[Editor's note: Since we did not come out with an issue anytime near Christmas, I am throwing all of our holiday stuff in first. Have a great year] IS THERE A SANTA CLAUS? By: Unknown As a result of an overwhelming lack of requests, and with research help from that renown scientific journal SPY magazine (January, 1990) - I am pleased to present the annual scientific inquiry into Santa Claus. 1) No known species of reindeer can fly. BUT there are 300,000 species of living organisms yet to be classified, and while most of these are insects and germs, this does not COMPLETELY rule out flying reindeer which only Santa has ever seen. 2) There are 2 billion children (persons under 18) in the world. BUT since Santa doesn't (appear) to handle the Muslim, Hindu, Jewish and Buddhist children, that reduces the workload up to 15% of the total - 378 million according to Population Reference Bureau. At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, that's 91.8 million homes. One presumes there's at least one good child in each. 3) Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seems logical). This works out to 822.6 visits per second. That is to say that for each Christian household with good children, Santa has 1/1000th of a second to park, hop out of the sleigh, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left, get back up the chimney, get back into the sleigh and move on to the next house. Assuming that each of these 91.8 million stops are evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false but for the purposes of our calculations we will accept), we are now talking about .78 miles per household, a total trip of 75-1/2 million miles, not counting stops to do what most of us must do at least once every 31 hours, plus feeding and etc. This means that Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second, 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle on earth, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second - a conventional reindeer can run, tops, 15 miles per hour. 4) The payload on the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium-sized lego set (2 pounds), the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons, not counting Santa, who is invariably described as overweight. On land, conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that "flying reindeer" (see point #1) could pull TEN TIMES the normal amount, we cannot do the job with eight, or even nine. We need 214,200 reindeer. This increases the payload - not even counting the weight of the sleigh - to 353,430 tons. Again, for comparison - this is four times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth. 5) 353,000 tons travelling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance - this will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as spacecrafts re-entering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer will absorb 14.3 QUINTILLION joules of energy. Per second. Each. In short, they will burst into flame almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them, and create deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team will be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second. Santa, meanwhile, will be subjected to centrifugal forces 17,500.06 times greater than gravity. A 250-pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force. In conclusion - If Santa ever DID deliver presents on Christmas Eve, he's dead now. %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% WHAT DO PEOPLE THINK? [Editor's Note: This was sent to us from a person who thought this was funny...and indeed it was. But I was blown back by trying to discover how (or WHAT) this person was thinking... In order not to reveal any company or the stupidity of some people, I have deleted the name of the author, and removed the name of the computer company and replaced their name with [COMPUTER COMPANY]. The company is a Fortune 500 company in Texas. Subj: [COMPUTER COMPANY] Suggestion Box Date: 94-11-11 18:49:05 EST From: xxxxxxxxx To: [COMPUTER COMPANY] Sysop To: Sysop Sent on: America Online (using WAOL 1.5) Field 3 = I would like for [COMPUTER COMPANY] to send me a free MultiMedia Computer, Monitor, printer, mouse, and modem. I need the equipment to start my own Charter business, but I am furloughed (pilot) and can't afford the equipment. I'll be happy to pay for it when I am able. Please send the equipment to: [name and address deleted to avoid terminally embarrassing the poor idiot] I thank [COMPUTER COMPANY] in advance for its generosity. xxxxx Here is their response: Subj: Re: [COMPUTER COMPANY] Suggestion Box Date: 94-11-11 23:22:00 EST From: xxxxxxxxxx To: AirLnPilot CC: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Sent on: America Online (using WAOL 2.0) While [COMPUTER COMPANY] understands your situation completely, certain regulations delineate proper handling of requests of this