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SURFPUNK Technical Journal 073
Date: Sat, 3 Apr 93 16:35:02 PST
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From: surfpunk@osc.versant.com (ohel nyy zl qernzf va gur pbyq-pbyq tebhaq)
To: surfpunk@osc.versant.com (SURFPUNK Technical Journal)
Subject: [surfpunk-0073] REVIEW: _Black Ice_
# Please subscribe me to your newsletter. My 8 year
# old daughter likes to show it to her classmates.
# Phil <neal@stat.washington.edu>
Here's a SURFPUNK submission on _Black Ice_ and an excerpt from the WELL
that its author mailed around. strick
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Date: Fri, 2 Apr 93 17:49:02 CST
From: matthew john baggott <bagg@midway.uchicago.edu>
To: surfpunk@osc.versant.com
Subject: _Blackice_ magazine
I recently ran across the first issue of a new cyber-zine called
_Black Ice_. I thought I'd pass my impressions on to the surfpunks.
Since I usually adopt a stodgy-old-hacker persona, I tend to react badly to
hacker/cyber media. They always disappoint me with their concern for fashion
rather than technical (empowering) how-to information and perpectives on the
larger "important" issues. Yup, I'm a dyed-in-wool _mondo 2000_ hater.
Given half the chance, I'll rant at length about how "out of it" and
disappointing _mondo_ is. I was able to stomache them back when they were
_High Frontiers_, a psychedelic _emigre_-wannabe, but I've found them less
and less palatable as they've glossed up.
And if I might allow myself another short digression: I noticed an article on
dumpster diving in a major SF newspaper some weeks ago. It was in the
style/fashion section and focused on people who get perfectly usable goods
by looking through the dumpters of malls. I didn't know whether to
laugh or cry about this article. Members of the computer/telecommunications
underground (as well as detectives and law-enforcement types) have long used
dumpster diving as a technique for getting information. Given my background,
I saw two elements at play in this article: (1) transformation of
hacker techniques into part of the consumerist 'spectacle' (no longer
does one 'go trashing' for information, now it is an alternative method
of consumerism); and (2) trashing as the logical outcome of the Reagan/Bush
upward distribution of wealth. In a way, those are sad things, but on the
other hand, seeing dumpster diving represented as the latest hip thing is also
incredibly funny.
This sort of tragicomic expansion of a once anarchic subculture was in
the back of my mind when I looked at _Black Ice_ (how's that for a
seque?). However, I was happily surprised to see Black Ice's
introductory editorial say "Spurred on by sheer boredom with what's available
on the high street newsstands, overdosing on media incest and rampant egos in
the industry -- a band of writers, graphic designers and photographers have
conspired to make something we really want to read and enjoy and I hope you
do to (sic)." They continued: "We've been working on it as a concept for
over a year, motivated in part by Mondo 2000s (sic) decline in editorial
content." Bingo! I had obviously stumbled upon kindred spirits. I bought
the zine and went home to read it.
It had two pages of ads (out of 67, not counting the front cover). Not as
good as no ads, but not offensive. The rest of the zine was broken down
like this:
p 2-4 'ACCESS: News and Products.' Decent short blurbs about upcoming and
new things. Minimum of hype. Comparable to what one might find in a
computer magazine, but with coverage including communications technologies,
robotics, etc.
p 6-11 'HIGH RESOLUTION MEDIA: The Kids Gloves Come Off for a Look at
International Media, Film and Television in News and Reviews.' Included
an article on Godzilla with contact info for the Church of Godzilla
and a filmography; an favorable review of Blue Man Group's performance art/
theatre piece 'Tubes;' a nice essay on why _The Lawnmower Man_ was so
terrible and the nature of modern cinema; a short description of _Ren &
Stimpy_ (which Europeans have apparently not yet seen); an interactive
European television series called _Piazza Virtuale_ in which users were
invited to participate using picturephones, faxes, computers, etc; a
short review of Shinya Tsukamoto's _Tetsuo_; a pan of DC comics' _Hacker
Files_; and a short, unfavorable review of the Beyond Cyberpunk hyperstack.
