Today's Crappy Aphorism is:

A New Year's Resolution is something that goes in one year and out the other.

The latest in free software- an employee manual!!!!!!!

We mentioned about a certain FSF members opinion of where the ownership of this digital publishing lark is going, but what do the open source people want to do instead?!?!? Well, here's a novel (!!!!!!!!!) idea!!!!!! A book- as open source!!!!!!!!!!!!

This one's probably going to be useful to computer workers- it's an Employee Handbook!!!!!!! The idea is that companies can work together using the "open source" model to develop a common personnel policy, just like they work together to make the latest versh of GNU YACC Lisp Emacs, or something!!!!!!! Even more interestingly, the peeps here want to some to create an employee handbook generator proggy!!!!!!

The length of coffee breaks agreed upon using open source?!?!?!?!?! Bet you didn't expect that one!!!!!!!

"Animated compositions of glowing blobs"!!!!!!

When I were a lad (!!!!!!), I was into all this demo scene stuffs!!!!! Now it seems "intelligent" and "arty" people are getting into them- except they're calling them "multimedia installations" or similar bollox!!!!! And just like the old 16-bit demo days, there's a couple of "demo construction kit" programs floatings, only they are of course not demo construction kits, because that's a bit too "populist" and "mainstream", and other snobby euphemisms!!!!!!!! No, this proggy here is a "Audiovisual Environment Suite"!!!!! And you can tell the person behind it is "serious" because he's from MIT, and not some 12 year-old from Sweden!!!!!! Tho to be honest, it's hard to tell the difference between the MIT stuff and the usual PC demos these days!!!! Apart from the fact that the MIT versh can't be bothered to do a module soundtrack for their demos, and instead have "sonified" them with some bloody awful algorithmic droning from various hugely expensive synthesisers!!!!!!!

Amazon- not a very smart "cookie"!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well, if you were a big dotcommie in debt, and you used cookies to track your registered users when they bought stuffs, then you might be tempted to do something a little "off", wouldn't you?!!??!?! Only prob is- if you've got a lot of registered users, some of them are going to notice something screwy sooner or later!!!!!!!!

Which appears to be exactly what's happening to Amazon!!!! Some users have bought stuff form them, and come back the same day to find that the price of the thing they've bought has just gone up!!!!!!! Yep, you guessed it, when the Amazon webserver receives the cookie of a regular user, it ups the price a little bit!!!!!!!!! Which is a nice little earner, I suppose- until the regular customers find out!!!! Which they have!!!!! Woops!!!!!!!!!

Still, if you have a dial-up account, and switch off the cookies, you can still get cheaper prices!!!! Just put the stuff into the shopping cart, and then switch cookies back on, and log in!!!! Then they can't increase the prices, or it'll be really obvious!!!!!!!

Better have a "Word" with MS over security!!!! (Doh!!!!!)

Now this is amusing!!!!! Since about 1997, you've been able to embed hyperlinks and image URLs into MS Word documents!!! Only thing is, when you're viewing this doc and it requests an image off that NetWeb, the web server can find out server info about you!!! And they've only just found this out!!!!!!

Even better than that, according to the report which took almost 3 years to find this, Word also can send and receive cookies, which would make it even easier for tracking peeps!!!!!!

I wonder how long it will be before that bloody annoying animated paperclip in Word will start flying down whilst you're reading a doc and emote: "It looks as though you are being tracked!!!! How may I be of assistance?!?!?!?". Then you tell him/her/it!!!!!! And he/she/it says: "I'm sorry, I do not have the phrase 'F$&^ OFF!!!' in my dictionary!!!!!!!!"

Weblogs Suck- Says Weblog Writer!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You know something's become popular when the people who were first involved start complaining that it isn't as good as it used to be!!!!!!!! Here's an (unintentionally) amusing thingy called "Why Web Journals Suck"- by a weblog writer!!!!!!! And as you'd expect, it's really a bit of angst about the great unwashed crashing the weblog party!!!!!

