September 2002 Archive Page

"In a four-paragraph release sent to area news organizations Tuesday, the sheriff department reported the investigation of several complaints of possible telemarketing fraud in the area, especially targeted at the elderly.... Detective Dan Nichols, who wrote the release, said Tuesday he did collect some of the information from The Onion, not knowing it was a humor publication." --Michigan Sherrif's Office Duped by Onion SatireBattle Creek Enquirer)

"in the beginning, there was nothing. well, actually, there was pinball, some shooting gallery games, a few nickel peep-show machines and those mechanical genies that would guess your weight and give a glimpse of your future." william hunter --the history of computer games: from 'pong' to 'pac-man'designboom)

Hey designboom webmaster... your "Shift" key is broken!

"The purpose of NASA's Visible Earth is to provide a consistently updated, central point of access to the superset of NASA's Earth science-related images, animations, and data visualizations. These images are considered to be public domain and, as such, are freely available to the interested public-at-large, the media, scientists, and educators for re-use and/or re-publication." --Visible EarthNASA)

"Ebonics may be an inferior dialect of English (contributors vilify that notion), but communicating that to students won't encourage them to practice [Standard English]. The cultural roots run too deep, and for every student who masters SE there are are a dozen who tune out, react in anger, and disappear." Review of The Skin That We Speak: Thoughts on Language and Culture in the Classroom. --The Languages of the ClassroomPartisan Review)

"We despised the Dockers-wearing advertising-executive manqués who somehow scammed enough money to start up Web sites that gave license to appalling ideas, chief among them convergence....It seems that online content has fossilized. Online ventures doing exactly the wrong thing or the right thing the wrong way are no longer the norm..." --Has Online Content Jumped the Shark?NUblog)

Commercial content has failed; weblogs have claimed the web. But now what?

"Playing IF is the first thing I remember doing on a computer actually, on my Commodore 64 (with cassette drive!). I suspect that I called it something other than 'interactive fiction' at the time, but I'm not sure what that was." Steve Himmer --I was trying to familiarize myself with the current state of Interactive FictionOnePotMealzilla)

"The last natural blondes will die out within 200 years, scientists believe. A study by experts in Germany suggests people with blonde hair are an endangered species and will become extinct by 2202." --Blondes 'to die out in 200 years'BBC)

Two comments. First, this reminds me of the game theory scene in A Beautiful Mind, where four male mathematicians scheming for the attention of a blonde all agree to ignore her in favor of her four brunette friends, reducing the chances that any man will be rejected. Second, this article is needlessly alarmist; blonde genes are recessive. People with blonde genes aren't having as many blonde children, because they're now more likely to have children with people outside the Scananavian communities where blonde genes are so prevalent. The story gets your attention becuase it seems to be claiming that all blonde people will fall to the ground and die by the year 2202.

"He appeared to be able to manipulate atoms with amazing grace. He seemed to be able to force electricity to do seemingly impossible tricks, and claimed he'd found ways to make working molecule-sized electronic components." Jan Hendrik Schön was also, apparently, a plagiarist. --The Undoing of a Star ScientistAP/Wired)

Google scans thousands of online news sites and automatically assembles what it thinks are the most newsworthy items. --Google NewsGoogle)

"A neighbour - an eminent retired politician, philanthropist and keen ornithologist - has just acquired an owl whistle, beautifully crafted from wood. When blown, it makes a most realistic toowooo.... The next day, another neighbour - a retired military man and also an ornithologist - showed me his latest toy, coincidentally also an owl whistle.... It is quite clear that these two gentlemen have been hooting to each other, with no actual owl involved." Name withheld, Somerset --Your Problems Solved (U.K. Advice Column)Spectator)

Oh, those lovable, eccentric Brits.

