daunting 676 letter-pair challenge.

My code created 1,000 random keysquares and mutated them, randomly selecting squares and swapping them with one another, or swapping entire rows and columns. The new generation was scored, and those that scored high had a better chance of making it to the next generation than those that scored low (survival of the fittest, if you will). And in just 28 generations, what was once a mass of jumbled letters slowly transformed before my eyes into perfect English. Once the solution had been found I actually felt bad about killing the process, as if I had creatd life and killed it. It was truly amazing.
--

Have you ever seen yourself give a speech or even perform in everyday life? Have someone film you often enough so you forget about the camera and then review the tapes- it's very instructive.

The point being that we often have little idea about our motivations or actions until we view them with both knowledge of our own beliefs and motivations and the ability to view our implementation of those forces from the viewpoint of a 3rd party.

So, the effect of the "digital revolution" will be unapparent except in retorspect or thorough analysis. See the 1900 House- I don't think the participants had any real appreciation for the effect modern life had upon their expectations and behaviour- neither do we.

Give the "revolution" time- it will take at least a generation before we are affected and it's been less than 25 years (really). Actually, I could get along without central heating or a car easier than I could get along without my internet connection and computer. I call that an impact- even if I don't know it.

Was MS-BOB some kind of MA-75B target practice level? But Seriously--

So purchasing Bungie isn't necessarily bad. If Bungie gets to keep doing what they're doing...

But this is highly unlikely. See Bob Crigely's story "Be Careful What You Wish For: Why Being Acquired by Microsoft Makes Hardly Anyone Happy in the Long Run" here

This is a NIGHTMARE. I love Bungie, but I'm sure they will have all the freedom of any drones in the collective...

Clearly, games are part of the operating system! Would you consider Windows complete without Minesweeper or Solitaire? I didn't think so.

Seriously, I think this is a direct attack on Sony, who Microsoft is really worried about. They don't really give a damn about the Mac versions and maybe care a little about Linux. Read Cringely's article on the X-Box: "A Shot Across the Bow".

I found this "top secret" web page at pbs. Cheesus, here's the nuclear HOWTO (plutonium not included). Ok, here's the picture gallery - you guys pick one, someone's knocking at the door.

According to Bob Cringely Microsoft might have deliberately messed up the original trial (they weren't exactly s**t-hot) in order to crush the thing on appeal (they're holding things back). Why? So that the US DOJ thinks they've dealt with MS once and for all, thereby ignoring all the other things that MS get up to. Cringely mentions the Hardware Design Guide as a method of enforcing PC obsolescence.

I think another interesting perspective is that of the great Robert X. Cringely, in the latest edition of the Pulpit. All is spelled out here.

Put simply, he believes that Microsoft lost the trial on purpose: in order to be illegal, a monopoly must be harmful to its consumers, and the DoJ failed to dig up enough evidence to that (such as the "Windows Certified" scam), choosing instead to focus on the damage done to other companies (particularly Netscape). So Microsoft is pretty damned sure it will get Judge Jackson's ruling overturned on the appeals court, all will be back to normal, and at best it'll take a few years for the DoJ to find a new strategy to take them down; in the meantime, Microsoft will be "innovating" a few billion dollars more out of the consumers' pockets.

That's all his opinion, of course. But it looks right on the money. And it does account for the incredible stupidity that the MS lawyers have shown in court...

Pbs website

A very good book titled "Who's Afraid of Schrodinger's Cat"

Once upon a time, I made a fansite about a different TV show. The only copyrighted material I used was one picture of the main character (fair use 3) for non-commercial (fair use 1) purposes. I even linked to the official site (fair use 4).

The copyright owners sent me a cease and desist letter. I took the image down within half an hour of checking my mail. I would later study the issue in more depth and discover that fair use is not infringement; cease and desist letters against obvious fair use can constitute harassment.

So I asked for a license. They refused to give me one, claiming a possibility of defamation aka libel. Then I just took the site down and put a rant in its place.

...I understand you can get that phrase on bumper stickers now.

Unfortunately it can ring all too true, as Anime can fast become
a very expensive hobby; especially once you move past videos
into the realm of anime merchandise:
Posters, T-shirts, Art Books, Models and model kits, J-Pop,
Games, etc...

Before you get in too deep...
(or to help you on your slide into deeper addiction)
here are a few quick notes and a
few (more or less) obscure reccomendations of my favorites.