p 12-19, 54-57 'W INDUSTRIES: Interview with Jon Waldern the Man Behind the
World's First VR Arcade Games.' An ok interview, much of it concerning
JW's career as a VR engineer. Since I'm not a VR fetishist, I wasn't
too interested.
p 20-25 'ARTIFICIAL WORLDS: Home Based VR Systems on the Horizon? Virtual
Reality News and a Review of New Yorks first VR Exhibition.' Mostly short
blurbs. Shrug.
p 26-31 'GENERATION X: Feeling out of Place? Sick of the Sixties? The Lost
Urban Tribe Behind the 'Grunge' Movement And How They Might Change The
World.' Based on something which appeared in _i-D_ magazine, mostly
about Douglas Copeland (author of the book _Gen X_) and his perspective.
It's a relatively thoughtful piece which gains points for quoting Hakim Bey,
but who really cares about people watching and what they're calling us?
A waste of space, IMHO.
p. 32-33 'JAPANESE JUNK FOOD: Cute, Weird and Sometimes Inedible -- Black Ice
Takes a Trip to the Local sweet Shop.' I liked this article, although you
wouldn't want this type of thing to dominate an ostensibly cutting edge
zine. But if you're going to have cultural reporting, why not focus on
the things the people never notice or talk about?
p. 35-39 'STELARC: Interview with the Man who Gets Intimate with Technology
and Does It In Public.' One of my friends had this guy as an art teacher in
grade school in Japan. That amuses me to no end. I think that Fakir
Musefar's take on Stelarc (that Stelarc doesn't/didn't do his suspensions
long enough to experience ASCs and that this is too bad) has some validity.
Nonetheless, Stelarc does have some interesting things to say.
p. 40-45 'BUSTING THE SIMULACRUM: MOVIES AND DRUGS: Opiates for the Masses
or Harmless Escapism?" An interesting essay which asks whether movie
going represents the first mass experimentation with mind altering drugs.
IMHO that is a fairly stupid question, since by the article's standards earlier
theater should also be included. However, the essay goes on to raise some
interesting points about how cinema portrays drugs and the relationship
between cinema and war. I felt this article ended too quickly.
p. 46-57 'BUZZ INTERVIEW: with the Duo who Created One of Television's
Most Avant Garde Magazine Styled News Programs." Yawn. Too many pages.
p. 58-60 'SYSTEMCRASH: Is Barry Manalow In Your Computer? News and Reviews
about Computers Going Wrong." Nice short newsblurbs about hackers,
big brother, and telecom. Some of this is from _2600_ magazine. I consider
this sort of coverage to be a good sign since it shows where the editors'
heads are.
p. 61 'SPACE THE FINAL RIP-OFF: Sampled TV Comic Strip.' Not particularly
interesting ST:TNG-derived comic strip.
p. 62-63 'ARCHIVE: New and Old Books, Videos worth Chasing down.'
Capsule reviews of products function to say 'this is neat, check it
out.' Therefore, they're only useful if they have things of which you've
never heard. This particular feature scored 1 'I should get that' out
of 16 products for me, but then again they are in England, so they
may be slower in getting books like _Technoculture_. One gripe I have
with this section is that all the products but one (Chick comics) seemed
like slick, professional jobs. Europe must have its share of wonderful
fringe-culture zines and products. Why not mention some?
p. 64 'HOW TO BUILD AN ATOMIC BOMB: Home DIY Project.' Intended to be a
joke. Another waste of space. Either give a serious description of the
project or put something useful here. There are so many great projects
that they could tell us about (like 'how to build a pirate radio
transmitter') that it really annoys me to see them waste space with a
stupid reprint.
And that's the first issue. _BI_ can be contacted at PO Box 1069,
Brighton BN2 4YT UK. They don't give an e-mail address.
