AltaVista ragesClick for Ananova newsBy ADAM
GAFFIN Imagine a search engine with a really plain, no-nonsense interface that lets you get right down to the business of searching. You're thinking of Google or All the Web, right? Now imagine AltaVista. Stop laughing. Yes, the pioneer of plain-but-powerful searching lost its way over the past couple of years as it transmogrified into a butt-ugly freak show of portal "services" wrapped in confusing tables and poorly matched colors. Largely in response to the rise of such sites as Google and All the Web, though, it's now come out with Raging Search, which looks almost exactly like the fabled AltaVista of yore, only with a jarring 3D-effect logo, rather than a soothing mountain vista. Of course, in typical AltaVista fashion, the company buried the link to Raging Search all the way at the bottom of the home page. Funny thing is, AltaVista has long had a plain text-only version that's just the thing for us search fiends. Fortunately, AltaVista left that interface up, even if there's no longer any way to get to it from the main page (the company does still have a link to its advanced text search form, though).
My own "I Love You" tallyHere's the latest count from my inbox:
So at least in my case, the cure was worse than the disease. My favorite line in one of the warnings, a follow-up to an earlier warning, was "Unfortunately, my warning did not reach everyone in time, and several (desperate) people opened the e-mail hoping that somebody really loved them." How about you? Let us know! Readers respond:
5/04/00Old satellites tend to spiral to death in the upper atmosphere.But not if Save Our Satellites has anything to do with it. The group is trying to raise money to buy and re-activate the failed Iridium system. Otherwise, we could see "a rain of molten metal," possibly ending life as we know it, the group warns. So what would they do with dozens of low-earth-orbit satellites? "We plan to open the Iridium network up to people everywhere for the purpose of extending the Internet and its cabilities. We invite scientists, technologists, entrepreneurs, and people like you to join us in creating the world's first global satellite based open source public network." Oh, yeah, and don't forget to sign up for their IridiumCard credit card...
I love you, manI opened my inbox this morning to find three "I love you" messages and three messages warning me not to open any "I love you" messages because they contain a Melissa-like virus that replicates by reading your address book. It'll be interesting to see if the number of warnings about the virus begins to exceed the number of infected messages. If nothing else, it makes one long for a MAPI-uncompliant e-mail client (such as Pegasus or even Pine).Life imitating artWas it only yesterday I was complaining about Star Trek fans getting a bit too obsessive? Turns out the Army wants to build a real-life Holodeck, just like the one on the Enterprise and Voyager.
Boss not right there?Good. Now call up Oh, Shut Up! - and make sure your sound is turned up (but not too high; you don't want to attract too much attention).You see a boss type babbling away and "You know those days when your boss' voice turns into a monotonous drone that just takes you far too close to the brink of insanity?" Click and you get to see what a droning boss would look and sound like with his head in a water-fountain bottle, his lips stapled or taped or a tie stuffed in his mouth. Or you detest him so much you've just gotten a better job somewhere else and you really want to rub it in? Click over to Drop Dead Florist and order up The Terminator Drop Dead Bouquet: "12 long-stemmed dead roses arranged with dying baby's breath and wilted greens in a ceramic skull vase. Finished with black silk bow and red crystallized glowing eyes. The arrangement stands 2 1/2 feet high." All this for only $32.95.
5/03/00Now here's a money-saving idea: Stop buying Cisco routers and install Linux router software on all those old 486s cluttering up your supply closets.That, at least, is the idea behind the Linux Router Project, which is distributing a small network-centered version of Linux (it fits on a single floppy). Organizers want to create armadas of cheap, open-source devices "that will beat the pants off a Cisco router" as well as provide a framework for networking thin clients, network appliances and embedded systems. Before you take their advice, though, see why ITWorld columnist (and Network World reviewer) Jeffrey Fritz thinks these Linux routers are totally unsuited for enterprise networks. He says the better place for these machines is in sleepy remote offices or home networks. To see an LRP system in action, visit the Sevier River Basin Web site, which is using it to display real-time images from dams and canals in Utah. For an alternative Linux router package with fewer dreams of world domination, check out Coyote Linux. Reaction: Can you say: Get a life?Star Trek fans never die, they just go on increasingly useless tangents.How else to explain the Star Trek Communicator and Bring Back Kirk pages? OK, maybe I'm being a bit harsh with the former. It's basically just an Instant Messenger/voice-mail client tricked out to look like a Star Trek communicator. Fun as far as it goes (which is roughly 30 seconds). The Bring Back Kirk page, though, is almost brilliant in its sheer time-waste value. Seems there are people out there who want Paramount to bring Kirk back for another Star Trek movie so they can kill him off again. You see, the way he died the first time, by being smashed against a cliff, wasn't heroic enough. "Paramount, if you must 'phase out' one of the most cherished heroes in the history of television and motion picture and also the legend that helped make Star Trek the success that it is today, then please find a more appropriate way than dropping him off of a cliff and piling rocks on top of him." How about forcing Capt. Kirk to listen endlessly to William Shatner singing Mr. Tambourine Man or Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds until he goes insane and jumps out of a window? No, guess that wouldn't be very heroic, either. But it would be funny.
