Web Fed News Yearbooks - March 2001

THE MONTH IN BRIEF

Ddking scored a double whammy, coming top of both the cerebral and fighting leagues in Season 4 of Fed events.

Chewbacon won the first Fed Survivor, beating the other contestants who were all abandoned on the barren island with no money, no comm unit and no outside contact. Spybeams were overheating all week as everyone watched the action. The game was run by Macnbc, Jelly and Breyer.

Eenigma won the prestigious Walrus of Merit award for the outstanding design of his planet Obfuscation.

Hazed, in her other persona as Diesel, posted three articles to her web site about a holiday on a Greek island: http://www.chezdiesel.demon.co.uk/index.html.

The artist who drew the pictures of Selena of the Spaceways, the Fed mascot, put up a gallery of his work on the web: http://www.grenville-evans.co.uk/index.html.

In the real world, the Mir space station came splashing down more or less on target, without hitting anything it shouldn't have. Originally planned to be operational for 5 years, Mir actually kept going for 15 until it met its watery end.

IMPLANT ABUSE ON THE RISE
by our special correspondent, Qaxlor

Since the advent of sensory implants several years ago, reports of the abuse of this technology have been on the rise. Originally designed to assist in the repair of damaged neural function, an unanticipated market for the devices arose amongst thrill-seekers. The practice of having implants installed for recreational use has become common amongst young people. Although the regulated, therapeutic use of implants has proven safe, the recreational abuse of these devices has been shown to cause all manner of neurological disorders, from psychoses to neural degeneration.

Implant manufacturers have been blamed for some of the proliferation of these devices and for putting them into the hands of illegitimate doctors and abusers. Last year the Imperial Senate passed legislation requiring that implants be sold through licensed vendors and only sold to physicians certified to install them. It was hoped that this legislation would slow the rate of abuse, but black-market vendors cropped up quickly and until recently no action against questionable doctors has been taken.

Last week, regulatory authorities finally arrived at a plan for cracking down on implant abuse. In a sweeping move, two dozen doctors had their certifications to install implants revoked, which will prevent their obtaining the devices legally. Several black market implant dealers were also raided, yielding nearly 10 billion groats worth of black-market implants. This figure is, however, a mere fraction of the estimated 540 trillion groat black market for implants.

Ultimately, health authorities admit that curbing demand for the implants is the key to stopping the black market. An education campaign is in the works, pointing out the dangers of implant abuse. This should hit the airwaves this fall. Quietly, however, many officials are hoping the popularity of the implants simply wanes amongst youth. Either way, the problem seems likely to linger for quite some time.

SENATE BLOCKS MARTIAN RESEARCH
by our special correspondent, Qaxlor

In a close vote, the Imperial Senate moved to block experimentation on Martians. The vote, which withdrew Imperial funds from research involving Martians, is the latest chapter in a long and complex fight over experimentation on Martians, most of whom are captured during timewarp activities. Dr Hans Stetthammer, from the University of Stockholm criticized the action. "The Senate is depriving us of important research dollars," he said. "Martians represent a serious and ongoing threat to the galaxy and we must continue our live-Martian research programs. There is no doubt in my mind that Martians conduct inhumane experiments on other races - including humans, I might add - so I see no reason to curtail our experiments on them."

On the other side of the issue was a coalition of Martian-rights groups, led by Trilo Brood of MarsWatch. Mr Brood contended, "Simply because the Martians are a ruthless, cunning, underhanded and dangerous race is no reason to deprive them of their rights. We feel that this decision is the first step in coming to terms with centuries of hostility towards the Martians."

Although no Martian authorities could be reached for comment directly, the Martian's press agent in New York released the following statement, "We are pleased that the Senate has chosen to stop funding misguided experimentation on Martians. We further hope that those groats will be redirected towards the valuable research being conducted by Martian scientists on other races, which will ultimately establish the superiority and galactic dominance of the Martian race."

Senator Bonfort, commenting on the Martian statement, reiterated his opposition to the funding ban. "We are in a on-going battle with these nefarious Martians, and this action by the Senate has crippled our efforts to counter Martian aggression."

Several planets have already announced self-funded Martian research initiatives, although MarsWatch has promised to challenge these in planetary and Imperial courts if necessary. Whether the Senate's action will have any effect on actual research or on Martian relations, remains to be seen, but the debate promises to rage on for quite some time, as there are currently fourteen bills under Senate consideration which involve various Martian issues.

MARKETS CRASH!
by our special correspondent, Qaxlor

Investors and traders alike held their breath this week as the bottom fell out of markets across the galaxy. Early in the week, there was weakness in the technology sector, with bio-chips taking a hard hit. By the end of day Tuesday, sell orders for bio-chips, droids, GAs-chips and powerpacks on hundreds of markets had driven the prices to all-time lows. Analysts quickly saw that investors were looking for excuses to abandon tech, as a wave of frenzied selling took over Wednesday.

