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31 July 2001
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The Old Kingdom of Egypt collapsed during climate changes caused by
one of the
Little Ice Ages. Entire lakes dried up due to the change in rainfall. (The next
Little Ice Age is due to happen around AD 3100.)
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Bow to humanity's new masters, the
uberintelligent
raccoons of Boston!
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30 July 2001
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Apple's quest for aesthetics is
taken to its logical
conclusion.
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Glenn Juskiewicz
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The task of breeding vultures to devour corpses at the ancient Zoroastrian
Towers of Silence
is a job straight out of HP Lovecraft.
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These images of the ISS
are lovely.
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Ben Loukota
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27 July 2001
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Yet another reason why anyone professing himself to be a
monarchist must
be stupid or insane.
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Pranks for evil geniuses
include Yucky Ions and a Kindergarten Solar-powered Death Squad.
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Callisto may have an
ocean like Europa's.
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Revel in technological history with this large picture of a 1969
IBM punch card.
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26 July 2001
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You know that "tax rebate" you're (probably) getting? Surprise!
It's not really a
refund, it's effectively a loan from you-of-2002 to you-of-2001.
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Mars has
dust devils often
enough that their tracks have been
seen from orbit
more than once. They have been seen whirling in
Amazonis
Planitia and down on the floor of
Valles Marineris.
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It's a wheeled robot with a camera, which
can be controlled via radio through a Web interface. I want one of these and a Web
server...on the Moon. That would be cool.
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Glenn Juskiewicz
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If the ad campaign for
these phones isn't
changed to "Phones so simple a chimp can use them," then someone in marketing needs to
be fired.
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25 July 2001
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If you have anything to do with computers, you've heard of the
Code Red worm.
Now there is an
animated
map showing the spread of the infection.
(Note that Microsoft does not even mention Code Red in the
notification
of the patch which fixes the bug which Code Red explots. In fact, searching Microsoft's
knowledge base for Code Red turns up nothing of value. Idiocy or evil? You decide.)
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A first-hand report on the clustered
Stone
SouperComputer.
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The Pennsylvania Legistature
considers corn
more deserving of protection than gay human beings. Idiots. I'm sorry, it must have
been my turn to put the smart drugs in Harrisburg's water, and I forgot.
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24 July 2001
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The biggest meteor in
years was literally
right overhead,
and I missed it!
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Archaeology Magazine asks, "with automatic weapons, is stratigraphy so important?" in
regards to a review
of the Tomb Raider movie.
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Mark Sachs
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Another one from the archivists: The
Canonical List of RPG Famous Last Words.
My favorite: "Yeah, a shape-changing non-detection moose!"
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I thought the
Gospel
of Mani, the religious text of Manichaeism, was long gone. It turns out it's in
Ireland. Score one for the world's archivists!
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23 July 2001
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Tom Tomorrow
explains the inner workings of Washington's missile defense complex.
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Solar sail test flight
failed!
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More on bootleg wireless
Internet connections. The article mentions building 10-km-range microwave radio
antennas out of juice cans. The world is getting more cyberpunk every day, Heaven help us.
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20 July 2001
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Thirty-two years ago today, humans first walked
on the Moon. (Just a little people-centricism on my part: Let's see any other species
do that. In your face, dolphins! Who bad? We bad! Everyone who's been to the
Moon, give me a big opposable-thumbs-up!)
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The WTO hires a marketing
firm to get teenagers to stop hating them. A quote from the article:
"Note: in focus groups, 59% of teens reported that they would consider purchasing
WTO product if associated with friendly talking frog."
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Solar sail
test flight!
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Archaeologists have found a possible location for
the vault of the Oracle at
Delphi.
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From this time forward, I will only answer to the sobriquet
Jon of Megalon 14!
Tremble before us, lesser planets!
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19 July 2001
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I don't mean to panic you, but
we're all
gonna dieeeeeeeeee!!!! This objective reporting brought to you by CNN, who
would kill their own mothers if it got them a boost in ratings. Wolf Blitzer is
as smart as a slightly retarded radish!
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The site They Rule, which shows the interconnections
(one might say the incestuous relationships) among the boards of directors of corporations,
makes me want to become a Communist. There's maybe fifty people who run the monied
interests of North America. Jeez.
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A train
carrying, among other things, hydrochloric acid caught fire in a tunnel
right next to
the Baltimore Convention Center. Coverage
from MSNBC. Coverage
from CNN.
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More on that Martian
dust storm, from NASA. This page leads to another, which contains updated
weather map data for Mars!
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Glenn Juskiewicz
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Cool headline which denotes a cooler technology:
Hewlett-Packard
Patents "Atomic Pixie Dust."
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Jonathan Backer provides some beautiful
backgrounds as well as about a billion
megabytes of anime music videos!
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Matt Pyson
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18 July 2001
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The House has passed
an anti-flag-burning
amendment again. Why do we elect anyone who is unAmerican enough to fear
free speech?
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Researchers have found
an
immense Nubian city in northern Sudan. Some buildings have been preserved all the way
to their rooftops.
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You need a car radio
with a USB port. You really do.