Definitions (from my POV) -

Anime: (Ah-knee-may)
In general this refers to animated stories produced primarily
by and for a Japanese audience. Specifically it refers to the artistic
style of using animation as a vehicle for the story presentation -
much in the same way Black-and-White film is used for Film Noir or
"classic" looking movies. Particularly (from the western viewpoint),
it refers to stories that are presented with the artistic and cultural
influences of Japanese society as the underlying theme.

From the Japanese point of view, however, anime refers to all animation;
so even Disney, Dreamworks, Pixar, Cartoon Network... would be considered
as "anime" to some audiences. The greater difference is that Western
producers still have the stigma of treating animation as a method
"for kids" to produce "cartoons"; while the Eastern producers did
not fall subject to the Comic Book Code of the 1950-60s, and as
such were able to provide a richer and wider range of story elements,
to include more mature, sophisticated, and even adult themes than
is generally available from American animation.

Another notable difference in the creation of Anime is that the
artistic style applied to a given story is generally made in the
same style as one "Master artist" with an emphasis on consistency
and attention to detail.

Manga: (Mon-gah)
This is the Japanese equivalent of the "Graphic Novel".
They are hand-drawn stories that also follow much of the same
artistic stylization that is applied to Anime. Most appear
to be drawn on Black-on-White, placing more emphasis on
the use of detail and drawing elements than color as
a means of expression.

Many popular anime shows are an offshoot of a popular Manga
storyline (more or less the same characters and plot are
carried over). And Manga itself is becoming more popular
as it is translated and brought over as Graphic Novels or
independent Comic books.


Reccomendations:

#1. Use the Net. As Anime gains more mainstream popularity, more
sites are developed to promote particular shows. Much information
that was once only posted in Japanese is being translated/ported
into English and other local fan languages.

#2. Find a local Anime group. As good as the Net is, there
is an additional benefit to developing friedships with people
who may be even greater anime enthusiasts. Not only can
they provide insight and information about many shows that is
not generally known; they are also a good source for good
but obscure anime that may never reach sufficient market
share to find a Western distributor.

Note: some of the recommendations below you may not be able to
find commercially available - that is another reason to check
with local groups that might be able to give you a special showing
of the material. I will mark (FAF) - "Find a Friend" after those
I do not think you will be easily able to find.


Robot Carnival (FAF)
This is the "Whitman's Sampler" of Anime.
Several different artists/studios tell stories all based around
the theme of Robots / the interaction of Robots with Humanity.
The greatest benefit of this classic is how it exposes the viewer
to many different styles and genre's that Anime can encompass.
If you like the idea of "concept" albums or science fiction
anthologies you will find this classic to be a thrill as well.


Key the Metal Idol
Before there was Lain, there was Key...
Key must make 30,000 friends to become human...
The opening and closing sequences are just as cool (as S.E. Lain),
and the rest is of the story is an exhilirating means to
make you say "What the ----?" after almost every episode.
Like a great mystery, It all fits together in the end.

Vision of Escaflowne
Most people I've spoken to about this are completely hooked after
the second episode.


Giant Robo
I've only seen one episode (the end), and I know I must see
the rest now to figure out what led to such a heroic epic.


Yuu Yuu Hakusho (FAF)
I don't know if the series is available over here yet but...
CmdrTaco, if you think DBZ is like the WWF, then YYH is
the anime equivalent of the Ultimate Fighting Challenge.

(You can get one, or both, of the movies - but like the
X-files movie, you don't get much from it unless you are already
familiar with the series.)


GunBuster (FAF)
An Anime classic; this show is both a parody of many sports
related and giant robot shows, and an epic space opera in
its own right.

Otaku no Video
This is the video you get when you're ready for the
anime "Twelve Step" program.

(Also, both Gunbuster and Otaku no Video are Gainax productions, the
same studio behind Neon Genesis Evangelion and Kareshi Kanojo No Jijou).

Ping Pong Club (FAF)
For those who may think the Japanese could never come up with
something like "South Park" or "Beavis and Butthead"...

Maho Tsukai Tai
A light hearted comedy about an alien invasion, and high schoolers
who try to fight it by learning... magic?

Patlabor (esp. the movies)
In a future where mecha are used as industrial machines, Police
mecha are needed when things go wrong.