Well, all I can say is I did weblogs before they were hip, and even then I "failed" all the "criteria" set by this "essay"- which is just as well, as that's what made Senior Citizen a really great mag, if I may humbly say so!!!!!!!!! At least it wasn't some whiny self-indulgent "aspirational" waste of space like most weblog/diaries I've seen!!!!!!!!!!!! Pah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

W2K viruses- it's a stream!!!!! (Doh!!!!)

When you're in the country, and you see a little stream (or a "burn" as we call it up here!!!! Tho why the word "burn" should be associated with a moving mass of water is anyone's guess!!!!! Unless of course, someone poured some battery acid into it.) Ahem anyway!!! When you're looking at the stream, what you might not know is that it's indicative of a new generation of computer virii!!!!! The latest virus attacking Windows 2000 is a new type of virus which uses "streaming" technology!!!!!!

An astronomical load of rubbish- literally!!!!!!!!!

When that bloke out of Garbage was producing Nirvana, I bet he never thought he'd be in a band which would have a vague connection to a piece of flaming metal screaming through the upper atmosphere!!!! But here is some Garbage with a difference- space garbage from dead satellites and stuff, which has fallen to Earth!!!!

Don't read that- you haven't paid for it!!!!!

Well, at least we're not in the position describe in this piece of "speculative fiction"!!!! Richard Stallman, the open source dude, writes this "future vision", where you have to register everything you read, and when you read it!!!!

Big Brother is watching you- and you're watching back!!!!

Nope!!!!! We're not talking about "Nasty Nick" or "Crappy Craig" here!!!! In this interesting article, it's being suggested that all those big corporations that use the NetWeb to find out what we buy, when we go to the loo, etc will in turn be watched by website led consumer groups led by us!!!!! The only thing is- if we're spying on them and they're spying on us, that means when you spy on someone, then all you're going to see them doing is spying!!!! Which is a bit boring, really!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now you can get a virus- In your Palms!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yep, there's now a trojan for the handheld Palmpilots!!!! So wot, you might say!!!! But this one is interesting, because it mimics part of a program- and it appears that it was ripped off some code done by one of the coders behind the very same program!!!!!!!! He didn't spread, except to a couple of friends, one of whom then spread it through IRC!!!!!!!!! Woops!!!!!!!!!!!

Lee Harvey Oswald- Rock Star!!!!!!

Well, he might have assassinated the leader of the free world, or might have not!!!! Whatever happened, he got shot by some mafia dude called Jack Ruby anyway!!!!!! But what would it be like if instead of being an assassin/"patsy" he was a rock singer, and Jack Ruby was a member of the Rock Mafia instead?!?!??! Now you can find out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I think it would be really funny if they sung "Assassin" by Marillion!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Everyone would die laughing!!!!!

A big oddball- literally!!!!!!!

You might have seen some famous person on telly and thought: "What an oddball!!!" Well, here's the astronomical equivalent!!!!!! And it's got"beads"!!!!! It's a star called "He2-90", which makes it sound like a cross between He-Man and Joe 90!!!! Which is not too far from the truth as astronomers think it might actually be two stars, one of whom is a bloated red giant and the other a tiny white dwarf!!!!!!!!!!!

Compute- with honour!!!!!

Guess this gives a new meaning to the phrase "code warrior"!!!!! There's now an equivalent of Basic called "Var'aq"!!!! Yes, it's a programming language in Klingon, the language those funny people with lobster-like heads in Star Trek speak, which makes them sound like Spit The Dog!!!!!!!!!!!! There's even a development mailing list for it!!!! I expect Worf will be on it, arguing whether it's "honourable" to optimise the compiler code!!!!!!

IBM talks business- on tha NetWeb!!!!

Given that they've been around since "nineteen-canteen" you would have thought IBM would have has no problem talking business!!!!! But apparently they're just starrting to work out how to talk business- on tha NetWeb, that is!!!! They're teaming up with some company to do UDDI, which is apparently some HTTP-like way to allow businesses on tha info-highway-pipe to provide info about themselves- a bit like all those companies who do a crap 2 page website giving out their address, phone and the usual "the sun shines out our bottom" type bumf!!! Except that UDDI is presumably a bit better.