Commander ChekovThis just in from a Check Point press release: "Just wanted to remind you about Check Point's roundtable discussion on enterprise security at N+I and reveal the identity of our mystery guest. Walter Koenig, Star Trek's Commander Chekov will be Check Point's special guest at Star Trek: The Experience for the evening."Feh! Koenig's best role wasn't as the naive, sweet young Star Fleet officer with the bad Russian accent and the even worse Davy Jones wig but as the malevolent, scheming Bester in Babylon 5. You can keep up with Koenig's appearances, by the way, on his very own Web site, where you'll learn that "A one character piece that Mr. Koenig wrote and performed entitled 'You're Never Alone When You're A Shizophrenic' was a finalist in the 1996 New York Film Festival awards."
5/02/00Microsoft has discovered a neat little trick for keeping viruses off your computers: Run Unix.In a paper on how the company avoids shipping virus-laden software, Microsoft writes: "Disks are duplicated on a variety of industrial-strength, quality-focused systems. Most of these systems are Unix-based. The Unix-based duplication systems used in manufacturing are impervious to MS-DOS-based, Windows- based, and Macintosh-based viruses." We found out about this nugget, by the way, from Need to Know, a sassy newsletter/Web site focused on high tech that's well worth the need to have a British slang dictionary handy.
MS-MonopolyIt's hours, well, minutes, of fun for the whole family.You can probably figure out the basic idea behind MS-Monopoly without even visiting the site. What makes it kind of neat is that it's built on the PHP scripting language and a MySQL database. Click on any of the properties (all companies Microsoft has acquired or invested in) and see the back of the deed. Click on one of the Chance or Community Chest, um, Public Purse, and you get to see a different card contributed by site visitors. You can also download the source code or read up on "What is a Satire?" Speaking of monopolyThere are some interesting results in our (admittedly unscientific) Microsoft breakup poll - 52% of the 1,038 people who've voted so far say the government's proposal to break up Microsoft goes too far (while 22% say it's just right and 26% say it doesn't go far enough). What do you think?Isn't one Clippy enough?Any Microsoft Office user with half a brain quickly learns to despise Clippy, that insufferable talking paper clip that pops up about every 15 seconds to dispense stupid advice (you know what I'd pay good money for? An app that lets you twist Clippy until his little metal bones snap and he screams in agony).Now, as a joke, somebody's come out with a version of Vi (you know, plain-talkin', we-don't-need-no-steenkin'-GUI Vi) that sports a Clippy clone. The sad thing is, the author reports some people have asked him, in all seriousness, if he could port it to Windows.
Compendium: 5/01/00We do a lot of Web surfing here at Network World Fusion (sometimes even for work). Whenever one of us runs across a "hey, you gotta see this" kind of Web site, we send urgent e-mail to the rest of the Network World staff to let them know. But why stop there? Welcome to Compendium, our new daily column of Stuff You Need to Know. Every day, we'll introduce you to can't-miss Web sites - either because they're way cool or because, well, who doesn't slow down for a car wreck? Let us know what you think. And let us know what good sites you've found!Hiya, I'm on Fiyah!Somewhere, Max Headroom is laughing his virtual head off.
 And Motorola is vowing to cyber-inundate us
with an anorexic silver-haired Time/Life operator wrapped in tinfoil
named Mya.
Mya is going to read the Internet to us because we obviously
have lost the ability to dial up airlines ourselves to see if our
flights are leaving on time. We also seem to be too busy talking on
our cell phones while speeding down the interstate to call up our
e-mail by ourselves. Unfortunately, Mya belies her sultry good looks
by talking in inanities ("Hiya! I'm Mya!").
So is humanity doomed? Are we destined to be replaced by avatars with metallic hair and eyes that look like they've had contact lenses in too long? Will Ananova have Mya read her her e-mail? Does Woody Allen, who put a robot dog in "Sleeper" way back in 1973, get royalties from Sony for its AIBO simulated puppy?
A sticky noteForget CDs and DVDs. A German research lab has figured out how to store 10G bytes of data on a roll of adhesive tape by shining a laser onto it."The writing of information onto the various layers of tape does not require the roll to be unwound," the researchers report. In fact, that could make your average roll of Scotch Tape superior to a CD or DVD: "Since it is the laser beam and not the removable storage medium that rotates, one avoids the potential balance problems that can occur, for example, in high-speed CD drives." Commercial use could come within five years.
Oh, greatRTMark, best known for helping to coordinate denial-of-service attacks against online retailer e-Toys last December, now has a new campaign: trying to convince people to phone in sick today. And how are they spreading the word? Through spam. So spam's evil when corporations send it, but OK from self-appointed do-gooders?And what cool stuff have you run across? Contact Fusion Executive Editor Adam Gaffin.
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