"For the first time ever, information and pictures of all ACME products, specialty divisions, and services (from 1935 to 1964) are gathered here, in one convenient catalog. For more information about any ACME product, simply click on the thumbnail picture." G.P. Markham --The Illustrated Catalog of ACME ProductsLooney Lyrics)

"British composer Mike Batt found himself the subject of a plagiarism action for including the song, 'A One Minute Silence,' on an album for his classical rock band The Planets. He was accused of copying it from a work by the late American composer John Cage, whose 1952 composition '4'33"' was totally silent." --Composer Pays for Piece of SilenceCNN)

Pacemakers: "Batteries must be replaced, at further risk and expense, every 5-10 years, and patients must avoid strong magnetic fields, such as metal detectors and some medical scanners. The new approach instead adds a gene that changes the flow of chemicals in and out of heart cells." --Gene Therapy Could Replace PacemakersNature)

"Are any biotech companies or researchers putting animal DNA into human embryos? Nobody knows. But, unbelievable as it may sound, some bioethicists and philosophers explicitly endorse engineering animal DNA into human embryos as one method of producing the 'post-human' race." Wesley J. Smith --The Transhumanists: The Next Great Threat to Human DignityNational Review)

"The chromosome unique to men is a microscopic metaphor for those who bear it. For it is the most decayed, redundant and parasitic of the lot... From sperm count to social status, and from fertilisation to death, as civilisation advances those who bear Y chromosomes are in relative decline." Steve Jones --End of Sperm ReportGuardian)

"This paper proceeds first by reviewing literature on bullshitting. I then provide the definition of bullshitting that guides the subsequent analysis, and include a description of its key features. A brief discussion of the ubiquity of bullshitting also is provided. Drawing on related research, illustrations from everyday life, and social theory, I next explore the functions of bullshitting and the interpersonal and social contexts in which it occurs and that structure its occurrence." Daniel P. Mears --The Ubiquity, Functions, And Contexts Of BullshittingJournal of Mundane Behavior)

"Japanese never touch. It's not even customary among themselves when they meet to shake hands. So how to explain why this woman would so casually reach over and adjust my collar? In public! And yet, not exactly.... My moment of contact, I concluded, could have only happened in an elevator, and then perhaps only in Japan." Terry Caesar --In and Out of Elevators in JapanJournal of Mundane Behavior)

"Florida found itself in another voting debacle during last week's primary election: Tens of millions of dollars spent to abolish hanging chads and they still can't get it right." Lauren Weinstein --A Vote for Touch and Go Away [Florida Ballots]Wired)

No charges will be filed against Buzz Aldrin for allegedly punching a man who called him a liar for claiming that he'd been on the moon. --Update: Moon Hoax Conspiracy Theorist Punched by Buzz AldrinSpace.com)

"Mel Gibson is set to direct a movie about Christ's last 12 hours played out entirely in two ancient tongues - Latin and Aramaic - with no subtitles. The formula hardly sounds like the recipe for a hit movie but Gibson thinks language should be no barrier for the film, titled Passion." --Mel Gibson to Direct Film in Latin and ArabicABC Australia)

"[S]tudents with low GPAs who were quizzed weekly outperformed their counterparts by 18 percent... 'Students hated me. They raged in front of the whole class. They hated being quizzed, and yet, it worked,' Tuckman said." --Students Get Better Grades When Tested Frequently In ClassOhio State)

"The results show that procrastinators don't work better under pressure, but it may be the only way they work... They don't have any idea how well they might do if they didn't procrastinate."Bruce Tuckman --Procrastinators Get Poorer Grades in Class, Study FindsOhio State)

"If you ask people why they procrastinate, you possibly may hear the real reasons. More than likely, though, you will hear their excuses. When an excuse sounds believable, it has a name - rationalization." --Reasons and Excuses for ProcrastinationOhio State)

A former freshman comp student: "I figure you're about neck deep with groans and complaints from your 'newbies' right now, so I thought this might be a good time to say 'Thank you. I was very fortunate to be in your class. No other class ever has, nor I suspect ever will, prepare me as thoroughly.'" A Former Student Says "Hi"Via E-Mail)

It's e-mails like this that really make teaching worthwile.

"Described by those who've tried it as 'souffle-like,' the deep-fried Twinkie has become so popular that it has been mentioned by Jay Leno and will be featured on the Food Network." --Deep Fried TwinkieCox)

Can you tell that I'm hungry right now?

My sister sent me links to (what else?) chocolate hexagons.Chocolate is great. So are hexagons.

Whiteboards vs. Blackboard: "So, on the one hand, we've got a classroom board that can be written on only with special pens. You can never tell when the pens will run out before they actually do so, and there's no good way to extend the life of a pen once it finally expires. On the other hand, we've got little sticks of calcium carbonate. Sticks that are so cheap that even starving teachers can afford to spring for a box..." Jared Kendall --Chalk's Demise Greatly ExaggeratedThe Advocate)

Who remembers the smell of ditto machine ink? I mentioned it just now while waiting around the office printer, and five or six faculty/staff members all went "Mmmm!" but the student worker shook his head blankly.

