Sweepings From Under the Web

Best Bet for Rotating Storage

In the past couple of years the CD-Rom has been touted as one of the saviours of the publishing industry. This incredibly high volume low cost storage medium was seen as a possible replacement for books and other permanent or even periodicly changing text, graphics, sound and motion. At the recent W.R.I.T.E. 94 conference this medium was explored in very great depth, with new materials on show and some of the movers and shakers of the industry in attendance. The one memorable outcome was a comment to the effect that

"... in the light of the World Wide Web and Mosaic, the CD-Rom was somewhat like pre-Columbian Earth - flat and you fall off the edges; Mosaic on the Internet goes on forever."

The comment coupled with the falling cost of traditional rotating magnetic (hard drive) storage leads us to suspect that the CD-Rom will find its niche only in small and unconnected systems. For larger systems and especially Internet connected ones, traditional hard drives will probably rule because of their faster access and higher information density. This is born out by the recent announcement of a new Seagate 9 Gigabyte 5 1/4" form factor hard drive which can store at least the equivallent of 12 full CD-Roms, and with typical actual storage of less than 300 Megabytes each, more likely 30 - all in a space smaller than the actual stack of CD's without the necessary drive, and with faster access in all respects. And all this for far less than $1.00 per Megabyte - a price which compares very favourably with the amount of hardware (juke box) needed to access the equivallent stack of CD-Roms.

We predict that you will start to see these drives in systems like Wimsey "Real Soon Now".

Local Vancouver Seminar

A number of people have commented on the recently held Traveller's Guide to the Internet seminar at the Hotel Vancouver.

Seems that although this was the first such function put on by the organizers, most people came away with some good information and ideas. What this writer wants to know is who invited the guys in the silk suits that got up to speak at about 3:00PM?

In our opinion, these obvious Stock Promoters not only had the slickest pitch of the show, they said absolutely nothing! No prices, no demo of their self proclaimed "Best Interface", nothing but a lot of stabs at almost every local provider there is. Come on guys! This was supposed to be an educational seminar, not a blatant sales pitch. The Internet was founded on the premise of giving as good as you get - you didn't give a thing and you took our time.

Crackers

Grape vine has it that a local was spotted cleaning out their home directory after being caught working at some security cracking stuff. Next time the police might have to be called. It's not a joke.

Microsoft gets slammed

Well, maybe not slammed exactly, but Billy's going to have to lighten up on some of his contracts with people he sells his OS's to. Seems the guys in the US Govt. have finally pointed the finger at him and said "No No". Oh well, what's a guy got to do to maintain his standing as the richest man on the continent eh?

"I don't know if it will fly" dept.

Seems that Packard Bell has trundled out a line of 486 based home computers with built-in TV, radio, stereo and answering machine. Now you can tell your spouse that all you want is a better TV and get the whole bunch without their ever suspecting.

Late Breaking Flash

Brazil wins the World Cup - in world record game - 0 to 0 in regulation and after overtime. They had to resort to a Shoot Out of all things. Maybe the organizers will do something about this silly rule for next time eh?

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