--Matt, bagg@midway.uchicago.edu
________________________________________________________________________
From: Mike Godwin <mnemonic@eff.org>
Subject: From the WELL
To: eniac
Date: Fri, 26 Feb 93 15:07:06 EST
Topic 409: Cyberpunk on the cover of TIME Magazine
#381: Mike Godwin (mnemonic) Fri, Feb 26, '93 (08:52) 46 lines
I was just talking about the differences between traditional print
media and computer communications last night at a meeting of the
Northern New England Unix Users Group. I wasn't talking about
market share or audience size so much as about the difference in the
dynamic. Here's a relevant excerpt from my recent article in INDEX ON
CENSORSHIP:
---
This reliance on the printed word is, of course, something that the
computer-based services share with traditional print media. But they
differ from print media--and from broadcast media--in two very important
ways. First, the means of communication are cheap enough for almost
everyone to gain access: a desktop computer and a modem can be purchased
now for a few hundred dollars (still another way in which the new medium
is far more democratic than its predecessors).
The second difference follows from the first: while traditional print
and broadcast media rely on a "one-to-many" model, computer-based
communications of the new sort are "many-to-many." A newspaper is a
typical "one-to-many" system: information gathering and reporting is
supervised by hierarchy of editors and other management personnel who
control the flow of copy and make numerous editorial judgments about what
information to include or discard. Information tends to go in one
direction only: from the editors to the readers.
Computer information services, in contrast, are "many-to-many"
systems--in general, they rely on little or no hierarchical editing
function. Instead, these services are a colloquy of different voices with
different styles, with information flowing in multiple directions at once.
The "filtering" function performed by newspaper editors is left to the
readers, who are also contributors. The very distinction between "reader"
and "reporter" is blurred.
This may sound like anarchy, but in practice it's more like a town-hall
meeting, albeit one in which everyone has a chance to speak, no one is
shouted down, and everyone has time to develop and explain her ideas. Some
systems, like Compuserve, rely on moderators to keep conferences on track,
but their role is less that of the editor, who may make line-by-line
changes of a writer's copy, than that of a discussion leader. At their
best, these online conferences manifest a give-and-take that surpasses
even that of face-to-face discussions. When we're face-to-face, the
intimacy of physical proximity tends to be offset by inevitable starts,
stops, and hesitations of oral conversation, and by the distractions of
physical presence. Online, we each have the chance to write paragraphs
rather than sentences--to develop arguments rather than interject
comments.
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
The SURFPUNK Technical Journal is a dangerous multinational hacker zine
originating near BARRNET in the fashionable western arm of the northern
California matrix. Quantum Californians appear in one of two states,
spin surf or spin punk. Undetected, we are both, or might be neither.
________________________________________________________________________
Send postings to <surfpunk@osc.versant.com>, subscription requests
to <surfpunk-request@osc.versant.com>. MIME encouraged.
Xanalogical archive access soon. SURFPUNK, the final ripoff.
________________________________________________________________________
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From: eugene@jimmy.public.su (Eugene SKEPNER)
Newsgroups: alt.emusic,alt.rock-n-roll,rec.music.country.western,
rec.music.misc,rec.music.gaffa,rec.music.bluenote
Subject: TWaits ( TWaites ? )
Date: Sat, 20 Feb 93 15:27:50 +0200
Distribution: world
Message-ID: <ABM7ZXhaJH@jimmy.public.su>
Hi friends,
we here in Russia not only know where is screen and where is keyboard, but
listening Tom Waits also. But catching not all the words. As well as some
Americans we've found here, according to our tests. I'm interested in two
texts especially - "In The Morning I'll Be Gone" & "Cold, Cold Ground".
Does anybody have a copy? - I'll be grateful. Please, PLEASE don't send me
a full songbook - I'm scored both for outgoing and incoming traffic (so
don't score me for my language at least), though I'll appreciate someone
indicating me where on the net can I find it. Sorry if I've knocked a
wrong door/newsgroup - would you please lead me to appropriate one? - and
don't bury all my dreams in the cold-cold ground.
Mike.