nature. Therefore I am forwarding your message to the appropriate agency. You may want to follow up with them - the address is: Mr. S. Claus North Pole, Earth Please direct any addition requests of this nature directly to this department to avoid unnecessary delays, especially here at the end of the fiscal year. Glad I was able to help, Sincerely, xxxxxxxxxxx [COMPUTER COMPANY] %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% .SIG HEIL Holocaust revisionism goes up in flame wars By K.K. Campbell It was 56 years ago today that Germans awoke to find the Nazis had spent the night terrorizing Jews and destroying property in something called "Crystal Night." It was a trial-run pogrom for the Holocaust to follow. Once upon a time, net.news (the Internet's public discussion forums) was swamped with flame wars about the Holocaust. They'd be found anywhere -- in newsgroups like alt.conspiracy, soc.history, soc.culture.canada, misc.headlines, alt.individualism etc. One of the most persistent Nazi-apologists, Dan Gannon (dgannon@banished.com), wildly spammed Holocaust-denying material, either not understanding or not caring about netiquette -- that is, you post appropriate material to appropriate groups. Thousands, from dozens of newsgroups, complained. Gannon's posts were bad enough, but they always brought rebuttal and endlessly repeated arguments. Today, most of these debates are found in one newsgroup: alt.revisionism -- dedicated to discussing "Holocaust revisionism," the claim that the Nazi extermination of Jews and other distinct peoples is a "hoax" exacted upon millions of unwary non-Jews. Anti-racist and anti-fascist online activists continue to track Gannon and his pals around the 9,000-odd newsgroups. One such hunter is Canada's Ken McVay (kmcvay@oneb.almanac.bc.ca). McVay, 53, came to Canada in 1967 from the U.S. and is now a Canadian citizen (holds dual citizenship). He's Canada's foremost online anti-revisionist warrior. I've been reading his stuff for years. TRUE COLORS "When I first got started on this, everyone was sort of out there on their own," McVay told eye in a phone interview from his Vancouver Island home. "Almost by accident, working groups started coordinating their efforts." McVay works closely with Danny Keren (dzk@cs.brown.edu) and Jamie McCarthy (k044477@hobbes.kzoo.edu), among others. The goal is not censorship. "I am absolutely, unequivocally opposed to any kind of censorship," McVay says. This is a real shift in McVay's thinking. I vividly recall reading McVay his posts from about two years ago, where he'd vehemently defend Canadian anti-hate speech laws. "I don't anymore. I think it's the biggest possible mistake." What changed his mind? "Dealing with these guys on a daily basis for over two years. Seeing how easy it is to shoot them down. And it is. The most intellectual among them are stupid and completely inept when it comes to historical research. And, of course, they are liars. That being the case, why on Earth would anyone want to shut them up or force them underground? I want to know who I'm dealing with. I want to know where they are. And I want to know how their minds work." To see their true colors, McVay and compatriots badger and prod revisionists until they drop the scholarly pretense by, say, calling McVay a "Jew-lover" or complaining Hitler unfortunately missed the parents of some Jewish netter. It happens regularly. "These online discussions are not aimed at getting Gannon and his pals to change their minds," McVay says. "That ain't gonna happen. It's to reach the rest - - such as the new users that pop up every September in universities and stumble on this stuff. Many don't know how Nazis operate. Most racists don't go around with a little patch on their shoulder proclaiming: `I hate Jews, or blacks, or natives.' But it's there. We work to bring it out in the open." A.R. AS TESTING GROUND McVay and company are working on putting together a book, a primer on Holocaust-denial techniques. (He hasn't approached a publisher yet.) You often see the results of this ongoing research in alt.revisionism . McVay chuckles about having rabid anti-Semites ever at hand to help write it. "We throw out a chapter when we think it's done, content-wise. If the revisionists ignore it completely, then we know it's finished. If they respond, we say, `Ah! We missed that trick, calling a maple tree a Porsche.' So we add that argument in." A month later, they upload the chapter again. McVay says the "classic" revisionist tactic is misrepresentation of text. Outright lies. "They'll cite a historical text: `K.K. Campbell says on page 82 of his famous book that nobody died at Auschwitz.' Then you go to the Library of Congress and look up K.K. Campbell, page 82, and what you find he really said was, `It was a nice day at Dachau.' They get away with this because they know goddamn well most people don't have time to rush off to the