Some money moved to industrial commodities as institutional investors looked for safe habors to weather the panic. However, a virtual floatilla of weak earnings reports late Wednesday from industrial leaders, such as Mars Mining, Manufacturing and Millwork (4M), and General Hyperdrive shook the industrial sector and caused another widespread wave of selling.

Bargain-seekers briefly stemmed the declines on Thursday, boosting prices for a few commodities, but nothing could stop the investor panic that had gripped the market. Steve Macbuck from Sweeney Investment Bank, summed up the feelings of most professional investors in comments to the Chronicle, "I've never seen anything like this, there is such market volatility, seemingly caused by the flood of amateur speculators in the market. I'm just trying to find a safe place to hide for a few weeks"

Many small investors have been hit hard by this decline. Skip Graybow, an engineer, said of his investments, "I finally got into the markets, probably too late, and invested heavily in the tech sector. This drop in the market means the difference between hanging up the hauling hat this year and another couple years of plugging away".

The conventional wisdom says that in the long run, the markets will make you money, but it seems an awful lot of people got used to constant up prices. This latest market downturn reminds us of the concept of short-term volatility and that the old axiom about those things which appear too good to be true, usually are.

ORBITAL RESTAURANT CRASHES TO EARTH
by special correspondent Qaxlor

The Space Rock Cafe, hailed as the largest orbiting restaurant in the universe when it opened 15 years ago, has met a fiery end after several years of lack-luster sales. The operators of the restaurant announced last year that they planned to ditch the venture when they failed to arrange a buyer for the 25-billion groat facility. Early Friday morning, the huge orbital platform fired rockets to slow it down and allow it to fall into the Earth's atmosphere.

Tad Hanson, CEO of Orbital Eateries, Inc., the former owner of the Space Rock Cafe, said of the crash landing, "We hated to have to scrap the restaurant, but without a buyer in sight, maintenance on the facility was too expensive and the structure represented a hazard to navigation."

Engineers worked long and hard to find a suitable area to crash the pieces of the restaurant that survived re-entry. There were concerns that the grease traps and deep fat fryers might form huge flaming comets on re-entry or that someone would wake up with second rate rock memorabilia embedded in their front lawn.

The most spectacular part of the re-entry occurred as the decorative pink Cadillac on the roof of the structure separated during re-entry, spinning wildly as plumes of flame streamed from the tires. The scorched hunk of metal finally plunged into an uninhabited stretch of Los Angeles.

DANNY’S LAWSUIT MOVES FORWARD
3 JUDGE PANEL NAMED
by Kao (FedNews Service)

MARS - Danny’s controversial sexual harassment lawsuit against alleged boxer shorts thief Redspice took a large step toward going to trial when a three-judge panel consisting of Nightdroid, Fireimp and Icedrake was named by the Imperial Justice Ministry to hear the case.

The lawsuit, which claims that Redspice, Baroness of Northstar, has sexually harassed numerous Fedmales by stealing their boxer shorts, seeks 4.3 billion groats in damages.

"There are still men of justice in the universe," said Geiiga, Danny’s lead attorney. "There are still people willing to fight for what's right. We're no longer content merely to lead the cheers at women's foosball games." Geiiga claimed that "thousands" of emotionally damaged FEDmales have joined the lawsuit, though he declined to identify any.

Geiiga stated that Danny decided to go forward with his lawsuit because most FEDmales "are too emotionally injured to go public with Redspice's crimes." Geiiga expressed unfettered optimism in the outcome of the trial and concluded the interview by saying, "Men will not be victimized by thieves like Redspice -- by emotional terrorists like Redspice"

The Defense, as one might expect, has a different view of things. Eenigma, Squire of Obfuscation (I did NOT make that up) has been retained by Redspice as her lead attorney at a reported fee of upwards of a billion groats. He was unimpressed by the plaintiff’s stated motives in bringing the case.

"Boredom on behalf of the prosecution," was Eenigma’s explanation for why Danny chose this particular time to go forward with his lawsuit. He dismissed Danny’s claims that Redspice’s alleged boxer shorts thievery emotionally damaged any FEDmales. "Ah well in a logical case yes, the act of stealing boxers could be a foundation for a sexual harassment case. Key words being 'could' and 'logical'. The prosecution has shown little logic in this and past dealings," he said.

When asked about the Defense’s strategy in the upcoming trial, Eenimga would only say, "As for what my defense will be, you'll have to wait until the trial." Sources close to the Defense say that one strategy is to bring forward FEDmales whose boxer shorts were pilfered to testify that they did not feel that they were being harassed. That, or to testify that they weren’t wearing underwear to begin with.

Justice Ministry sources say that the trial will be scheduled for sometime early in April.