Stories

The Blooker Prize: small pieces, partially digested

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The Bible, for example, was originally produced as a scroll
– Cory Doctorow

Some press releases are so simply, staggeringly indescribable, we print them without comment. These are most often related to corporate makeovers or rebranding exercises, which is quite appropriate in this case.

We’ve tried to be faithful to the original’s unique typographical qualities where possible.

And we’d better warn you: there’s a lot of SHOUTING at the start, and odd emphasis throughout – but that’s very much its charm.

So sit tight – and here goes:

ANNOUNCING “THE BLOOKER PRIZE” THE WORLD’S FIRST LITERARY PRIZE FOR “BLOOKS” (BOOKS BASED ON BLOGS OR WEBSITES) LAUNCHES 10TH OCTOBER

 

“BLOOKS” ARE THE FASTEST GROWING NEW KIND OF BOOK – AND THE HOTTEST NEW PUBLISHING AND ONLINE TREND

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Six Things you need to know about Bubble 2.0

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We follow the money

Web 2.0 Techno utopian types love their earthy metaphors. The web is a new planet that’s being “terraformed” before our eyes, one advertising consultant likes to say. Or the “web is a garden“, if you believe Sun Microsystem’s director of research.

Even my overgrown garden doesn’t have something like this lurking in the corner, and I hope there isn’t such a horror in yours.

But enough with the hot-tub psycho babble. The future of computer networks is both a lot more promising and a lot more ominous than anything you’ll hear at the “Web 2.0” conference in San Francisco this week, where some of the web’s horticulturists will be gathering for an evangelical uplift.

There’s every reason to be optimistic, now in 2005, that computer networks can begin to fulfill their potential. They can even start to be really useful – but it’s only by dispensing with such utopian nonsense – so we can really begin to see what these tools can do for us. Here’s a reality-based guide to what’s happening – and if you hear a futurist omit more than one of these in a presentation, send them to the Exit toot-sweet, with a firm smack on the backside.

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‘p2p is leagal its already bought its in the air’

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The following letter was sent from a K12 school account in a southern US state. It illustrates the problems facing both paid legal download services, such as Apple’s iTunes Music Store and Napster, and the RIAA’s attempt to combat the illegal download services.

We’ve protected their identity, for reasons which should become obvious.

when will winmx be on again tell me when it does and keep me informed. even if you dont know anything now tell me when its on again
p2p fs is leagal its already bought its in the air how can it be illegal i looked into it and the courts just want money my cousin works at the pentagon i asked him to look into it and says they just want money he used to work in the white house.

the bible dont say thou shall not download its not stealing its in the air

Here’s how music business lawyer Ken Hertz, who supports the recording industry withdrawing its co-operation for the iTunes Music Service, describes the problem.

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Ireland counts the cost of MIT Media Lab fiasco

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$40m down the bog The Irish government invested $40m of taxpayers’ money in MIT’s Media’s Lab Europe – and has bugger all to show for it. A report by the Republic’s public auditor-general also reveals that Media Lab executives awarded themselves large severance pay-offs when the money was running out, and refused to refund public … Read more

The Hollywood crisis that isn’t

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Everyone panic – that’s an order! Analysis Barely a week has gone by without reports of Hollywood’s great box office slump of 2005. So our thanks go to screenwriter John August for pointing out that on closer examination, the ‘slump’ is as elusive as missing Weapons of Mass Destruction. “Every Monday brought new speculation about just … Read more

Wi-Fi a basic human right, says SF Mayor

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Like gay marriage, but for bloggers Newt Gingrich once proposed giving laptops to the homeless – at the same time as he was axing food and medical services for the poor. Now San Francisco’s Mayor Gavin Newsom has borrowed a page from his playbook. Wi-Fi is a ‘fundamental right’, Newsom said today at a press … Read more

Microsoft: beating itself back to health?

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It’s masochism fortnight at Redmond! Microsoft’s PR campaign of self-flagellation continues – with senior executives offering theWall Street Journal‘s Rob Guth an account of why Windows Vista will arrive so late and so incomplete. Thanks to the co-operation of Amitabh Srivastava, Brian Valentine, product manager Jim Allchin and even Gates himself – the Longhorn death … Read more

The Hive Mind has spoken: ‘I need help!’

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Bloggers blog for therapy – Official Half of American webloggers cite self-help as their primary motivation for maintaining their online diaries, a survey has discovered. 48.7 per cent of the sample say that blogging “serves as therapy”, and it’s the most popular reason for publishing an online journal. The second most popular reason, to stay … Read more

Police stake out bar, hoping to catch man drunk

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Canadian cops staked out a bar in the hope of finding a journalist drunk, a court heard today.

The journalist in question, Edmonton newspaper columnist Kerry Diotte, wasn’t suspected of involvement in any crime. But Diotte had written a column criticizing the police force’s radar and camera technology as being more of a cash cow for the force than an effective measure against road fatalities – and the story enraged the local constabulary.

Diotte has been a consistent critic of the police’s technology dependency habit.

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GoogleNet flickers into life

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Five months after announcing its first Google-branded hot spots, covering San Francisco’s Union Square and main public library, Google is enhancing the service. The ad giant briefly made a beta of a proxy server, Google Secure Access, available for limited download today before withdrawing the link. The proxy is intended to protect 802.11 wireless users … Read more