SATURDAY, 3/24/2001, 11:45am HST by Raul

This one is originally from Luzsyd: Tired of that old boring "thatch" pattern on your desktop? Check out Digital Blasphemy, as site that specializes in 3D rendered desktops. There are some nice ones to be had. Be sure to check out the user gallery. My favorite of the moment is this one.

• Well a couple of days after Team Canada was announced for the 2002 Olympics, Team USA has also been announced. Seems like the all-star rosters all over again. Hmm, I wonder why they don't mention the goalies. At any rate, 2002 Olympic Hockey will be a spectacle for sure.
• After being together on the same incredibly talented line since Mario Lemieux' return, Lemieux and Jagr are splitting up to help keep opponents on their toes defensively.
• Sniper John Leclair and all-star center Simon Gagne have both been cleared to practice again with the Philadelphia Flyers and could see ice time soon. Leclair has been battling back problems since the start of the season, and Gagne messed up his shoulder in a fight.

Doc Nickel is just a tweaky kinda guy. When he's not making the most tricked paintball guns on the planet, he's doing weird things like making 4x4 Corvairs and such.

• Is USB syncing faster than serial syncing? Although some insist that the speed of the sync is limited by the PDA's serial port itself, the short answer is: YES. This article looks into the truth of the matter.
• Is NVIDIA poised to make an entry into the PDA graphics chip market? This article says so.

FRIDAY, 3/23/2001, 11:58am HST by Penfold
The "Three Day Weekend" Edition

If the courts aren't open, then I'm off.

A worker at the US Geological Survey office did the most horrid of mistakes and was summarily fired. What was his crime? Doing his job and posting a map. Check it out here.

Is Jenna Bush, W.'s daughter, a pot head? If she is, what does that say about the war on drugs. See what Salon.com has to say about it here.

I guess they really are running out of Simpsons ideas. See what might be in store for Bart here.

FRIDAY, 3/23/2001, 12:45pm HST by Raul

B and A Computer is an eBay computer equipment reseller. They have over 900 positive feedbacks BUT BEWARE! They charge high shipping and do no special packaging of the products. They also do no special handling -- a 100ft ethernet cable I purchased arrived DAMAGED! Can you imagine that, a CABLE being damaged by handling? On top of their high shipping for essentially zero care in handling, they will NOT ship multiple auctions together, so you get stiffed with the full shipping on each auction. We're talking $4 shipping on a $2 cable. Fucking bitches. In short, stay away from these scammers.

This is actually a day or so old, but Siemens debuted a PocketPC-based phone product at CeBIT. PDAbuzz.com has the goods here.

I guess they were waiting for CeBIT, but Samsung finally officially released their SPH-I300 PDA phone.

Here's a rather funny eBay auction from someone selling a possible piece of Mir. The Reg was reporting that there were other auctions like it, but most of them seem to have disappeared. Let me know if the eBay link dies, I'll mirror it.

UH harassment complaint filed

A male University of Hawai'i-Manoa student filed a formal sexual harassment complaint recently, which named a male professor as his sexual harasser.

Penfold posted a couple days ago about Salon going pay, but this article projects a considerably more dire circumstance than that.

THURSDAY, 3/22/2001, 8:58pm HST by Penfold
The "Sluggin in Court" Edition

This going to court in the morning is getting boring really fast.

Congress Adds 'All Your Base Are Belong To Us' Amendment To Bankruptcy Bill

WASHINGTON, DC -- Seeking to increase fiscal accountability among citizens who have no chance to survive make their time, the House of Representatives added an "All Your Base Are Belong To Us" amendment Monday to H.R. 333, the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2001. "What you say!!!" shouted the bill's sponsor, Rep. George Gekas (R-PA), following the amendment's approval. "This bill will not only make debt-ridden Americans more accountable, but it has the added benefit of taking off every 'zig' for great justice." Opponents of the amendment protested that it would potentially set up U.S. the bomb.

Zero tolerance is getting in the way of rational thought. 2 second grade boys were suspended for brandishing a paper gun. Read about it here.

I heard this person giving the same explanation on a show today on NPR. Doesn't make any more sense when you you her him say it either, you can only spin things so far. Check it out here.