"It is true, of course, that the 'Far Side's' famous cows are not always so secretive; sometimes they even make fun of us, as if getting revenge for all those times that passing car passengers--usually children, like the calf in this cowmobile--'mooed' derisively at them when they were behind the fence. But for the most part the secret life of animals remains secret, and seemingly anthropomorphic." --Aesop After Darwin: The Radical Anthropomorphism of "The Far Side"Elias Canetti)

"I have, at times, been too quick to bark, and I have whimpered needlessly. I have gnawed upon things I never should have gnawed. Yes, I have even bitten others in anger. Not often, and only when I felt I had to, but now I see that turning to the tooth never solves anything. I have been a bad boy." Tuffy --I'm Not Proud of Some of the Things I've DoneThe Onion)

An interesting rebutttal the Far Side cartoon in which a dog, being scolded, hears only "blah blah blah Ginger blah blah blah".

David Brin knows how George Lucas can save the muddle that the Star Wars franchise has become. His suggestion is brilliant, and at the same time obvious. "Why else would Obi-Wan 'hide' Vader's son in Vader's home town? Their final 'deathfight' distracts the guards to let Luke/Han/Leia get away. How else do you explain that Vader grabs/interrogates Leia, yet never detects her force? Watch carefully... Vader's 'chase' of Luke in the first film clears all the other Imperial fighters off his son's back and halts the antiaircraft guns, giving the kid a clear shot! And guess who's the only Imperial survivor?" --David Brin's Attack of the Clones CritiqueDavidBrin.com)

"In Heathers, Heather Chandler has the best lines, including a great insult: 'What, did you have a brain tumor for breakfast?' She's killed by Christian Slater in the movie. Kim Walker, the actress who played her, died of a brain tumor in 2001. Creepy." Lindsey CorcoranHeathers Triviareenhead)

"[T]he web has been unable to deliver on its socially progressive potential because it has been 'born' into capitalism, a socioeconomic system that creates and depends upon the same 'hierarchical classification systems' Berners-Lee [inventor of the WWW] would like the Web to eliminate." mowabb --Illusions of Freedom-Kantian Divisions in an Electronic Agethere is no spoon)

"It was the image of a rebellious, youth-corrupting Bart Simpson that caused many conservatives-George Bush I, among them-to decry the show as evidence of America's moral decline when it debuted in 1989. But recently The Simpsons has gotten a lot of positive ink for its thoughtful portrayal of faith and family values, including cover stories in Christianity Today and The Christian Century. What changed?" --Don't Have a Sacred Cow, Man!Sojourners)

The Sojourners website ("a Christian ministry whose mission is to proclaim and practice the biblical call to integrate spiritual renewal and social justice") returned 724 hits for "justice" and 510 hits for "Jesus," giving it a "justice to Jesus ratio" of 1.4:1, which, according to Tony Woodlief's quirky formula, suggests the organization is more interested in social action than in Christianity.

"A Scottish chemistry lecturer believes she has discovered the scientific reason why cold, left-over pizza, tastes so good the morning after." --Cold Pizza Passes the Taste TestBBC)

"A surprising number of college students say they regularly use the Internet for academic purposes, but they see cyberspace as a supplement to -- not a replacement for -- traditional classrooms, a team of researchers reported Sunday.... The researchers warned against ignoring the possible educational benefits of some recreational online activities, such as instant messaging and downloading music." --Students Embrace the Internet, but Not as Replacement to Classrooms, Study FindsChronicle)

This news article is a summary of a Pew Interent Trust report, "The Internet Goes to College".

"A mysterious new obstacle has emerged for Chinese internet surfers attempting to use the Google search engine - entering politically sensitive search phrases crashes their internet connection." --Google keywords knock Chinese surfers offlineNew Scientist)

"Belief in freedom of speech does not require us to sit by passively as our systems, networks, work and lives are suffocated under an unending torrent of useless and often fraudulent e-mail. This is not to suggest we throw spammers in jail. As appealing as the thought might be..." --A Call to Jail the SpammersWired)

On the hyped-up TV news reports of terrorists in Florida: "Television reporters were certainly connecting dots -- lots of dots, some of them seemingly from another planet -- but if journalism is about facts and not hype, then they definitely weren't doing what they were supposed to do." --TV Dots Airwaves with InaccuraciesMiami Herald)