Batsu and Terry / Dirty Pair: Project Eden (FAF)
This was originally shown as a double feature -
Batsu and Terry was described by one friend as "full contact baseball"
Project Eden is a classic example of the antics of two of anime's
most dangerous (collateral damage wise) secret agents.

My point behind making the car anology was to point out that IE is not free. If you pay 30k for the car and they give you a tank of gas for free, you could say you've payed 15k for the gas and you've payed 15k for the car. You could also say you've payed 28,080 for the gas and the car was 20 dollars. You can use any acounting method you wish, but in the end, you've payed for both items.

Why does this analogy apply?

Windows 98 is free. Free? yea, free.

You pay for IE. Like it or not, and ms throws in the OS as a distrobution method in the same way Corel throws in Linux to help distribute their Work Perfect Office suite.

Now, I know what some of you ms droids are thinking "I never wrote a check to microsoft for the use of their browser, they gave it to me because they love me and they think I'm special." They love you and they think your so special, they charged you for the browser and they threw in an operating system for free.

To bolster my point, I quote item 137 from the text of Judge Jackson Finding of fact in the case:

137. In early 1995, personnel developing Internet Explorer at Microsoft contemplated charging OEMs and others for the product when it was released. Internet Explorer would have been included in a bundle of software that would have been sold as an add-on, or "frosting," to Windows 95. Indeed, Microsoft knew by the middle of 1995, if not earlier, that Netscape charged customers to license Navigator, and that Netscape derived a significant portion of its revenue from selling browser licenses. Despite the opportunity to make a substantial amount of revenue from the sale of Internet Explorer, and with the knowledge that the dominant browser product on the market, Navigator, was being licensed at a price, senior executives at Microsoft decided that Microsoft needed to give its browser away in furtherance of the larger strategic goal of accelerating Internet Explorer's acquisition of browser usage share. Consequently, Microsoft decided not to charge an increment in price when it included Internet Explorer in Windows for the first time, and it has continued this policy ever since. In addition, Microsoft has never charged for an Internet Explorer license when it is distributed separately from Windows.
___

My suggestion is to write as much as you can in .pm modules (perl objects if you're really looking for maintainability) and then just do loops and stuff in your templating language. That way, you can easily write command-line interfaces to the same functions you're calling from your HTML pages...which makes testing MUCH easier and faster.

As for speed...mod_perl has eliminated perl as the bottle neck for most requests for us...database queries are much slower than the a reasonable perl function, so you can ignore anyone who says that perl is too slow for dynamic, high traffic stuff.

http://www.pbs.org/internet/timeline
http://www.geocities.com/~anderberg /ant/history

Precious stone:
"A gemstone that, owing to its beauty, rarity, durability, and hardness, has the highest commercial value and traditionally has enjoyed the highest esteem since antiquity; specifically, diamond, ruby, sapphire, and emerald (and sometimes pearl, opal, topaz, and chrysoberyl)."

As many of you might be aware Charlie Rose (on PBS) had a head-to-head interview with Lars and Chuck D. on 5/12/00. Essentially, Lars and Chuck agreed to disagree, however, both were quite "eloquent" in their arguments and I was impressed with Lars' passion for pursuing a public debate. Chuck D. was equally (if not more) impressive in his knowledge of the issues (philosophical and to a lesser degree technical). I can't seem to find a transcript on the internet but if you go to the PBS site you can order the dead-tree version.

Bob Cringely has on several occasions described the remedy that would satisfy Stallman's "#1" and perhaps be more damaging in the longer picture...to MS at least.

He believes the only group (the group most ignored by the prosecution and the judge so far) to be split off should be the languages and libraries group. Basically, if Windows (and therefore Internet Explorer) lost the "secretness" of its APIs (including file formats since they're all shared within ms applications), the market would quickly get more competitive.

Not sure I believe him, but its raising a point that most have forgotten. MS is still a languages company. Languages aren't "applications" in the same way that Office products are.

