Fun_People Archive
30 Oct
NTK bits, 30/10/98

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From: Peter Langston <psl>
Date: Fri, 30 Oct 98 13:10:28 -0800
To: Fun_People
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Subject: NTK bits, 30/10/98

X-Lib-of-Cong-ISSN: 1098-7649
From: "Danny O'Brien" <danny@spesh.com>
Excerpted-from: NTK now, 30/10/98

 _   _ _____ _  __ <*the* weekly high-tech sarcastic update for the uk>
| \ | |_   _| |/ / _ __   ____30/10/98_ o join! mail 'subscribe ntknow'
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| |\  | | | | . \ | | | | (_) \ v  v /  o website (+ archive) lives at:
|_| \_| |_| |_|\_\|_| |_|\___/ \_/\_/   o     http://www.ntk.net/


                                >> HARD NEWS <<
                                 fruity chews

	The Net's very own degentrified no-go zone, USENET, fell further
	into screeching chaos this week. The newsgroup's new street drug of
	choice, HipCrime, is spreading fast - a simple script which replaces
	legitimate newsgroup posts with unreadable nonsense (and yes, the
	two are separable to an expert eye). No-one knows who's behind
	Hipcrime - some suspect it's a concerted effort by a small group,
	others asuume it's a generalised act of self-destruction by the
	usual script kiddies. Or maybe it's just like the Sixties, and the
	CIA are flooding the market with uncut HipCrime to prevent the
	Randian revolution from spilling out of alt.objectivism.
	http://extra.newsguy.com/~rchason/
	       - like anyone goes there now 'cept to score warez and whores
	http://www.ganesha.org/ptb/hipcrime.html    - more street craziness

	Germany's Chaos Computer Club lost one of its leading lights (in a
	suitably decentralised, Erisian way) with the death of hardware
	hacker TRON. One NTK correspondent recalled "he possessed superior
	nads", but Tron may be better remembered elsewhere for his work in
	exposing security holes in smartcards and the GSM telephone network,
	as well as the first probing of the new German digital TV set-top
	boxes.  Tron's body was found in a Berlin park. The police are
	treating the incident as suicide: CCC demur.
	http://www.ccc.de/CRD/CRD241098.en.html


                                >> ANTI-NEWS <<
                             berating the obvious

	Interface's Dr KEYBOARD recommends people ignore ISP advice, install
	Microsoft Internet Explorer... Time Out's SPYDER apologises for
	misnaming "Macromedia Shockrave" - it should, he explains, be
	"Shockrave's Shockwave"... NT 5.0 renamed 2000 (blame rounding
	errors in the math library)...  JIM BARKSDALE saw himself as
	"Stalin", reveal e-mails...  Interface's Dr KEYBOARD says
	alternatives to NT "for experts or enthusiastic amateurs with too
	much time on their hands"... new Freeserve-fearing A4-size AOL
	mailout uses the word "Free" 27 times (not counting uses in body
	copy)...  Interface's Dr Keyboard recommend you use Microsoft
	Hotmail with Microsoft Internet Mail or Microsoft Outlook Express...
	VM Labs rename "Project X" NUON, don't realise www.nuon.com already
	belongs to Dutch folk history museum.. AUDIOSTREET overestimate
	Prince revival:http://www.ntk.net/doh/audio981023.gif


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

	"The gradual co-opting of Halloween to celebrate science fiction
	mythology rather than supernatural tradition is symptomatic of a
	society that now projects its concerns towards technology rather
	than the metaphysical unknown.  Discuss." Whatever, any excuse will
	do for uber-webcast SCIFI CON 3.0, the SciFi Channel's weekend-long
	online jamming-on-the-net sort of thing, with Real Audio author
	readings (KW Jeter's new Noir - from 4am GMT, 31/10/98, Bruce
	Sterling's Distraction - from 5pm GMT, 31/10/98), and endless
	scrutinising of the original Halloween/ sci-fi crossover, Orson
	Welles' "panic-inducing" War Of The Worlds radio show. Though we
	bet Jim Cameron doesn't touch on the theory that the whole "mass
	panic" myth was *made up* by the authorities to "prove" there'd be
	chaos if first contact was made, thus justifying cover-ups of all
	subsequent alien activity.
	http://www.scifi.com/scifi.con/		   - note to SFX readers...
	http://www.venus.co.uk/wotw/
			 - ..."Orson Scott Card" is not a publisher of CCGs


                                >> TRACKING <<
                  making good use of the things that we find

	For those of you who tire of watching John Glenn's launch take just
	over five hours to "real time stream", allow us to present X-FILE.
	This utility can dump RealMedia files to disk even from servers
	using the "pnm:" protocol. So when you try to do a "Save link as..."
	on a RealMedia file, and all it gives you is a stumpy little ".ram"
	file, you'll still be able to grab the genuine article for later,
	full-speed playback. Unpleasantly, it's a Windows shareware utility
	with all the hallmarks of that ancient form (time-limited demo,
	"unusual" user interface, weirdo installation), but it does the job.
	And, hey, if he *does* die, you're going to want a permanent
	memento, aren't you?
	http://2bsystem-usa.www-hosting.net/X-FileGet/
				     - oh, yeah, as if you hadn't thought it
	http://www.pcisys.net/~mrunner/psxamp/
						- next: RIAA ban Playstation


                                >> MEMEPOOL <<
                              hasta la altavista

	Star Wars trailer spoiler (feel the evil rising in you):
	http://www.darkhorizons.com/news4/swtrail.htm ... too geeky for your
	wrist: http://www.orang-otang.com/ ... local weirdness:
	http://bltc.com/domains.htm ... John Romero and Bill Gates share
	birthday (28/10)... Is Your Kid A Hacker?, asks Kevin Poulsen and
	http://www.zdnet.com/familypc/ ...  using thetrip.com to track
	corporate jets; deals... how about a HOWITZER?
	http://www.briwebsite.com/ ... NETLINK rehiring previously fired
	employees?... Self-Important Newspaper Explains Onion To Dumb
	Americans Who Don't Get It
 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1998-10/25/063l-102598-idx.html


                               >> 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 "we blagged our way into the
    BAFTA Awards ceremony, and all we got was this lousy special citation"
   http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/entertainment/newsid_204000/204258.stm

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

           (K) 1998 Special Projects. Non-business copying is fine,
                        but retain SMALL PRINT. Contact
                terry@spesh.com for commercial license details.
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