Library of Congress. But people read that and say to themselves, `Who would lie about such a thing when it's so easy to prove them wrong? They must be telling the truth.' " The years of refutation have resulted in anti-revisionists transcribing mass amounts of death camp evidence and testimony into computer text files. McVay saved them. Soon netters requested the material. It began to take up so much time, he automated the process. You send an email request, the computer sends you back the file(s). The archive is now maybe 60 megs and may swell to over a gig in 1995. Write email to listserv@almanac.bc.ca with the message GET HOLOCAUST/INDEX -- you'll be sent a huge index of Holocaust files (other files, too, on fascist racist-right groups). If you like the convenience of gopher, check out jerusalem1.datasrv.co.il . Revisionists often assert McVay "secretly" gets operating funds from Jews. "I don't," McVay says. "The hard-drives are spread out on a table with a Canadian Tire fan blowing right at them. I can't afford to replace things, if it breaks, it's gone. However, I'm upfront -- if I get support money, I'll take it, Jewish or not. The fact that a Jewish organization would offer several grand to help wouldn't change the value of the historical data." He'd like to put it all on CD-ROM. "The Internet has to be a revisionist's worst communications nightmare," McVay says. "They can't ignore it, because, as you and I know, in 10-15 years everyone in North America is going to read stuff through the Internet. "And that's the beauty of the Internet: once it's refuted in an honest and academic fashion, you can't run away from it," McVay says. When the latest revisionist recruit charges in with the same old pamphlets, it's almost effortless for anyone to request a file and reply: "We covered this two years ago. Here is the massive refutation of that so-called scholarly report." It's there. For everyone. Forever. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Retransmit freely in cyberspace Author holds standard copyright Full issues of eye in archive gopher://interlog.com Coupla Mailing lists available http://www.interlog.com/eye eye@interlog.com "Break the Gutenberg Lock..." 416-971-8421 %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% THE WORLD WIDE WEB - The JUNKYARD OF THE INTERNET By Ram Samudrala (ram@mbisgi.umd.edu) [Author's Note:] I am not completely happy with this, especially the second part, because when I started writing this I had a lot of ideas about it and now I seem to have run dry. But I went ahead and finished it anyway, before I lost all interest. Feel free to post this wherever... For those of you who are familiar with the workings of the web, you can skip to The Junkyard of the Internet. ------ The World Wide Web About a year or so ago, there were about 500 HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP) servers on the World Wide Web (www). Now, every other person on the Internet with some basic computing experience can install their own server and provide information (I'm using the world quite liberally here) to the web. I wonder if Tim Berniers-Lee, the person who started the www project at CERN, really thought it would become the thing that revolutionized the Internet and end-user computing. And this issue, the ability to put yourself on a soapbox and be heard by the world, and the subsequent consequences, is what I will attempt to address here. First, what does the www give us that we didn't have before? By posting on USENET news, for example, you're probably heard by a lot more people than having a web server. Well, the main difference is that anything you posted normally was lost within in a few days, so your ideas didn't stay around long enough for everyone to assimilate. On the web, your pages are permanent, and you can promote them as much as you want and people will continue increasing the accesses made. But the www project would probably be doomed without the software that keeps everything working. Almost every w^3 browser I've used has been of high quality (which is absolutely crucial), but one of them, NCSA's Mosaic, stands out in terms of availability and accessibility for a variety of problems. Marc Andreessen wrote Mosaic for X and it spread like wildfire when NCSA released free versions of mosaic not just for X, but for a variety of other platforms, again, about a year ago (September). A friend of mine referred to it as "The Program of the Gods". I happened to get seriously addicted to the www at the beginning of this year, but I got over it soon. I then realized that all one needed was an anonymous FTP server set up and they could serve documents to the www. I did this initially, and this is yet another design decision that has been crucial---the www incorporates several existing information retrieval mechanisms out on the net, primarily gopher and ftp. I never thought gopher would be a big hit, and