Earlier this week I caught a Charlie Rose interview with Lars Ulrich. To tell you the truth he put up some pretty convincing arguments for banning MP3s on Napster. Lars pointed out that what they were objecting to was digital copies or their digitally recorded albums. He openly supports fans recording live performances. When the other guy in the interview accused him of being greedy he took the pragmatic stance by saying that though the record companies have a virtual monopoly, all Napster is trying to do is become the new monopolist (with no revenue going back to the artist). Lars also seemd to focus on the Artists right to coltroll the artistic work. I'm not sure that is a valid point. My personal feeling is that while the artist has the right to decide how to produce the art, it a general way it can't be called art unless the audience sees/hears it. The expression is controlled by the artitst, but the audience controls how they see/hear/interpret it. In this way I think it is valid to record performance and redistribute it since the recording itself becomes a new piece or art. Maybe Slashdot needs to interview Napster and really press them on their goals for generating revenue. Is their model based on finding the best online MP3 content and servicing it to the consumer, without the artist getting a cut? Is the software ging to eventually cost money? Will they start pushing ads down to Napster clients?

At any rate I can respect someone for standing up for what they believe is right. If someone basically crapped over all my work and then flipped me the bird when I ask them not to steal my work, I reckon I'd get a little pissed myself.

• The Digital Future Coalition
  
• The American Association of Law Libraries
  
• The District of Colombia Library Association
  
• The University of Maryland
  
• The Consortium of College and University Media Centers
  
• PBS
  
• The American Library Association
  
• The Association of Research Libraries
  
• The Special Libraries Association
  
• The Medical Library Association
  
• Georgetown University
  
• The California Digital Library
  
• The American Association of Universities
  
• The American Council on Education
  
• The National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges
  
• The Electronic Frontier Foundation
  

Many of the people against gun control seem to be hell-bent on portraying anyone supporting any kind of gun control as wanting to ban all weapons. But what the woman supporting gun control on the program proposed was not a ban of all (or any) firearms, but what seemed to me to be a reasonable approach (via registration and licensing) to try to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and those who are not able to use them safely. There are enough nutcases and irresponsible people out there; shouldn't it be possible to do something to prevent them from getting their hands on firearms, even if it makes it a bit more difficult for legitimate firearms buyers to acquire weapons?

I must confess, my first reaction to the subject matter of this book was "we need a $20 hardback to tell us this?". Ok, granted, opinions look ever-so-much more respectable when they're presented in twenty-buck bundles of chopped up dead tree with a shiny cover, but I can't help feeling the author is insulting the intelligence of his readership[1] by presuming that it's not already blindingly obvious to them[2].

Disclaimer: IANAE; my name doesn't have a nice shiny little "MEcon" after it, which is apparently required for you to have an opinion on the business world these days. Oh well. I'm going to have an opinion anyway. Damn The Man.

From my perspective, whilst there are some sharemarket players who do the logical thing, stick to the really high return blue chip stocks and "manage their money wisely" (whatever that means) this is not true of most people. A simple analysis of the market reveals this: if everybody share-shopped "rationally" (ack, I'm sounding like an economist!) the whole world would own stocks in IBM, Cisco, and a handful of others, Amazon.com would be bankrupt, and the "dot.com proliferation"[3] would never have happened.

Most market speculation[4] is about shopping with the gut and to a lesser extent with the ears. Shopping with the gut is just my fancy name for playing your instincts and intuition: buying into something you think will do well, no matter whether it has in the past or not.[5] Ditto shopping with the ears: most commentators I've observed agree that part of the impetus that pulled the NASDAQ out of its slump/correction/downturn/downward hurtle (pick your verb) was the fact that it was talked back up; "business confidence" is so important because a skittish marketplace won't engage in the volume of share-trading needed to keep prices from stagnating (or plummeting).

As for a "crash", booms and busts are inevitable in the market economy; especially in this circumstance, where tech stocks (as Cringely[6] points out best) are absurdly overvalued. The question is simply whether enough confidence can be retained that the adjustment of the overvalued stocks can be accomplished over a long period of time or if there will be a huge, sudden slump.

Actually, I wouldn't mind a sudden slump overly, except that it'd retard market confidence generally, rather than just dropping tech stocks down to what they should be at. I have no sympathy whatsoever for tech-stock speculator billionaires who will be reduced to impecuniary if the 'daq resets itself; can you tell?

I seem to have digressed a bit, but my point is this: if something like this is obvious to a Politics major like myself, why do we need a tarted-up twenty greenback thesis to explain it to us?

As a final note, given Jon Katz' propensity for tackling issues (whatever one may think of how he tackles them) I was rather disappointed that this article was not much more than a synopsis of the book and didn't attempt any critical evaluation.

