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WEB FED NEWS YEARBOOKS Earthdate September 2003 |
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WEB FED NEWS YEARBOOKS Earthdate September 2003 |
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OFFICIAL
NEWS |
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The summer quietness and the silly season extended into September. The Chronicle suspended publication for a week to allow the demi-goddess to go on vacation. See below for where she went and what she did...
YOUR COMPUTER PLAYS OUR COMPUTER Seen on the bar board this week:
Well yes, Pharell is right - in Fed, we have tried to create a game that can be played in many different ways, rather than enforcing a particular playing style. You can play just a few hours a week, or you can spend 7 hours a day working to advance; either way, you'll promote in the end. You can devote all your Fed time to advancing, or you can ease back and enjoy the social side of the game rather than aiming for the next rank - or a combination of the two. But personally, I have never understood the use of macros. Where is the fun in letting your computer do all the work? Particularly if you go off to work, to school, or to bed, and leave your macro hauling away on your behalf, for hours an a time. Note that I am not talking about f-keys or other keyboard shortcuts - the kind that saves you having to type "buy round" or "enter, in, n" or whatever. No, what I find mystifying is the full-blown hauling programs that actually take decisions about what to buy and where to sell it to. The ones that really do leave it up to your computer to play with our computer, and no humans need get involved. I suppose there are two opposing methods of playing game. First there's the one that says, "It's not whether you win or lose, it's how you play the game." The aim is to have fun, so what's important is the process of playing, not the goal. The other method is characterised by the phrase, "Winning isn't everything. It's the only thing." The end is what matters, not the means. The aim is to advance through the ranks, as fast as possible, using whatever tools are available to help - macros. Actually, things are rarely that black and white, and I am sure there are people as well who fall between those two groups. They use macros to do the work in Fed, to make sure they can get the groats needed to promote. But the time saved by running those macros, they use to hang out and socialise with friends. And there really is room in Fed for all of them, no matter how they choose to play!
The demi-goddess is back. I had a great holiday, and I am relaxed, refreshed, reinvigorated - although not actually rested, since it was quite a tiring break. The town we stayed in, St Ives, is all up hill, and there's no room for cars - so my leg muscles have had a real work-out. I mentioned in the last Chronicle that we planned to visit the Eden Project. Well... wow! It was astonishing. Two absolutely enormous biomes, that look like something built by aliens, housing plants from all over the world, one in a humid tropical environment (very hot and sticky!) and the other in a more temperate, Mediterranean climate. If any of you plan to visit England then try to fit in a trip to Cornwall (the bit sticking out on the bottom left of the map) and go to the Eden Project. More information at http://www.edenproject.com/. We also went to The Museum of Submarine Technology at Porthcurno. This is the point where the very first underwater telegraph cables came ashore, linking Britain to the rest of the world, and starting what has come to be known as 'The Victorian Internet'. Without the work done at Porthcurno, you wouldn't be able to play Fed today! It's a fascinating museum, telling the story of the people who worked there and the technology they worked on. See http://www.porthcurno.org.uk/museum/ for more details. The rest of the time was spent eating (fish pie made from locally caught fish, and Cornish pasties), drinking (Iocal ale and cider), spending too much money, and paddling in the sea. A great time was had by all!
A man working on Titan had himself shipped home to his parents on Earth, disguised as a cargo of meat, because he was homesick but short of money. Chax McKurdley, a 25 year old clerk employed by the Titan Chemical Company, could not afford the passage on a commercial liner, so he packed himself up into a crate and labelled it as 75 tons of meat. He then hacked into the Galactic Administration's job board and posted a job to collect the crate from Titan and deliver it to Earth. He had no food or water for the journey, and although he did pack a second-hand comm unit, it did not work. He said that while he was being transported he got out of the crate and walked around in the cargo hold of the ship to stretch his legs. Luckily he was wearing his company-issued vac suit, otherwise he would have died in the unpressurised hold. The crate, ostensibly full of meat, was then delivered to the processing plant where McKurdley's father works. McKurdley Senior, and the delivery droid, were both shocked when the crate suddenly opened and out crawled Chax! Galactic Administration officials want to know how the clerk managed to bypass security. In particular, they are keen to discover how he added himself to the jobs board. He is being held in custody, and will be charged with the offences of stowing away on a spaceship, and impersonating food products.