with the advent of the numerous w^3 browsers for almost any imaginable platform, there really is no need for gopher clients and why have a gopher server if you can get a http one up running just as easily? There is only a small (depending on how aesthetically pleasing you want your pages to look like---one can waste hours making things look pretty) overhead involved in converting plain documents to the HyperText Markup Language (HTML), the language that www browsers understand and use to format your text. Philosophically, the idea behind the www simply takes Unix philosophy to the extreme. The whole Internet is abstracted as a gigantic file system, and HTML allows you to specify any object on the Internet, be it a movie of comet Shoemaker colliding with Jupiter, gifs of paintings by Dali, a song you recorded on your 4-track that you have a soundfile of, or things you should know before you delve into linear and non-linear programming, by linking the locations of these objects to an anchor of your choice. And like Unix, a link could be anything, including other programs, telnet /news/mail/ftp/gopher ports, or just another section of a document. The touch of button that activates the anchor is all you need to access any particular link---the software figures out the rest for you---if it's a soundfile, it'll play it. If it's a movie or a picture, it will bring up the appropriate viewer, and so on. The Junkyard of the Internet This is all very nice, but what it lets you do is also access the latest porn clip, let you see gifs of Kurt Cobain's shotgunned face, contact your favourite astrologer for a consultation on-line, and do on-line shopping. I'm not going to pass judgement on whether these things are "wrong", but as the web grows, it is clear that it is the entertainment side of the web that is thriving. Megadeth is probably is one of the first groups to commercial go all out to advertise a release on the w^3 (the CD comes with a sticker saying "check out Megadeth, Arizona at through the www at http://bazaar.com or through FTP" (or something like that), and while Megadeth, Arizona is a cool place to visit, it is akin to the junk mail with colourful pictures that you receive in your postbox. It is propaganda. There are a lot of advantages to having entertainment information available on the net---but it also results in a lot of spam. And this is evident not only on the w^3, but also in the USENET newsgroups, where the commercial Internet provider industry thrives as millions of subscribers come on line and run amok. A few months ago, an advertisement on the net would've been flamed to ashes. Now there is a weak response, but the people who opposed this are fighting a losing war. Advertisers continue to spam the net. Not to mention the increase in the number "job wanted" or "items for sale" ads in completely inappropriate newsgroups. The number of inane USENET groups created for local objects of worship (I am guilty of this) are numerous. The ease with which computers can transmit hypermedia (pictures/movies/sounds) has not only furthered the www revolution but is pushing bandwidth to its limits (a state that we may perpetually exist in). All this has contributed to an increase in the noise:signal ratio on the net as a whole, but particularly in USENET newsgroups and the www. As w^3 usage increases, and it becomes more flexible to incorporate some sort of a BBS-type system, like USENET, or USENET itself, in www browsers, then we will see a exodus from the traditional forms of Internet use to w^3 use, just as there is a movement from people typing stuff at the prompt to clicking buttons on the mouse to perform local tasks. In fact, I predict that many people simply won't even figure out how to FTP or read news from the prompt, just like many people don't figure out how to do send mail from the prompt and instead type in a number or click on the mail icon for their favourite mailer, since they can do this at the click of a button. Again, this isn't necessarily A Bad Thing. What this means, however, is that there will be a dichotomy that will exist on the Internet. There will be people who can navigate the Internet only with help of the www and there will be those who can do both, i.e., use the prompt to do stuff. The advantages that the people who do have access to the internal workings of the system is left to your imagination. But what this is also leading to is the concentration of all the spam on the several networks that compose the Internet to the w^3, and hopefully it will leave the traditional forms of Internet use as it were. Commercial advertisers are more likely to find the w^3 a more viable medium to display their wares than making ephemeral postings on USENET newsgroups, especially given the capability for multimedia plugs. People, visionaries and otherwise, can put forth their agenda with ease. Real information will be much harder to