Footnotes:

1. One presumes the target audience of this book could be more or less described as "us": the educated, media-savvy, market-watching upper-middle and upper classes. ICBW, but the idea of a book which is fundamentally about economics pitched at an audience which will probably never buy a share in their lives oddly fails to wash.
2. My economic experience consists of two Cs in first-year economics classes, and it seems blindingly obvious to me.
3. Raspberry flavoured virtual chocolate fish for anybody who can tell me who coined that absurd name ("dot.com"), where they live, and where I can buy a good shotgun.
4. I don't have figures to prove this, but I'm going to posit that speculation makes up >50% of the sharemarket portfolios and almost all the share traffic. Anybody want to knock me down?
5. Anyone want some dot.com hysteria? Onna stick.
6. See Cringely, R. X., The Pulpit, Vol III, No. 5, 14th Apr 2000

/* My opinions, dammit. Mine. If you want to adopt them, that's your problem. */

He's a pretty clever fella...

The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.
Bertrand Russell

I really enjoyed a recent interview of Andy Grove I saw on The Charlie Rose Show, largely because Charlie kept trying to get Andy to say something really powerful, and Andy was seemed very careful. Andy Grove is known as a survivor of prostate cancer, and did a lot of research into the latest treatments and medical knowledge on the disease. So Charlie asked him what Mayor Giuliani should do (because Giuliani recently announced that his doctors detected he has early stages of prostate cancer). Andy said something like, "I can't say what he should do. I will only say what I have experienced. He may find that my experiences are pertinent to his situation..." This is just an example, but throughout the interview Andy consistently spoke equivocally, or qualified his opinions. I think this is really refreshing, since we all know that on the subjects he was talking about he could certainly be considered an authority. I think it's an academic influence that leads people to speak carefully like that.

So I guess I'm really rambling off topic here, but I just wanted to share this because I agree that too many people (especially ACs) speak in absolutes and make claims that they can't support because they don't have the knowledge to defend their opinions.

"What I cannot create, I do not understand."

Why doesn't the government just employ him if they don't allow him to get a job in the private sector doing what he's qualified to do?
Here's some sad-ass reality. The Government has always specialized in marginalizing citizens. It does this with gag orders, imprisonment, and deportation. It's no better than any other government it claims to be. Torture is torture, whether you're hanging from a ceiling fan being jabbed with a cattle prod, being sodomized by the cops, or being demonized by the press and being told that you cannot use technology to survive.

And yes, being forced to work in some mindless wage-slave job when you're qualified for much better is a form or torture. You gotta degree? Try flipping burgers and see if you don't have something to rant about.

Regardless of cuplability, if there's one "employer" Mr. Mitnick could feel comfortable with, it would be the Federal Government...because regardless of what bad things anyone has done, nobody, with the possible exception of Pol Pot, has ever done anything which would make the federal government blink.
Regardless of what they feed the press about outrage and damages, you can bet the Fedz have their own 3133t group that does the same kind of stuff (internationally) that they jail everyone for--and if they're not jailing them, they're paying them to lure/bait people who might not have otherwise even tried it. Be it smoking/dealing/shooting/cracking/phreaking/whatev er...

In this land of the Free to be incarcerated we must reconcile ourselves to the fact that since the United States is really not at war on foreign soil, the United States is at war with its people. It always has been, but in the past it was easier demonizing and rallying support (remember Paul Robeson?) against even popular, eloquent, and correct people. In short, the citizens of the United States have the full attention of a government/buracracy capable of monitoring/manipulating governments around the world. It's adventurous geek season and Uncle Sugar has a whole pack of slavering hounds and a double-aught legal system on his shoulder.

As a citizen of the United States, I wonder what it's going to take before people stop being cattle and realize who's holding the bolt-gun, the prod, and the bit.

How will history remember us for our complacency as we're all quietly emasculated, barcoded, and more thoroughly enslaved than we are today? Will anyone really even bother when the best they can manage after 12 useless years of "consumerism" training camps (public schools--know them for what they are) is something along the lines of "Uh, the porn used to be better."?

"So what did you do before you became a fry-cook?"

BTW...this makes up for not posting for a while. It's so freakin' low on the list nobody's going to read it anyway.

See the latest I, Cringely article at PBS online for why this is all irrelevant at this point (see towards the last half of the article). If you don't have your I, Cringely slashbox turned on, I'd say turn it on. The guy always has some interesting points, a better pundit than Dvorak.

-JD