|
|
frontier?
In a previous installment, I commended The Electronic Frontier Foundation <http://www.eff.org/> to your attention and I won’t hesitate to do it again. It is
one of the most eloquent, and possibly the most potent, organizations
advocating for our digital civil liberties. Here’s its mission
statement: "The Electronic Frontier Foundation has been established
to help civilize the electronic frontier; to make it truly useful
and beneficial not just to a technical elite, but to everyone;
and to do this in a way which is in keeping with our society’s
highest traditions of the free and open flow of information and
communication."
Now I support all of these worthy goals. My quibble with the EFF
is purely metaphorical: I don’t see the net as a frontier. The
net that I browse is thickly settled. I explore it only in the sense that
a tourist who wanders through Paris or a hiker who treks the Grand
Canyon "explores." I suppose the argument might be made that parts
of the net aren’t particularly civilized, but I submit that you
could stumble into precincts in any major city where you would
find yourself at the far edge of polite society. In no sense is
the net an undiscovered country, as is, for example, "Space, the
final frontier." It’s unlikely that when you click a new link,
there is the possibility you’ll suddenly understand the function
of dream sleep or you’ll discover that Tau Ceti has six planets.
space
That being said, there are literally millions of sites where you
can peek over the shoulders of true explorers, the women and men
who prowl the frontiers of knowledge. For instance, when I typed
the words "space science" into Google <http://www.google.com/>, I got 1,470,000 hits. You could spend years learning about space on the web. Let me recommend just two sites
as starting points for your investigation.
One is Space.com <http://www.space.com/>. The corporation behind this site isn’t shy about blowing its
own horn: "Space.com is the definitive site on the World Wide Web dedicated to space
and all space-related subjects. It focuses on news, information,
education and entertainment. Our primary mission is the popularization
of space." For all the PR swagger, this site delivers much of
what it promises. Space.com’s busy home page is the best place
I know to catch the latest space news. As I type this on the last
day of February, the top stories are the end of the NEAR mission,
confirmation of mountains on Jupiter’s Io and the discovery of
an unexpected black hole perched in the halo of the Milky Way.
But there is much more to Space.com than news. There are glorious
photo galleries of everything from the Hubble’s greatest hits
to Earth’s meteor craters. One of the coolest picture collections
is Earthrise <http://earthrise.space.com/>, 116,100 images snapped from NASA flights. You can search for
pictures of any location here on the home planet and see what
your hometown looks like from orbit. For those with broadband,
there are a variety of multimedia files ranging from shuttle liftoffs
to animations of flying over the Valles Marineris on Mars. This
would be an ideal site to turn your space-crazed kids loose on;
have them check out SpaceKids <http://www.spacekids.com/> or the games page. You might be surprised that Space.com has
a thriving Science Fiction <http://www.space.com/sciencefiction/index.html> section. Print fans may be off put at first by the heavy emphasis
on media SF, but click around and you’ll find publishing news,
reviews, and even some original fiction of varying quality. Space.com
has also given hard SF master Larry Niven his very own digital
pulpit, from which he preaches the gospel of personned space exploration.
Another indispensable space resource is NASA <http://www.nasa.gov/>. Actually, NASA is not one but many sites –far, far too many
to mention here. In fact, this is probably the biggest agglomeration
of sites I have ever visited; it is impossible to do justice to
the breadth and depth of information NASA makes public on the
web. If Space.com is the dictionary of space, then all of the
NASA sites constitute an encyclopedia. The problem is, the volumes
in this encyclopedia are in no particular order. A good way to
navigate these sites is to click the NASA Subject Index <http://www.nasa.gov/nasaorgs/subject_index.html> and explore from there. Here are a few random highlights. If
you’re interested in seeing the International Space Station from
your backyard, check out ISS Visibility Data <http://www.hq.nasa.gov/osf/station/viewing/issvis.html> which will tell you where and when to spot it from 3,408 locations
worldwide. Prefer a closer look? You could take a tour of the
ISS hosted by a cornball cartoon robot named MC at Meet Me at the Space Station <http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/gallery/video/station/mmats/index.html>, but I wouldn’t advise it unless you’re in the fourth grade.
Better to click the self-guided ISS Virtual Tour <http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/gallery/vtour/>; your jaw will drop, guaranteed. There is a site something like
Space.com’s Earthrise called Visible Earth <http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/> which, while it may not necessarily show your home town, is
a much better tool for understanding landforms, the biosphere
and human impacts on earth. Scope out a place to land your spaceship
at Mars Landing Sites <http://www.mars-sites.arc.nasa.gov/project.html>.
Speaking of Mars, you may not realize that one of our own is a
NASA scientist. Geoffrey Landis <http://www.sff.net/people/Geoffrey.Landis/>, whose fiction regularly graces these pages, works for the John Glenn Research Center <http://www.grc.nasa.gov/>. His projects include Mars research, photovoltaic power systems
for space, and advanced concepts like the mythical faster than
light drive.
future evil
On a somewhat different note, did you know that it’s now possible
to explore the future at FutureFeedForward <http://www.futurefeedforward.com/>? I was referred to this amazing site by Cory Doctorow <http://www.craphound.com/>, who had it from Bruce Sterling <http://www.well.com/conf/mirrorshades/>. It’s hard to describe FutureFeedForward, but let me try. Apparently
a gentleman named Redroe Boudaine discovered temporal networking
in 1996, whereby information from the future could be received
and used here in the past. He founded a company called FutureFeedForward
to exploit his discovery. Among their products are "custom, bulleted,
and accessible research reports detailing future events, markets,
people, and technology." Their financial services division "is
revolutionizing the consumer banking and capital-raising industries
by selling money below cost." There may be a job waiting for you at FutureFeedForward: "Although experience is important, it can
inhibit your ability to adapt to rapid and radical change. We
prefer to hire individuals with interesting and diverse backgrounds,
but with little or no position-related experience." All right,
all right–I know you’re skeptical. So was I. But just look at
some of the undoubtedly authentic headlines they’ve culled from
the future: 2/23/2056: HOME JAILING MORE POPULAR THAN HOME SCHOOLING.
