Take-a-Hike: A Very Special Invitation from EGR
Initially, we weren't going to put this on the web at all -- it was just gonna be a little note to subscribers. Then it got out of hand. Naturally.Like it says, there aren't any pichers, so it's going up bracketed in <PRE> tags and looking like what it is: email. If you don't like this format, please send your detailed thoughts to /dev/nul@panix.com.
Thank you.
SPECIAL EDITION (for subscribers only -- no web version on this one). ...in which we set out to send a little note, but get carried away... ENTROPY GRADIENT REVERSALS All Noise - All the Time Seeing as how our Gonzo Manifesto generated a record number of unsubscribes -- about five or six -- and that this helped *a little* in weeding out some of the more obvious deadwood (we picked up at least 20 times that in new subs), we thought we'd try to top our own Personal Best for generating the Most Readers Disgruntled By a Single Issue. There's quite a lot of text in this edition, but no pictures -- so sadly, we'll only be able to piss off those of you who can read. Ready on those delete keys? OK then, let's get started! EGR Nominated for Webby Awards ============================== As we just wrote at http://www.rageboy.com It seems EGR has been nominated for something called The Webby Awards, sponsored by The Web Magazine, The Discovery Channel and a bunch of obscure cyberadvertisers. This allows us to display what must be one of the all-time lamest gifs ever hacked up for an award (see graphical abomination at left -- what *is* that, an irradiated rubber glove?). But what the hell, click on it anyway and go vote for us. Think about it: if we win, you may be able to hear John Belushi's terminally disembodied voice shouting "Holy Shit!!!" over the Discovery Channel... Despite the Kindergarten Graffiks and our usual savaging of the hand that feeds us -- presumably embedded in the aforementioned glove -- the fact remains that we are so enthusiastic about this contest we can barely contain ourselves. We are so excited we could have an accident! (Maybe that's why a *rubber* glove -- though naturally, this is mere speculation.) Evidently, the sponsors were pretty excited too, as they neglected to insert actual dates into the Official Contest Rules posted on the web, depending on Unix-like parameters instead: "To enter The Web Magazine's Fly to the Webby Awards Contest (the "Contest"), vote for your favorite web site in each of 15 categories between [date and time contest began] and [date and time contest ends] on The Web Magazine's web site, Web Central Station." Never mind. Just go vote for EGR at http://www.webbyaward.com/ [actually, you can't anymore, as we had to replace the URL above with this year's, and this year we're not part of all the excitement.] Another item in the rules states that "Except where prohibited, by accepting prize, winner consents to the use of his/her name, photo and/or likeness for advertising and promotional purposes without additional compensation." In the spirit of Good Clean Fun, we really want to win and/or be selected for a prize in this competition so that, with respect to the foregoing stipulation, we can refer The Web Magazine to our own Official "Jump Up My Ass" Page, which astute readers will no doubt recall from our last outing. http://www.rageboy.com/unsubscribe.html Perhaps the full announcement we received is worth sharing -- along with the curious wrapper it arrived in. Note that it was initially sent to one "info-person," which seems to have prompted some head scratching at Panix, our Internet Service Provider in New York. Note also, that sender and signer are either different persons or a single, seriously identity-challenged, individual. >From: "Victoria O'Staff" <vf@panix.com> >Subject: Congratulations from THE WEB Magazine! (fwd) >To: clocke@rageboy.com (Christopher Locke) >Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 11:42:28 -0500 (EST) > >Apparently, this message is meant for you. Perhaps PC World doesn't >quite grok the concept of user web pages on an ISP... > >(Congrats on the nomination, though!) > >Victoria C. Fike | Praise to Eris and her Apple >Panix Support Wench | We tend her Chao who's nicely dappled >Work-stuff: vf@panix.com | As we sit here chugging Snapple >Other-stuff: tori@panix.com | Discord's good enough for me! > > >Forwarded message: >> From: angie_weber@PCWorld.com >> Date: Mon, 20 Jan 97 14:22:38 PST >> To: info-person@panix.com >> Subject: Congratulations from THE WEB Magazine! >> >> Congratulations! Your site, Entropy Gradient Reversals, has just been >> nominated for the Webby Awards. >> >> The Webby Awards is the Internet's first major content-driven, >> consumer-focused, webcast and nationally televised awards program. The >> event will take place on March 6, 1997 at the San Francisco music club >> Bimbo's. Mayor Willie Brown will introduce the bash along with other >> celebrity presenters and top-notch bands brought in by CBS affiliate, >> Alice 97.3 FM. Other Sponsors of The Webby Awards currently include >> LinkExchange, Princeton Graphic Systems, US Robotics and the Discovery >> Channel TV show, "Cyberlife," which will televise portions of the >> ceremony for a special national TV broadcast later in the year. >> >> You have the possibility of winning 2 different awards. One award is >> decided by a distinguished panel of judges in your particular category >> and the second award possibilty is The Top of The Web Award, chosen by >> by all online users. >> >> Winners will be announced at a gala event: >> >> 7PM >> March 6th, 1997 >> Bimbo's >> 1025 Columbus Avenue >> San Francisco, CA 94133 >> >> Four members of your team are cordially invited to attend the New >> Media celebration. If you cannot make it to San Francisco, there will >> be a live Webcast www.webmagazine.com 7 p.m. PST We will also >> celebrate the nominees and winners in the April < May issues of THE >> WEB Magazine. >> >> Please encourage your fans to vote for your site. We have created a >> graphic that you can post to your page that will directly link to the >> votingsite. You can download a graphic and also rsvp to the event by >> pointing your browser to www.webmagazine.com/webby/nominee >> >> Everyone who votes for "The Top of The Web Award", will automatically >> be entered into a drawing to win a free VIP trip to San Francisco from >> anywhere in the continental US to the event. >> www.webmagazine.com/webby >> >> Please forward this note to all other persons responsible for the >> site. Also, if you will, please confirm that this email has gone to >> the correct contact persons by sending a return email. >> >> Again, thank you for turning the World Wide Web into a true artform. >> >> Sincerely, >> >> Tiffany Shlain >> Producer, The Webby Awards >> tiffany_shlain@webmagazine.com >> 415-978-3171 So, hey, brush up on your HTML, Shockwave, Perl, whatever. If you manage to leverage content-driven, consumer-focused, webcast and nationally televised techniques to turn the Web into a True Artform, then maybe you can go to Bimbo's too!!! Dear Friends, *please* help send RageBoy to this Gala Event. Just think of the good he could do there. The poor kid has been wandering around the office all week humming "Blue Moon" -- all he can think about is getting his ass on Television! Here is the Official List of Webby judges. Sure it's long, but that's the whole point. If you know any of these people personally, by all means pass along to him/her several dozen copies of this now-voluminous Special Issue. EGR is an Equal Opportunity Alienator. If we can sow even a *little* ill-will and rancorous malcontent within the self-styled Online Community, perhaps our work will not have been entirely in vain. Dean Andrews Contributing writer, THE WEB Spencer Ante Associate editor, THE WEB Justine Bateman Star of the TV series Men Behaving Badly Alex Bennett Radio host of the Alex Bennett Program on Live 105 Jane Bosveld Contributing writer, THE WEB; former editor at Ms, Omni, NetGuide Lily Burana Former editor in chief of FutureSex magazine and a THE WEB Magazine regular columnist. Ted Casablanca E! Entertainment Television and E!online gossip columnist James Cury Senior Associate Editor at THE WEB Magazine The Eels Dreamworks band, the Eels Ira Flatow Executive Producer/Host of National Public Radio Science Steve Fox Editor-in-Chief, THE WEB Angela Freeman PC World Assistant Editor (@Home section) Kurt Freytag President, Lucid Dreams David Futrelle Editor, Salon Lisa Goldman President, Construct Internet Design Michael Goodwin Movie critic, computer journalist Michael Gough Editor