REAL LIFE NEWS: DUMB CRIMINAL MIXES WITH HIGH TECH I told you recently how much scumbags journalists like us Chronicle newsdroids enjoy stories about technology doing unexpected stuff like rescuing people, or exploding or whatever. We also really, really love dumb criminal stories - you know, the kind of thing where a bank robber sticks up a bank cashier and writes his demand for loot on the back of one of his personal checks. So imagine our jubilation when we found a news story that combines the two: a dumb criminal brought down by high tecnology. This kind of journalistic opportunity comes along but once in a blue moon. The story concerns a 40-year-old man from Wisconsin. He stole a piece of equipment from outside a woman's house, and took it home with him. He didn't know what the equipment was, but I guess he figured it would be valuable somehow. Unfortunately for him, the gizmo he stole had a built-in GPS satellite receiver. It was, in fact, a device for monitoring criminals who are on probation. It had been temporarily placed outside the home of a woman serving home detention when our unfortunate thief made off with it. Prisoners wear a transmitter about the size of a pack of cigarettes, which is strapped round the ankle. The device which was stolen acts as a base station, tracking the movement of the transmitter. When the felon carted it off, the device automatically notified the authorities that it had been removed from the prisoner's home. Its new location was easily tracked over the net, leading authorities right to the suspect's apartment. Lovely!
REAL LIFE NEWS: BYE-BYE GALILEO Jupiter probe Galileo is set for a spectacular fiery death, years after its mission was due to end. Galileo has orbited Jupiter for nearly eight years, when its original mission was only planned to be two years long. During its extended time it made many important discoveries about the gas giant and its many moons, including volcanos on Io and the fact that Europa has water under its icy surface. But now Galileo's life is almost over, and today (Sunday) it will be going out in a blaze of glory. Scientists considered keeping Galileo in orbit as a long-term observatory, but it has little fuel left. There were fears that a "parking orbit" would not be stable; the complex gravitational effects of Jupiter and its moons could have pulled Galileo out of orbit, resulting in it crashing on one of the moons - and that could have caused contamination. In particular, scientists don't want there to be any risk to Europa's pristine environment, since this moon is the current best hope for finding life elsewhere in the Solar System. (And it was Galileo's information that led to that hope...) So NASA decided it would be best to finish if off. They have aimed it at Jupiter, and today it will hit the planet's atmosphere and disintegrate. Even as it dies, it should continue to provide vital information about Jupiter's atmosphere, and about some "mystery bodies" that may be orbiting the huge world like a ring. The impact has been timed for about 2.00pm eastern. A last call from Galileo will be received on Earth about 52 minutes later - the time it takes for the radio signal to reach Earth at the speed of light. RIP Galileo!
REAL LIFE NEWS: TECHNOLOGY GETS THE BLAME Three stories this week about technology being blamed for all the ills of the world. First in the dock is the video game Grand Theft Auto. Two teenage boys from Tennessee are claiming that the reason they opened fire on a car with a .22-calibre rifle, killing one man and severely injuring another, is because they were acting out the computer game. Apparently, they were bored. Their lawyer plans to sue the game's makers because of the consequences repeated playing of violent games can have on young and impressionable minds. This rather overlooks the fact that the game is rated M, intended for over 18s only, so the parents of the boys should take some responsibility for having allowed them access to adult material. Not to mention the fact that the parents failed to control their access to firearms! (When reporting on this story, The Register finished with this gem: "Perhaps the answer to the perennial problem of delinquent teenagers dropping bricks from motorway and railway bridges is to sue the creators of Tetris.") Mobile phones are next to be deemed a threat to the nation's youth, by disrupting their sleep. A Belgian study reports that many teenagers leave their mobiles on while they sleep, and are then awoken by incoming text messages. Sounds little different from falling asleep listening to the radio under the bedclothes, which was my generation's secret vice when we were young. Finally, an online divorce service claimed that "online adultery" is increasingly being blamed for the break-up of marriages. They say almost half the divorce petitions they processed are due to cybersex, inappropriate online relationships, and pornography. Ooo-er!
REAL LIFE NEWS: HI-TECH SOFA FOR COUCH POTATOES Now here's some new technology that I can really appreciate. An Irish University has invented a high-tech sofa which allows those lounging on it to control domestic appliances such as cookers, kettles or lights, or - and this is the bit I really like - to order take-away meals. All this without actually getting out of the chair. What's more, this smart sofa will be able to work out who is sitting on it by the weight registered on special sensors, and will offer a voice greeting when it detects a presence. What's missing from this idea is a carrying robot that can bring the take-away from the door, or the coffee from the kitchen, once you've done the hard work of pushing the buttons to activate such things remotely. The prospect then looms of being able to spend your entire life on the sofa, never having to stand up again. Well, maybe that will only be possible when the sofa comes with a built-in porta-potty... More seriously, the team that came up with this idea believes it could be of benefit to the very young, the elderly and the sick. Yes, well, very worthy, but the real appeal will surely be to lazy couch potatoes. Idlers of the world, site down for your rights!
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