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Glenn Juskiewicz
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In today's Mars weather
report, dust. Lots of it.
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17 July 2001
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Eta Carinae is 7500 light years away. Even at such great distances, we can still
see things move.
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Skin color becomes
a fashion choice.
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16 July 2001
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Underground
marketing sounds like it came out of a cyberpunk novel. And it's probably illegal.
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Doctor Who returns in
Death Comes to Time.
Includes an enhanced
version with some spiffy art.
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Diane Kasacavage
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Ben has passed along CNN's informative little slideshow on
how NASA gets the Shuttle into space.
It took some work, but I managed to tease out
the
permanent URL for the show.
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Ben Loukota
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13 July 2001
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For "Dark Cloud" addicts: Mike Ryan has passed along
his suggestions for getting the most out of the fishing
minigame in Dark Cloud, which I have ported over to HTML.
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Mark Sachs' Grand List
Of Console Role Playing Game Clichés has been chosen as a Site of the Week for
7/13/2001 by Steve Jackson Games. Way to go, Mark!
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Mike Ryan
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Beijing won the 2008 Olympic Games. Now
we can discover who will win the 100-meter Fleeing Oppression Footrace or the Tiananmen Tank
Slalom.
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It's probably a sign of the Apocalypse that I entered a caption for IADL that
was accepted. I entered the one
as "Raiders of the Lost Asterisk." (Probably only Matt Smith will care. Ah, well. :)
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Have at thee, Moon Landing Disbelievers! The Web, in its vast glory, brings us
answers to all those questions
asked by Moon doubters!
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Ah, Texas. Home of unfettered racism and overly powerful judges. Texas. Where you can
hire a
wanted man as an undercover cop and use him to railroad people into jail.
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People are
stupid.
(Not the kid who died when the Coke machine fell on him. The parents who are suing
Coke over the incident.)
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Noel Tominack
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12 July 2001
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Eppur si muove: I changed the subtitle in the upper left this morning.
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Few things are prettier than
the crystal blue
of hydrogen fluorescing in the void.
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There are some whackos who
believe
we never went to the Moon. Fox, ever on the lookout for a way to make a buck while
destroying civilization as we know it, is feeding their weird belief structure.
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Cleaner fish pet other
fish to apologize and to calm them down. This is the first time such behavior has been
noted outside the mammals.
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11 July 2001
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The city of Los Angeles is
attempting to
levy property taxes on satellites. Welcome to the future.
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Instead of "Dictator or Sitcom Character," it's
"Guess your religion."
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10 July 2001
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Hi there, I'm the President, and I not only want to give your money to religious
organizations without your consent (good Christian charities only, please!), but I also want
to make it possible for government-funded
religious groups to practice hiring discrimination against gay people. To top it
all off, now that people know about it, I'm backpedaling!
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The proposed HR 175, the
Enumerated Powers Act,
is interesting. It
states: "Each Act of Congress shall contain a concise and definite statement of the
constitutional authority relied upon for the enactment of each portion of that Act." It
would be interesting to see how government would change should this pass (seeing how I
suspect this would give the Supreme Court a specific discussion point for any legislation
brought before it for review).
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9 July 2001
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Early fraternity brothers hunted
game animals and were, quite possibly, civilized.
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Terry Pratchett expounds upon
alien Christmases.
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6 July 2001
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What is the leading cause of efficiency loss among wind power turbines?
Bugs.
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Ben Loukota
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Abe Lincoln died here.
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5 July 2001
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You always knew it was true: It might not be the same as the Pop Rocks and cola you
were warned about in grade school, but
Pop
Rocks and sherbet are dangerous together.
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AfAP is now
Microsoft Smart
Tag disabled, huzzah. (The linked Microsoft page has a section titled "End User Privacy."
At first glance, I read "End" as an imperative verb instead of as an adjective.)
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We were discussing economics at dinner on Saturday. That led to me reading up on
Amartya Sen.
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Mars. If there is
life there, we
should be preparing to meet the invasion of its terrible steam-powered land behemoths!
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Ben Loukota
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4 July 2001
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Angels from Another Pin will be celebrating America's independence from Canada or
France or
something
today. During the holiday, enjoy the
Independence-Day-themed colors.
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3 July 2001
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Another large
Kuiper Belt
object. ("Where are we going? Planet Ten...!")
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Heh.
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Advisors report: The civilization of
Australia has
developed the technology of WHEEL. We demand you give us the technology of WHEEL
or we will declare war!
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Single-bit
Linux.
Note the author. (Hi, Jon!)
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Daniel Pinkwater, the author
of Norb.
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2 July 2001
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No, that's not Matt and me. And those two ladies aren't
Donna and Ivy. Really. We swear.
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This puff
piece on geneology was written by someone named Corey Kilgannon. Spooooooky.
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The hard way to get DSL.
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Bangkok's full name
means "City of Angels, Great City of Immortals, Magnificent City of the Nine Gems, Seat of
the King, City of Royal Palaces, Home of the Gods Incarnate, Erected by Visvakarman at
Indra's Behest." Locals call it "Krungthep," or City of Angels.
The modern name, Bangkok, means "City of Wild Plums."
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