in Chief, Sidewalk Nina Hartley Adult film actress, and now a mainstream film actress Ean Hauts Multiplayer gaming expert and computer journalist Eric Hellweg Contributing writer, THE WEB; Staff Editor, PC World Penn Jillette Magician, prankerster [sic], performer Amy Johns Wired magazine editor Pagan Kennedy Contributing Editor, THE WEB Magazine; author Todd Lappin Cyberrights Editor, Wired Rob Levine Music Critic and WEB Magazine contributing editor Karen Libertore Online Producer, MacWorld Online Jennife McDonald Literary Agent Mark Meadows Creative Director, Construct Internet Design Pamela Mendels Reporter, New York Times CyberTimes Sia Michel Contributing Editor, THE WEB; Associate Editor, SPIN Erika Milvy Freelance Writer Lisa Palac Founding Editor of FutureSex Magazine Tony Perkin Editor-in-Chief, Red Herring David Pescovitz Author, Editor Adam Philips Contributing Writer, THE WEB Suzan Revah Contributing Writer, THE WEB; Associate Editor,American Journalism Review Derk Richardson Music, TV, and Film Critic Bob Sabat Managing Editor, SmartMoney Nathan Schedroff Creative Director, VIVID Studios Dr. Leonard Shlain Surgeon, Author R.U. Sirius Author; Cofounder of MONDO 2000 Howard Smukler Attorney Michael J. Straczynski Creator and Producer of SCI-FI TV series Babylon 5 Jennifer Sucov Senior Editor, Folio Eric Tyson Contributing Writer, THE WEB; Syndicated Columnist; Author Laura Victoria WEB Magazine Sex section Writer Brad Wieners An Editor, HardWired Bernie Yee Author of many gaming books Zak Zaidman Founder, Gravity, Inc. Henry Rosenthal Independent Film Producer Glen Helfand Freelance Writer Marjorie Ingall Freelance Writer We say: spam em all! Especially that newbie "R.U. Sirius" -- ya gotta love these people with AOL handles like that! But gosh, we hope they pick us anyhow... Oh yeah, and one last thing. Let's not have anyone from this group putting that award nomination gif at www.webbyaward.com/nominees on his/her own site. It's one thing to poke fun, but quite another to be a dirty underhanded cheater! [Besides, it's too late now anyway, as that was last year and, this being the web after all, it's a goner. -ed] Just When We Thought We Couldn't Take It Anymore... =================================================== We have to go to California on business next week (bummer), so there won't be another issue for a while. However, be sure to drop by t@p online at http://www.taponline.com next Wednesday (Jan 29). Tara Calishain <calumet@mindspring.com> writes zine reviews with wit and panache, and she's done a bang up job on EGR. The section is hard to find from the homepage, so go direct to http://www.taponline.com/fringe/views/zines/012897/index.html You needn't wait til Wednesday, of course; her stuff is really good and points to a fair number of nifty web pubs that EGR readers may enjoy. Just don't enjoy them too much, or you're off the list. This website says of itself: t@p online is the largest and most publicized website on the Internet aimed at the "Next Generation"... With four network sites and more than 15,000 pages of information, t@p has something for everyone... t@p online is a high traffic site receiving an average of 12 million hits a month, 500,000 visitors a month and 4 million page views a month. Combine this with the fact that, thanks to SuperKoolDude Mark Grimes, EGR is heavily linked to the new Callahan site at http://www.eyescream.com/callahan -- which in turn has been featured all week on Netscape's "What's New" page -- and you get a growth curve that's clearly on a collision course with the Ultimate Bandwidth Limits of the Internet Itself. Thus, we hope readers will understand why we are attempting to get our unsubscribe rate up as high as possible before the shit really hits the fan. Please volunteer today for the new EGR Early Retirement and Chicken Whirling Plan so that others on the distribution list won't have to be Downsized later. Thanking you in advance for your attention to this matter at your earliest convenience, we remain...b'd'yeah, b'd'yeah, b'd'yeah...
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Entropy Gradient Reversals CopyLeft Christopher Locke clocke@rageboy.com http://www.rageboy.com"reality leaves a lot to the imagination..." John Lennon
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