find even with tools like the Web Crawler. All this will result in The Program of the Gods becoming a metal detector. Not everything has to be negative: the ability to reach the masses in an unprecedented way will also hopefully lead to an information revolution, where information will be made available free (this is evident in the www pages of the two camps of the San Francisco newspaper strike). It will lead to independent reporting of events, and even though these will be biased, the perceiver, facing many alternatives, can discern the relevant bits themselves. The www, more than anything else, will lead to a society where information is free. While I have always been for this, I just realized it comes with a price---lots of noise. But this might push us to developing better software that will allow one to filter signal from noise in a efficient manner. And then of course, there's the issue of speed---there is nothing like the net for receiving the latest information on the fly. Sure, it might be tainted, but when one's working and if, for example, one wants to check what the latest election results are (why one would want to do this is another issue), just get on your local newsgroup and post a message, if there isn't already a continuous thread going on. And of course, we all know how the www let us view the pictures of Shoemaker/Jupiter collision almost as it happened. This is probably the greatest advantage of maintaining a net-lifestyle. No longer do we have to rely on one or two view points---you can select among several and information is made available as soon as it is disseminated. And what about the incorporation of computers and networking into our lifestyle? We're holding the First Protein Folding Competition in Asilomar, CA, and the top priority is making sure we have access to the Internet. We would be basically lost without this access, i.e., without being "plugged in". It is interesting how life has changed for some of us. 5 years ago, I hated computers and now I cannot go for a few hours without having access to one. Visions of cyberspace as portrayed in the cyberpunk genre are still far away in reality, but a similar affect seems to have been achieved by the people who exist on the net. Disclaimers: the Internet isn't just about the USENET or the w^3. I'm addressing only certain aspects of it. ram@elan1.carb.nist.gov ...because you believe that science is the greatest achievement so far of the human race and its long term best hope for survival and enlightenment. ---John Moult %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% AUSTIN ZEEN SCENE By Josh Ronsen (rons@quads.uchicago.edu) Here are some Austin zeens I've read recently. I am somewhat surprised on how good so many of these are, considering the somewhat stale nature of Austin's music scene. I've recently posted to alt.zines the Austin Zine Guild's "Scratch Paper" #2, which is more of an overall commentary on Austin Publications rather than reviews of individual zeens as this is. Email me if you missed SP #2, and I will send it to you. PEEK-A-BOO #10: This marks the recovery of Peek-A-Boo from a flirtation with blandness in recent issues, the sex issue, the Halloween issue, back to the glory of it's first bunch of issues. Lots of personality and personalities in here. An interview with Blast Off Country Style, a "scene girl" report (hopefully to become a regular column) on cute boys at a Jon Spencer show (which I missed, damnit!), and a page of stuff from the women who do the wonderful zeen MTM (see below), including a dream featuring Joan Jett, are my faves in this ish. Plus cool comic and xerox artwork. P-A-B is free in Austin, so I guess send them a dollar at 305 W. 39th St #107, Austin, TX 78751. They also claim to have email at boo-key@mail.utexas.edu SAD #1: I just picked this up today, and I like it lots. It's kinda tiny and is all about (surprise) sadness: people who are sad, music that is sad, and three pages of the sadder entries in Kafka's diaries (really!). Very well done. The four music reviews, Joy Division, Idaho, Bedhead and Timco, are rated by how likely their members are to off themselves. Nice touch. Cheer up the sad publisher and send 2 stamps to 704 W. North Loop, Austin, TX 78751 MTM #3: Another really fine Austin zeen! What's going on here? Is it something in the water? I missed #'s 1 and 2, and deeply regret it. A number of interviews here, with 7 Year Bitch, Glorium and two guys from Ken's Donuts. I love the witty, irrelevant questions and answers in the interviews. The other stuff has some very humorous and spirited writing, including the two editors, Lula and Alabama, trading stories of weird incidents in their lives, a page of "Uppity Women" you might not be aware of, but should (I didn't, but now I do), and an expose on a local strip club. This is another freebie, so sent $1 or stamps for this or a future issue to 2834 Salado B, Austin, TX 