A blogger with too much time on his hands uses a search engine to compare the rank-and-file content of an organization's website to its official rhetoric. "[W]hen one types the word "abortion" into NOW's search engine, 853 articles that mention the subject appear. But surely childbirth is something an organization that claims to be 'for women' should provide information about, right? Someone should tell the gals at NOW -- their search engine provides exactly 30 articles that mention this term, and most of these describe its dangers and complications.... the term 'married women' was mentioned in 10 articles, while 'lesbian' was mentioned in 584." Tony Woodlief --"Don't you wish some people had search engines installed in their foreheads?"Sand in the Gears)

Of course, "lesbian" can be used as both an adjective and a noun, so that single word is likely to appear more frequently than the phrase "married women". Articles of interest to married women might never use the phrase "married women," instead using terms such as "wife", "spouse," "marriage", or "married couples". There simply aren't as many synonyms for "lesbian", though terms like "homosexual" or "same-sex" might yield additional results. Further, not all heterosexual women are married, so it's misleading to contrast "lesbian" with "married women". Woodlief makes no claim that his search engine experiments are scientific, and he doesn't hide his politically incorrect conservatism. To be fair, he attacks Republicans as well, and he uses his methodology to examine the Baptist fixation on "homosexuality" over other sins. But even more fun is his quirky analysis of the "justice to Jesus ratio" -- the more conservative the church, the fewer hits its website returns for "justice," and the more liberal the church, the fewer hits it returns for "Jesus".

Description of an Irish museum exhibit: "A giant mechanical bug, it looks like a demented cross between a bat, a praying mantis and the superstructure of a blimp... once it senses someone's presence its arms begin to hover menacingly, as if they had eyes, over the viewer. " Daithí Ó hAnluain --Man, Machine: Can't We Get Along?Wired)

Here's what's reputed to be an archive of the first e-mail message that included a smiley. [I wish I'd found it instead of Micro$oft. :( In 1979, someone named Kevin MacKenzie suggested the symbol -) for "tongue in cheek". It's not a "smiley", of course, but it serves the same function. I've archived MacKenzie's post here. --The First SmileyMicrosoft)

"In the old days, it was magnetic stones, magnetized trees, and magnetized air. Today, it's magnetic bracelets, magnetic necklaces, magnetic shoe inserts, and now, magnetic mattresses. What's next? Magnetic jock straps? But I knew that Grandma wouldn't listen to a history lesson or a science lecture, so I thought I'd try another approach. " Nada Mangialetti --Once Upon a Magnetic MattressACSH)

The author, a medical writer with a Ph.D., uses a fairy tale to communicate an important message to her grandmother. A very clever form of technical writing by vivid analogy. See also "Show, Don't (Just) Tell."

"[R]ather than examining why online writing is so undisciplined and attempting to appreciate the virtue of such impertinence, O'Conner and Kellerman are determined to impose on electronic communication all the limitations of the forms to which they're already accustomed." Review by Jonathan Keats --"You Send Me" by Patricia T. O'Conner & Stewart KellermanSalon)

"Human communication across the globe began with the same primitive metaphors, logic associations and rules, all of which emerged from three main concerns: food, sex and territory..." Rosella Lorenzi --Is Rock Art a Sign of a Universal Mother Language?Discovery Channel)

A collaborative online glossary is being developed for the forthcoming book Interactive Fiction Theory. Anyone can edit existing entries or suggest new terms. --Glossary of Interactive FictionIF Theory)

Emily Short is the editor-in-chief for IF Theory, and I'm the editor of the theory section. The book should be out within a year.

"One of Canada's top business schools has decided to stop selling the paper version of its journal and will give the publication away online instead.... 'We're not interested in making money, although by switching to online-only, we'll save about $300,000 a year in print-production costs.'" --Canadian Business School's Journal Opts Out of Print and Onto the InternetChronicle)

It will still be a peer-reviewed academic journal, and it will communiate scholarly achievements more efficiently by being available to more readers.