Transmeta is not fab!!!!

Apparently Transmeta now plans to become a "fabless" chip supplier!!!! I dunno what that means, but it sounds interesting!!!!!!

Chupacabra is a dog- literally!!!!!

Some farmer in Nicaragua found some bones, and of course, he thought they were of the infamous Chupacabra blood-sucking animal thingy!!!! After all, "It's teeth were rose-colored. It reared up on its hind legs and sucked the blood from at least 120 sheep.'', which shows you can tell a lot from a skeleton, can't you?!??!?!?!

Unfortunately, some university folks don't think so!!!! "It's a dog, without any room for doubt. It's an ordinary female dog. All our investigations didn't show any anomaly. It's a dog.''

Geek Power!!!!

But geeks can start the "fightback", as those delightfully quaint "socialist workers" might put it, with this "Agitprop" site!!!! There's been Black Panthers, Green Panthers, Grey Panthers, Pink Panthers, etc,. now there's Slightly Pale Panthers!!!! This one's called Geek Force, which aims for a "Global Effort to Eradicate Know-nothings"!!!!!

Coffee- Without the good bit!!!!

Honestly!!! First it was GM food, then GM whisky, then GM plantpots!!! Now... GM coffee!!! Some scientests have found out how to get rid of the caffeine gene in coffee!!!! And I bet they think this is really clever of them!!!! What next- GM Ale that doesn't get you drunk?!?!?!

Bush- wot a loser!!!!

This US Presidential race is getting interesting!!!! Both the two candidates are going on about how wholesome and moral they are- and they're called Bush and Gore!!!!!! There's probably some US public access channel show somewhere where two fat blokes review "adult" videos and give them "Bush" and "Gore" ratings!!!!! "Nymphoid Mutants: it's got lots of Bush *and* lots of Gore!!!" Mind you, at least the two names will help US voters remember about Monica Lewinsky and US foreign policy!!!!!

Ahem, anyway!!!! Now here's a site about one of presidential hopefuls, called "Son of Bush", with the sub heading "Loser like his Father?" Hmm... I wonder who this person is going to vote in the elections

Do a log- on tha NetWeb!!!!!

As I said above, apparently the sort of stuff I was doing in Senior Citizen is now known as a "Weblog"!!! Which is a really good name, because even if your weblog is crap, then the name "weblog" is still very appropriate!!!! There's now a few dedicated weblog generator sites, the king of which hosts this very site wot you are reading!!!!! It's called "Blogger"!!!! Which sounds even more lavatorial if you ask me!!!!!!!!

If someone were to shut Blogger down, wouldn't that make them a "Blog-Stopper"?!?!?! (Right, Paul?!?!?!)

The very first editorial of the very first issue of the very second version of SENIOR CITIZEN!!!!!!

Well, I've finally worked out how to set this flippin' thing up!!!! Now I can publish all my webby stuffs on this wonderful new site!!!

Explanation thingy: I used to do a fabby webby magaziney called Senior Citizen!!!!! Then I stopped doing it because I didn't have too much time to add stuff, and it was a bother to constantly update the HTML and stuffs!!!!

But in the time since I "rested" Senior Citizen, suddenly the sort of thing my weekly maggy did has suddenly become "hip"!!!! It's now called a weblog!!!!!! Well I never!!!!! And there's been a couple of websites which cater to this sort of thing- which is jolly lucky, as it means less work for me!!!!!!!!!! And given that I've still been posting my wacky linx to all my friends, and they've been saying "Why don't you just resurrect Senior Citizen, you silly old man!!!!", I thought "Why not!!!!!!!"... And you can bet my friends will regret the day they ever opened their mouths!!!!!!!!!!! But that's another story!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anyway, enough craptalk- here's some more craptalk!!!!!!!!!!!!!!