78705. RETICENCE AND ANXIETY #3: I think #4 just came out, but this is the first one that I've gotten (for the somewhat slimy reason that it was the cheapest). Written by lesbian lovers (is that really important for me to mention? They refer to the two interviews in #3 as being with "queer men", so I can call them "lesbians", can't I? Well, I will and there's nothing you can do about it!) who write under the pseudonyms R. and A. (this *is* Texas, you know, not that there is any bigotry or intolerance around these parts, not here!) This is very well written, with moving and interesting accounts of their first days after moving to Austin, coming out to one's grandmother, dealing with unsympathetic (and downright hostile!) parents and... Having two wonderful, intelligent, loving parents, I am always surprised to hear how shitty other parents can be. Anyways, interviews with film-maker Todd Haynes (after reading this I really want to see his film "Poison") and David Wojnarowicz (whose interview I have not read yet). Some political articles, A.'s liking for some Heavy Metal, and a photo and commentary of Chris Carter of Throbbing Gristle round everything up. All in all, an interesting look into two people's lives. Sometimes it is difficult to separate writing like this from fiction (I read a lot of fiction). After all, what is the difference between writing from someone you do not know and a first-person fictional narrative? R&A makes clear this difference. $2 and 2 stamps to PO Box 2552, Austin, TX 78768. The other issues have differing prices, so just send them lots of cash, that's all I'm saying. ALCOHOL, DRUGS, AND DRIVING #1: There are more issues, but I haven't read any, and I'm not very thrilled with this, and not just because of the multi-page feature on the guy who gunned down 40 people from the UT Tower years and years ago. I think this is unequivocally inferior to my zeen, unlike everything mentioned above and probably below, and I have a problem with anyone who does something worse than me. I mean, if I can do something, surely you can do it better. Also they guy's address is not in the issue, so I have to look it up in Scratch Paper #2: oops, it's not in their either, so if you really want this, you have to come down to Austin and get it for yourself. MONK MINK PINK PUNK #2: This is my zeen, and it is not out yet despite rumors to the contrary. When it does come out (don't hold your breath), expect interviews with prolific punkers God Is My Co-Pilot, and story-teller Juliana Leuking. Also expect a unique and exciting format, which is under secret development in what is only known as "Josh's Bedroom" (it's worth spending a night there) (anyone who gets this reference I'll send you a prize). Email me for details on #1, of which I am quite proud of, and of which I have, well, more than a few copies left. I have been getting a lot of promo stuff in the mail from MMPP's not unfavorable Factsheet 5 review, including anti-rock Christian literature (wow, those arguments were really convincing; I'm burning my record collection tomorrow!), lollipops from Atlantic records to entice me to go see a Melvins show, and a few actually good records! ASIAN GIRLS ARE RAD #'s 1-10: A very amusing fetish zeen on the beauty and wonder of Asian chicks. Sounds disgusting and perverted? Well, it's actually quite cute and endearing. I always enjoy this...as an anthropological study into intercultural relations, not because I'm...you know...you're not buying this, are you? Anyways, Dave writes a lot about his life, cool moms, astronomy, taking classes, dishwashing, washing dishes with Asian girls and... Like an old friend, but only $1 a back issue. #7 has a Shonen Knife review, and a picture of them reading AGAR...wow! (When God Is My Co-Pilot read my zeen, they verbally harassed me for not liking Elliott Sharp, really!) AGAR c/o David O'Dell, 707 W. 21st St, Austin, TX 78705 LAZY WAYS #1 (?): Marc just sent me his zeen as a trade for mine, so right off the bat you know he is cool, although he does not live in Austin. Lots of gloriously positive admiration for many indie-pop bands that don't seem to get mentioned very often, something which I really admire. One more article on Sebadoh and I will barf! Stuff here on Allen Clapp, Bomb Pops, Musical Chairs and many more bands I have never even heard of (and I read every issue of the Indie-(Music Mailing)-List). Hurrah! Marc really likes this stuff and his enthusiasm only infects me with the same, despite the fact that I've probably listened to too much of this kind of music already. $2 to Lazy Ways, PO Box 17861, Plantation, FL 33318. BLIND STUMBLING AFTERLIFE by Elisabeth Belile: This is not a zine and is not from Texas, but is so marvelously wonderful that I must rant and rave about it. Belile writes/produces some of the best and most rewarding poetry that I've read in years, if not ever. Her stuff is very