7/23/2104: COMING TO A STAIN NEAR YOU: ADS! 4/23/2202: SUICIDE
ARTIST FAKES DEATH, DEFRAUDS PATRONS.
Okay, so maybe the future isn’t for you, but you’re still interested
in exploring a career change. Consider applying to Evil Science University <http://evilscience.net/institutions/esu/esu.htm>. Founded by Vlad, a refugee Romanian baron, in 1785, it is located
in the quaint New England city of Fortune, which "has all the
dangers of a large city combined with all the annoying failures
of a small town." Judith Berman <http://home.earthlink.net/~judithberman >, non-evil Ph.D. and a terrific new writer, pointed me toward
the site of this most famous member of the Poison Ivy League.
ESU offers a full complement of courses in Evil Biology (Comparative
Vertebrate Reanimation), Gender Studies (Advanced Objectification),
Performance (Drinking for English Actors), Environmental Science
(Killing Frogs), and Evil Art (Unwholesome Photography). Student
life is an important part of the ESU experience; the most popular
clubs are the Geek Council, the Chernobyl Club, the Paving Club,
and the Young Authoritarians. Among the social highlights are
the Martian Weekend (April 19-21, 2002), and the end-of-the-year
Zombie Dance when "the zombies created as final projects in many
biology and occult classes are released from their holding pens."
When you’re finished perusing the ESU online catalog, consider
jumping up to Dr Vulture’s Laboratory of Evil Science "Evil deserves more than an educated guess" <http://www.evilscience.net/main.htm> for a tour of ESU’s sister institutions, Vulture Industries
and the Evil Hall of Fame.
true or false
a) Never throw rice at weddings; the birds that eat it will explode.
2) Coca-Cola used to contain cocaine.
C) Thomas Crapper invented the flush toilet.
iv) Ronald Reagan was originally cast for Bogie’s part in Casablanca.
five) Star Trek’s theme music has lyrics.
a) False. Rice and bird experts agree: birds, even small songbirds,
can eat rice without harm. Many birds have wild rice in their
diets. The real reason you shouldn’t throw rice at weddings is
that it makes the steps and floor slippery. Drunken Unsteady guests may trip and fall.
2) True. But not much, as little as 1/400 of a grain of cocaine
per ounce of syrup. By 1929, Coke was coke-less.
C) False. Actually, a gentleman named Adamson took out the original
patents. Thomas Crapper ran a Victorian plumbing supply business.
iv) False. Humphrey Bogart was the only actor ever considered
for the part of Rick Blaine. Producer Hall Wallis actually had
the part written for Bogart.
five) True. The reason you’ve never heard them is that they are
truly execrable, perhaps because they were penned by Gene Roddenberry
himself. Maximum Editor Sheila Williams gets antsy when I try
to quote song lyrics in this magazine so let’s just say that Mr.
Roddenberry’s use of rhyme and meter betray someting of a tin
ear.
How do I know all this stuff? I found it exploring the Urban Legend Reference Pages <http://www.snopes2.com/>. WARNING: DO NOT CLICK THIS URL IF YOU HAVE ANYTHING IMPORTANT
TO DO THAT REALLY, REALLY NEEDS TO GET DONE ANYTIME TODAY. This
highly addictive but invaluable site is largely the work of Barbara
and David Mikkelson. Worth a regular click is Current Urban Legends and Netlore <http://www.snopes2.com/info/current.htm>, which will give you the true facts about all those cataclysmic
email messages that accumulate in your inbox every week. For instance,
at this writing you can get the skinny on the 809 area code (never
dial it!), the petition to stop cuts at the NEA (aimed at the
1996 budget, it is undead "scarelore" that resurfaces periodically),
and the notion that 75 percent of Americans are "chronically dehydrated"
(not necessary to drink eight to ten glasses of water a day unless
you like spending time in the bathroom).
exit
I should probably apologize for the middle of this column, but
I confess that I’m a sucker for deadpan humor sites. The problem
is that they’re not always easy to spot. For example, be warned
that there is a spoof section at the Urban Legend Reference Pages
called The Repository of Lost Legends <http://www.snopes2.com/lost/lost.htm>. It looks just like the rest of the site; the fiendish webmasters
would seem to have posted it as a gullibility test. Well, it fooled
me. I actually typed many sentences for this column informing
you that television’s Mr. Ed was not a horse but was rather a
trained Grevy’s zebra and that, mirabile dictu, on the night the Titanic sank, the movie screened in second class
was The Poseidon Adventure. No, not that Poseidon Adventure. The one D. W. Griffith directed in 1911, right after he made
Metropolis.
Wait a minute, I start out quibbling over metaphors and end up
discussing arcane silent movies. What does that have to do with
the theme of this column?
Exploring means never knowing where you’ll end up.
–Jim cheerfully invites comments and corrections at jim@jimkelly.net. |
|