"Remote bell-tower hacking is just one of the ways the wireless network is changing life at Dartmouth. The network is subtly but profoundly altering teaching techniques, social interaction, study habits, and personal security. In spite of its remoteness, the college has long been one of the most wired places on earth, fashioning its campus into the prototype of the fully wireless, always-connected community..." Josh McHugh --Unplugged UWired)

"The planetarium show sped forward, and ticket holders' seats literally shook as subwoofers installed under each chair created a rumbling lift-off effect. Tom Hanks' voice filled the dome-shaped hall, and an image of the Orion Nebula burst into view overhead.... What are astronomers trying to do when they design planetariums?" Diana Michele Yap --Costs, F/X Multiply at Star ShowsWired)

"The pre-modern in [T.S.] Eliot's poetry is a matter of Fisher Kings and fertility cults; in his prose it is a question of classical order, Tory traditionalism and the Christian church. In both cases, however, a discredited individualism must yield to a more corporate form of being, roughly at the time when laissez-faire capitalism was giving way to its international monopoly version. " Terry Eagleton --Nudge WinkingLondon Review of Books)

"An amateur astronomer may have found another moon of the Earth. Experts say it may have only just arrived.... It could be a passing chunk of rock captured by the Earth's gravity, or it could be a discarded rocket casing coming back to our region of space." --New 'Moon' Found Around EarthBBC)

Did you know the Earth already has a second moon? This will be third.

"In 1855 two Portuguese translators, José da Fonseca and Pedro Carolino, produced an English phrasebook so unbelievably bad that it was reprinted for half a century as a masterpiece of hilarity, under the title English as She is Spoke.... I thought it would be interesting to compare Fonseca and Carolino's translations with Babelfish's...." --English as She is Spoke vs. BabelfishZompist)

"Skyscrapers in general, and the twin towers of the World Trade Center in particular, symbolize, for many writers, either prideful arrogance, or a new technological beauty. This site attempts to survey what has already been written on this topic." --World Trade Center: Literary and Cultural ReflectionsDennis G. Jerz)

In case you haven't already been inundated by anniversary memorials, you can compare before & after images of the attack site. Meanwhile, First Lady Laura Bush says turn off the TVs on September 11. --WTC Satellite Images: Before & AfterSpaceImaging.com)

"On a random day, on a random flight, they found themselves - unwarned, unprepared, unarmed - on the front lines of a vicious new kind of war. And somehow, in the few confusing and terrifying minutes they had, they transformed themselves from people on a plane into soldiers, and they fought back. And that made them heroes..." Dave Barry --On Hallowed GroundMiami Herald)

Barry, best known as a humorist, writes a thoughtful tribute to the passengers of Flight 93.

"We hope you enjoyed watching the construction of the butter cow live. If you missed last year[']s construction, watch the high-speed, time-lapsed Real Player video from start to finish." --LIVE Shot of the Butter CowIllinois State Fair)

"Wisconsin-born professional cheese sculptor Sarah Baumann (now of Cincinnati) admits her cheese-head heritage is to blame and has been fashioning cheese figures for advertising and publicity for the food industry, retail and foodservice clients for five years..." --Cheese ScupltureWOXY)

"But while the day [9-11] will surely be difficult to endure, it remains unclear which television network will rise to the occasion, with its sensitive, cathartic anniversary coverage helping us decide what to feel while bringing a sense of closure to our national period of mourning." --Who Will Bring Closure to a Grieving Nation?Satire from The Onion)

"How did technologists, government officials and a host of other early players turn something with no obvious business model into a system that has become so intrinsic to the new century?" Dan Gilmor --10 Choices that were Critical to the Net's SuccessMercury News)

"The interest in poetry in the wake of the calamitous attacks of last fall surprised some observers. But the art of poetry makes the breath of any one reader its medium: a commanding appeal, heightened at a time when many of us felt overdosed or overwhelmed by mass media." Robert Pinsky --Poetry and Sept. 11: A Guided Anthology(Slate))

Pinsky is the former U.S. Poet Laureate. He also wrote an interactive fiction work called Mindwheel. See also a website created by a former student last fall, Poetry after September 11.

