FULL MARKS for trying.
A colleague has been monitoring a pirate video website for the past few
months. Openly using a British address, the pirates offer a wide range of
digital video discs, including Star Wars movies that have never been
officially released on DVD. Customers send cash or a cheque and the discs arrive
through the post.
The pirates鈥� attempt at a legal disclaimer is as entertaining as the movies
they offer: 鈥淚f you are affiliated with any government, or anti-piracy group or
any other related group or were formally a worker of one you can NOT enter this
website, cannot access any of its files and you cannot view any of the HTML
files. If you enter this site you are violating code 431.322.12 of the Internet
Privacy Act signed by Bill Clinton in 1995 and that means that you can NOT
threaten our ISP or any person(s) or company storing these files, cannot
prosecute any person(s) affiliated with this page which includes family, friends
or individuals who run or enter this web site.鈥�
Advertisement
If only . . .
UNITED AIRLINES cargo planes have imposed a little-known restriction on
flights out of London鈥檚 Heathrow Airport. According to the company website, the
following embargo was imposed effective from 12 July last year: 鈥淧er cargo
service. Alert 00-104. United will no longer carry primates on their aircraft.
This restriction is for all primates on all aircraft.鈥�
So who, or what, is flying the planes?
TIGHTEN your belts! That鈥檚 the message going round the business world in the
current uncertain economic climate. And according to Red Herring
magazine, that鈥檚 exactly what some of the world鈥檚 leading companies are
doing.
Hewlett-Packard, for example, now has its rubbish collected every other
night, instead of each night, saving the company between $3 million and
$5 million a year. American Airlines has instituted steeper, and
therefore faster, descents for some of its planes鈥攁n idea apparently
thought up by a pilot, and involving savings of $500,000 of fuel per
year. But it wasn鈥檛 just money that network giant Cisco Systems was thinking of
when it ordered that same-sex employees should share hotel rooms while
travelling to conferences. It was, says Red Herring, 鈥渃loser
friendships among employees鈥�.
Altogether now: Aaaaaaaaah!
THE MOST infuriating spams are those that claim to be against spamming.
Several readers have written in expressing their annoyance at receiving an
unsolicited e-mail from Mailbox Filter. Entitled 鈥淪top junk e-mail鈥�, it offers a
free trial offer of its 鈥渟tate-of-the-art鈥� e-mail filtering program to
鈥渆liminate spam鈥� and give you 鈥渋nstant relief from all that junk mail鈥�.
Thanks very much, but we鈥檇 rather not receive the Mailbox Filter spam in the
first place.
滨罢鈥橲 the same with junk faxes. 鈥淪tand up and join the campaign against junk
faxes,鈥� said an unsolicited fax that reader Mike Greenwood received at work. 鈥淲e
can register your business fax number with the Fax Preference Service, who will
instruct all fax broadcasters registered with the FPS not to fax you鈥�.
All Greenwood had to do for this service was fax back a form with his details
(oh yeah?) together with a copy of his business letter headed paper (oh yeah?)
and a signature from an authorised member of personnel (oh yeah?) to a premium
number at a cost of 拢1.50 per minute for an estimated 4 minutes fax
time.
A junk fax that wants to charge you 拢6 for 鈥渉elp鈥� in solving your 鈥渏unk
fax nightmare鈥�? Thanks a million.
READER David Pearson is fond of trawling the WoS Science Citation
Index鈥攆ormerly BIDS鈥攊n his idle moments. Occasionally he sets it
challenges. For example, a recent search for titles including the words 鈥渟heep鈥�
and 鈥減izza鈥� threw up this paper from the Australian Veterinary Journal
(vol 69): 鈥淧resumed ethanol intoxication in sheep dogs fed uncooked pizza
诲辞耻驳丑.鈥�
Pearson has also been kind enough to tell us two of his favourite chemical
descriptions, which another of his searches (for the use of the word 鈥渟not鈥� in
scientific literature) unearthed in the journal Organometallics (vol
15. They are: [(Me(2)Sn)(Me(2)SnO)(Me(2)-SnOT)(HONZO)(ONZO)] and
[(Me(2)Sn)(2)(Me(2)SnO)-(HONZO)(ONZO)(HONZO)].
This same search, incidentally, located something called the 鈥渟inonasal
outcome test-16鈥�, otherwise known as SNOT-16, which Pearson found discussed in
Otolaryngology鈥擧ead and Neck Surgery (vol 121).
There鈥檚 clearly a lot more fun to be had from citation searches than you
might think.
OUR ITEM about the McDonald鈥檚 customer care manager called Caroline Careless
(2 June) reminded reader Timothy Bowden of his elementary school days. He had a
classmate there who was born Careless, being the daughter of the eminent
Canadian historian J.M.S. Careless.
This Careless, Bowden adds, took over his mantle of eminence from an earlier
distinguished Canadian historian called George Wrong.
Obviously, when it came to history, neither Careless nor Wrong were often
careless or wrong.
MEANWHILE, our story about the Indian magazine Down-to-Earth鈥檚
blistering denunciation of the US as a 鈥渞ouge鈥� nation (12 May) reminded reader
Keith Walters of a headline from the Australian creationists鈥� publication
Prayer News. There they made the surprising allegation that the Australian
Skeptics organisation had been infiltrated by agents of 鈥淪tan鈥�.
A BOTTLE of Palacio de la Vega cabernet sauvignon wine has this suggestion on
the label: 鈥淭his wine should be drunk preferably at a temperature of 卤18 degrees C鈥