Seems that Salon.com, along with other online publications, is running into money problems. Their solution is a ad-free pay version or an ad loaded free version. Not a bad way to do it. Check out their letter to the readers here.

THURSDAY, 3/22/2001, 10:30am HST by Raul and Penfold

I barneyed and lost Penfold's post in the process of archiving. It will be back later tonight ...

Well, Mir is supposed to come down within 8 hours. Check it out somewhat live at this site. Maybe we'll all get a taco.

No sooner has the M500/5 series Palm hit the streets, Kodak releases a new PalmPix to work with it. Sorta. It's strictly a preorder item right now. The new PalmPix should be quite improved over the old one -- 800x600 (SVGA) resolution, variable focal lengths, real zoom (I think) -- but it still lacks a flash, which was one of the major drawbacks to the original. Oh well, I guess you can only ask so much from something so small. MSRP is supposedly $129, making it quite afforable.

Well the Star-Bulletin is reporting a doom-and-gloom scenario of skyrocketing fish prices and sure drops in quality, all due to the shackling of the longline fleet in Hawaii. Hmm, you'll have to ask the conservationists for their take on this one, because the SB sure didn't.

Now this is some thick glass. But you know, with only a 2" diameter at the mouth, 20mm glass thickness leaves only about a 1.25" opening, which is a serious design deficiency IMHO.

While you're at it, check out Hawaii's own Macaw Glass.

WEDNESDAY, 3/21/2001, 9:45pm HST by Raul

This site is too good to pass up a link to. Engrish.com is all about the phenomenon of Japanese Engrish. It's hard to explain in words, so I'll let the site do the talking. In some ways, allyourbase has somewhat Engrish roots. Thanks to Jui.

WEDNESDAY, 3/21/2001, 1:00pm HST by Raul and Penfold

Well this is all over the news, and silly me, I forgot to post about it last night. Anyway, Taco bell will set up a 40-foot x 40-foot target in the Pacific Ocean and offer a free taco to everyone in the U.S. if Mir hits it when it splashes down later this week.

Switzerland looks to legalize it

Bern, Switzerland -- Swiss government officials recently endorsed draft legislation that recommends police stop enforcing laws prohibiting the cultivation and sale of small amounts of marijuana. The move comes on the heels of a nationwide poll indicating that more than one-quarter of the population has used the drug, and that 54 percent favor liberalizing marijuana laws.

Love not war

Three-fourths of Americans think the nation is losing the war on drugs and think the demand for drugs is so high it will be impossible to stop their use, a poll says.

Moose mess

OSLO (Reuters) -- A sex-starved moose in Norway mistook a small, yellow car for a would-be partner, but defecated on it after it got no response.

TUESDAY, 3/20/2001, 9:58pm HST by Penfold
The "Sansei" Edition

Party Party Party

Hockey Times

Hockey times for the week of 3/20/01.

• ESPN2-23 Tue, Mar 20, 2001 11:00 PM "San Jose Sharks at Colorado Avalanche"
• ESPN-22 Wed, Mar 21, 2001 3:00 PM "New York Rangers at New Jersey Devils"
• FSWH-21 Wed, Mar 21, 2001 5:30 PM "Edmonton Oilers at Los Angeles Kings"
• ESPN-22 Wed, Mar 21, 2001 10:00 PM "New York Rangers at New Jersey Devils"
• FSWH-21 Thu, Mar 22, 2001 10:00 AM "Edmonton Oilers at Los Angeles Kings"
• ESPN2-23 Thu, Mar 22, 2001 3:30 PM "Colorado Avalanche at St. Louis Blues"
• ESPN2-23 Thu, Mar 22, 2001 11:00 PM "Colorado Avalanche at St. Louis Blues"
• KITV-6 Sat, Mar 24, 2001 1:00 PM "Anaheim Mighty Ducks at Los Angeles Kings"
• ESPN-22 Sun, Mar 25, 2001 3:00 PM "St. Louis Blues at Dallas Stars"
• ESPN-22 Sun, Mar 25, 2001 10:00 PM "St. Louis Blues at Dallas Stars"

We will strive to be worthy of your sense of grandeur. I will find someone with whom you can fight. Bolo!