What did September 11 have to do with Nostradamus? Oliver North? Snapple? All feature in assorted urban legends about the attacks. --Osama Bin Ladin is Alive and Well and Living in UtahSalon)

"With the eyes of the world focused on a small number of related events, many stepped into the role of amateur journalist, seeking out sources and sometimes assembling these ideas for others. Most striking, perhaps, were the wide number of accounts from those who had seen the World Trade Center collapse, or had in some way gained first-hand knowledge of surrounding events." --One Year Later: September 11 and the InternetPew)

"From the comfort of their desktop or laptop, co-eds can add soap and fabric softener that is dispensed by the washing machine. Finally when the wash is done, kids can get an e-mail telling them to come and get it." --IBM Hooks up Dorm Washers, Dryers to WebForbes)

"The US State Department and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have granted TransOrbital, Inc. of La Jolla, California, permission to send its TrailBlazer probe to map the surface of the Moon and photograph Earth." --First Commercial Moon Landing Gets Go-aheadNature)

"He was a junkman with an extraordinary dream...to salvage the junk left on the moon by the Apollo moon expeditions in the 1960's and 70's. The subsequent series followed the adventures of Harry and his crew as they attempted various salvage operations." (From a fan page devoted to the short-lived Andy Griffith TV series "Salvage-1".)

"While IKEA's instruction sheets lead to a safely constructed unit, Antifakos thinks that the order in which parts should be assembled often seems arbitrary to the buyer. 'People find this annoying so they don't follow them,' he says. " --Foolproof Flat-pack Warns of Assembly ErrorsNew Scientist)

Do people hate reading instructions so much that furniture makers need to embed computerized sensors in "ready to assemble" kits?

"If all you have is a hammer then everything is a nail. How else can you explain why web sites are so incredibly painful to use? If I were paranoid I'd assume there was a conspiracy to assure that the Internet is kept lame. But perhaps it is a combination of ignorance and laziness." Bob Frankston --Trapped by the Websatn.org)

Well now, isn't that SPECIAL. Now who could be behind this weblog... could it be... SATN? (Thanks, Church Lady.)

"A blog works if it addresses its audience, whether that audience is five or 500 or 5,000. In fact, many blogs, by their precise nature, are never going to get that big. So, why worry about the bigger fish? Enjoy yourselves." Andrew Sullivan --Are Weblogs Changing Our Culture?Slate)

"What the relentless focus of bloggers like you and Kaus on the Times and other big media institutions must surely do is make writers (poor Paul Krugman!) and editors just a wee bit more careful about accuracy, fairness, and all the rest, since they know you overcaffeinated watchdogs are watching..." Kurt Anderson

"Science is often hard to read. Most people assume that its difficulties are born out of necessity, out of the extreme complexity of scientific concepts, data and analysis. We argue here that complexity of thought need not lead to impenetrability of expression; we demonstrate a number of rhetorical principles that can produce clarity in communication without oversimplifying scientific issues. The results are substantive, not merely cosmetic: Improving the quality of writing actually improves the quality of thought. " Gopen & Swan --The Science of Scientific WritingAmerican Scientist)

A 1990 classic, republished by research.att.com

"The diamond invention... is a mechanism for converting tiny crystals of carbon into universally recognized tokens of wealth, power, and romance.... To stabilize the market, De Beers had to endow these stones with a sentiment that would inhibit the public from ever reselling them." The illusion had to be created that diamonds were forever -- 'forever' in the sense that they should never be resold." Edward Jay Epstein --Have You Ever Tried to Sell a Diamond?The Atlantic)

Fascinating deconstruction of a marketing myth that benefits the diamond monopoly.

"...Dan would learn there was a time when anyone could go to the library and read journal articles, and even books, without having to pay. There were independent scholars who read thousands of pages without government library grants. But in the 1990s, both commercial and nonprofit journal publishers had begun charging fees for access. By 2047, libraries offering free public access to scholarly literature were a dim memory. " --The Right to Read (short story)Richard Stallman)

"On these pages are five astronomy misconceptions that are so common they're almost canonical. Is one of these lurking in your brain? " Phil Plait --Top 5 Cosmic MythsSpace.com)

"Thousands of tourists in Greece are unknowingly facing heavy fines or long terms in prison for owning mobile phones or portable video games...Internet cafes will be allowed to continue to operate, providing no games-playing takes place. If a customer is found to be running any sort of game, including online chess, the cafe owner will be fined and the place closed." --In Greece, Use a Game Boy, Go to JailC|Net)

This is an excessive attempt to curb illegal gambling.

Another use for 24/7 text messaging services: bullying children in the British school system. --When Text Messaging Gets UglyWired)

"When a game is done well, the motion picture industry can't compete. Last year, people spent $14 billion worldwide on films, but Americans alone spent $8 billion on games for their homes and another $7 billion in arcade playing." Brad King --They Weren't Meant to be Games (Wired)