dada/surreal, and seems to be the product of some cut-up process that is not explained. Not stream-of-consciousness, but cut-up. I would quote the entire thing if I could, but my fave (since getting this just today): "These are the politics of my dream: 1. Crush Beauty 2. Spit It Out! 3. Plagiarize -- go naked for a sign! 4. Appropriate when appropriate 5. Follow and run on angel's clocks 6. Command them to call you, *now*." The book is one long four-part poem, with a (not meaning to make it sound trite) a strong feminist bent to it, esp the last two parts. I really have not pondered on it's meaning yet, just enjoyed the beautifully powerful juxtapositions of words and phrases. This is must-read stuff. $4 -> Broad Press, 2816 Avenel St, LA, CA 90039. While on the subject, BSAL, good as it is, no where near approaches the power, the emotional malaise, the surrealness of the other book I've read from Belile, called "AFTER WITH HOPE", which is a chap book, and quite an amazing one at that. I do not have the words to describe how great this , so just trust me or email me for more info. $4 -> We Press, PO Box 1503, Santa Cruz, CA 95061 Thanks to anyone who has read any or all of this. I wrote this not only because I really like most of these publications, and want to see them thrive and prosper, but also because I am generally too shy to write to these people myself to praise their efforts. I figure if I can turn anyone on to any of these, and they send letters of praise, well, that's just about the same, right? Peace, Josh Ronsen rons@midway.uchicago.edu ps: I am in Austin despite the email address... %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% PRESS RELEASE: Object Technology in Cyberspace By Chris Hand (cph@dmu.ac.uk) FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Chris Hand, De Montfort University. Fax +44 116 254-1891. e-mail: cph@dmu.ac.uk ** A Hypertext version of this Press Release is on the World-Wide Web ** ** at http://www.cms.dmu.ac.uk/Research/OTG/Online/pr1.html ** ________________________________________________________________________ OBJECT TECHNOLOGY MOVES INTO CYBERSPACE Leicester, England -- 28th November 1994. De Montfort University's TaTTOO'95 conference to be held in January will feature the world's first commercial exhibition held in Cyberspace. A number of companies world-wide have already expressed an interest in sponsoring a stand in the Virtual Exhibition Hall, where anyone on the Internet will be able to browse on-line product information and chat in real time with company representatives. "This will be just like a `real-life' trade exhibition, but without the hassles of travelling long distances or struggling through the crowds", says Chris Hand, organizer of the Virtual Conference. "Exhibitors will benefit since they won't have to worry about travelling costs or time away from HQ. In fact, it will be possible for one exhibitor to work on several stands simultaneously. The potential for events of this kind is enormous." Advertising space will be available both in the Virtual Exhibition hall and on an integrated World-Wide Web server. Other on-line events planned to run alongside the real-life conference include a Virtual Press Conference and Discussion to be chaired by Eric Leach of the Object Management Group, and tutorials on working within object-oriented virtual environments. Internet users will be free to mingle on-line with the TaTTOO'95 delegates and speakers. Alan O'Callaghan, conference organizer, adds: "With the recent investments in Object Technology by giants such as IBM, it's now more important than ever that we bring the message to as many people as possible. The Virtual Conference will allow us to do this. OT is moving so quickly now that if you're not on-line to it you could easily miss the wave." More details on the on-line events are available from Chris Hand (e-mail: cph@dmu.ac.uk) and Mark Skipper (mcs@dmu.ac.uk), fax. +44 116 254-1891. WWW: http://www.cms.dmu.ac.uk/Research/OTG/tattoo-online.html Background TaTTOO (Teaching and Training in The Technology of Objects) is an international conference which in 1995 will be held in the Queens Building, De Montfort University, Leicester on 4-6 January. TaTTOO'95 follows the highly successful inaugural event in 1994 which was attended by 185 delegates from academia and industry in the UK, USA, Sweden, France, Holland and Germany. More information: e-mail: tattoo@dmu.ac.uk WWW: http://www.cms.dmu.ac.uk/Research/OTG/tattoo.html De Montfort University is recognized by the World Bank as the fastest growing university in Western Europe. A distributed university with sites in Leicester, Milton Keynes, Bedford and Lincoln, DMU is pioneering the use of Video-Conferencing and Internet services by staff and students. The School of Computing Sciences, well-known for its expertise in Object Technology, has been operating a World-Wide Web server since 1993.