TUESDAY, 3/20/2001, 9:45pm HST by Raul

Thanks to everyone who sent me birthday greetings. Here they are in no particular order: 1 2 (There's more but the point is moot by now)

Leave it up to PBS to come up with something kewl like this. You can simulate a nuclear blast at any location in the US using a PBS.org site feature. Up there is what happens if a 1 megaton bomb detonates on the surface at Penfold's office. Click it to enlarge.

Well Palm Inc. finally got wise and got itself an official Palm docreader. As anyone who Palms knows, the different types of docreaders have led to a pool of documents that are reader-specific, so formatting could be fux0red on other doc readers. Check out the scoops here.

Couple of items of note today in the NHL:

• The Avalanche beat the Sharks 4-1, but lost newly-acquired defenseman Rob Blake and all-star goalie Patrick Roy.
• St. Louis Blues' star defenseman Al MacInnis returned to the lineup today, but couldn't keep the Blues from losing to the Islanders in overtime.

Ahh, the march of progress. It seems like just yesterday I was pumping rolls of quarters into SFII machines at the former Holiday Cue. Now you can get all that "sho-ryu-ken" goodness in the palm of your hand. No, not the Palm of your hand, but that could be just a little while away.

Unequivocally Bushy

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- President George W. Bush came out with a new word from his personal dictionary on Monday -- "Hispanically."

For those people in or considering going to to law school, do as I say and not as I did. (Note: You have to register to view this article. Make up some bullshit.)

MONDAY, 3/19/2001, 8:58pm HST by Penfold
The "Ribbit" Edition

No good content, so i guess I just have to make some.

Tribes2 finally went gold today. Get the announcement here.

Will the Bitbop tuner become the next Napster and embraced by the RIAA? Probably not, if the RIAA likes it, it's probably crap. Check out Salon.com's take on it here.

Well here's an alternative energy source and there's probably lots of it circulating around, especially on submarines.

Salon.com has been predicting the demise of the XFL for a while now, and it looks like they might be right. Check out the latest nail in the XFL coffin here.

Instead of taking the gun away from everyone, this town has taken the Swiss approach and requires almost every head of house hold to own one and ammo. Hear about their experiment here.

MONDAY, 3/19/2001, 10:45am HST by Raul and Penfold

Well as reported a few days ago, Palm today announced the M500 and M505 handhelds. At the same time, Palm has announced PalmOS 4 to go with the new PDAs. Unfortunately, I don't think you can upgrade your III- or V-series palm to OS 4.

This is just too tasty. A prime number has been discovered -- that translates into a compressed file containing code that can decode DVDs (DeCSS). Check it out here.

Oh, stop the madness!

There is no sex in ... public

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (Reuters) - Teenagers in the Cambodian capital have been warned by police not to embrace or have sex in public, the English-language Cambodia Daily newspaper reported Monday.

Those who are caught doing so will be educated about the immorality of their behavior and forced to swear not to do it again, the paper said.

Record irony

With Napster a shell of its former self and services like MP3.com paying hefty tribute, record labels are poised to conquer cyberspace with their own streaming and downloading services.

Ironically, only one thing stands in the way: copyright.

I was digging around any found these old articles which we did not report on. I think they bear linkage though:

• Man has ears stolen
• A bit on "casu marzu" cheese, the cheese that is, literally, "alive"

SUNDAY, 3/18/2001, 7:00pm HST by Raul

Here's the most comprehensive page I've seen yet on removing the damn ICQ ads that have appeared recently. This one has graphical instructions so no one should screw it up (you know who you are). It even has a file that does the whole thing for you (WARNING: I can't vouch for its efficacy; I haven't tried it. Use caution.)

FYI I tried the technique posted by Penfold earlier (here) and it works too. Another member also had luck with it.

While you're at it, let AOL know what you think about them fucking up ICQ here and here.

I feel so strongly about this crap AOL is pulling that I'm devoting my own Web space to helping fight it. Download 99b and get rid of all this crap here.

Missing the joke

"I can't find tea bags, can you?"

"You have waste eyes."

"..."

"There, in the can of coffee."

The banner above says it all. Check out this funny geek parody here.

I'm not sure what to make of this. Burgerpipe is the burger shaped like a hot dog. I'm sorry, but I am having trouble distinguishing this product from "sausages made of various things."