From jmrobins @ condor.sccs.swarthmore.edu Wed May 5 11:04:26 1999 Date: Fri, 13 Dec 1996 16:42:14 -0500 (EST) From: Snibor Eoj To: _swat.org.swil <_swat.org.swil @ cc.swarthmore.edu> Subject: SWILNews #n, where 7 < n < 11 A tale of SWILnewses: On the 18th day of the 11th month, in the 5999th year since time began, three co-presidents got together to write a SWILnews. (Really. We're not making this up. Trust us. -L) (Just look at that innocent face.... um... never mind. -F) Long and hard they toiled, crafting a work the likes of which has not been seen since the creation of the perfect pizza in 1849 by Giacomo Linguini. (As an interesting historical side note, Linguini didn't realize what he had, and sold it for a nickel. The purchaser, one Andrew Carnegie by name, used that pizza as a starting point for launching his career, amassing a considerable fortune by the time he died.) Eventually, having sculpted this masterpiece of business both SWIL and non-SWIL, they sent it out to the masses. A brief interlude: There are evil forces in the world. Forces we cannot begin to comprehend. They lurk everywhere, waiting to wreak havoc upon the unsuspecting. In fact, it is even possible for these harbingers of doom to hide out within a computer (hence the use of the term daemon in computer science). We now return you to the story already in progress: It is estimated that the time it takes from when you click the "Send" button until the message gets from your computer to the server is approximately 0.5834 seconds. Unfortunately, this was time enough. The daemons of Fraternite's computer knew that if this SWILnews was allowed to exist, it would bring about a new era of peace, harmony, and happiness, something they could not tolerate. Thus, as the message departed to the nether region known as "The Internet" the daemons adjusted a single bit. One 0 became a 1, and it was enough. A considerable time later, the co-presidents pondered the fact that their SWILnews had never showed up. "What could have happened?" they wondered. They could not guess it, until a message arrived from the daemons. Then they knew what fate had befallen their work. The daemons had set the Invisible flag to true. Their SWILnews was out there, hiding in people's mailboxes, but nobody would ever know it, for that SWILnews was never to be found. At this, the co-presidents rent their garments (for $10 a day? -F) and let loose a howl of anguish, for they knew in their hearts that there would never again be such a document. They alone had been blessed with the knowledge of its existence, and the rest of the world would have to live without it. Great was their sorrow, and they mourned for many days. However, it soon came time to once again take up the keyboard and bring into being another SWILnews. Though they knew that this work would pale in comparison to their previous efforts, the co-presidents resolutely began work on this new document. Time passed, and their labors were completed. They had a new SWILnews. Once again, they sent it forth, that the masses would be informed of all the goings on, strange and otherwise. Another brief interlude: There is a criminal known as The Man in Orange and Purple Polka-Dots, about whom very little is known. The FBI has been hunting him for several months, but to little avail. He perpetrates his crimes over the internet, weaving fantastic paths through domains everywhere, so that it is difficult to trace his route, and he can disappear before they can find him. Nevertheless, they continue their efforts, searching everywhere where any trace of him has been found. The story continues: It just so happens that the MOPPD has recently made use of a Swarthmore server as a part of his ingenious and insidious plots. You may be wondering what the siginificance of this is to our story. The answer is this: The FBI traced his route to Swarthmore, and was conducting an investigation of all traffic on our network at that time. The leader of this crack team of computer experts was Harris Farkin. Harris Farkin is a devoted fan of Keanu Reeves, and would do anything to protect Keanu's honor and prestige. (He/It has honor and prestige? -L) Imagine his shock when he discovered a document that was being sent out across the Swarthmore network in which Mr. Reeves was slandered in a most vile fashion, and made the butt of a large quantity of jokes. Something seemed a bit fishy. Mr. Farkin made a decision. He could not allow this message to survive, for the safety of the nation. (A questionable decision, surely, but it was his call.) He traced it back to Fraternite's room, then killed the message. Minutes later, he and his men broke in on the three co-presidents, who were now idly chatting about the upcoming holiday. While holding your co-presidents at gunpoint, he went over to the computer, and deleted all traces of the original message. He informed us that no further action would be taken against us, but that we had better watch ourselves, and that we were not to try to recreate the document in question under any circumstances. A secret interruption of which Liberte is unaware: A secret organization has been formed at the Swarthmore campus to destroy SWIL, calling themselves LIWS (Let's Immediately Whack SWIL). They have vowed to counteract any action SWIL takes, including the creation of SWILnewses. Whether they can effectively carry out this threat remains to be seen. Now where was I? Oh yes, the regular story: And now we come to this, our penultimate SWILnews. It is finals week, and we have little time to devote to such activities. Fraternite is studying for an Algebra exam. Egalite is writing three papers, one with each hand, and one with his left foot. Only Liberte remains to try to pass on the vital information to the masses. And so I sit here typing, hoping that my words will reach someone. Only time will tell. In case they do, however, they will bring you the... SWILbusiness: All present folks (except Josh Smith) wore their Josh Smith numbers to meeting. The lowest present was Melissa Binde, with a number of 1. Her prize is a cup of Mello Jello, redeemable on any odd-numbered Thursday on which the moon is waxing gibbous. Excluding those with infinite Josh numbers (i.e. no connections found yet), the highest number goes as a tie to Otavia Propper and Anna Hess. Their prize is each other, so that they can commiserate together on their lack of Josh connections. As far as we can determine, nobody took the opportunity to lower their Josh numbers while he was here, so we have no new 1's to add to the list. In a break from tradition, we began our meeting with a proof of sentience and subsequent dismemberment. The victim was Anna Hess, frishlingman of two-thousand oh-nought, a hunter from New Jersey, or perhaps an anti-fur activist from California, or a proud ML resident from Tennessee. Her proof of sentience was one of the most elaborate ones seen in a long time, and a retelling can't do it justice, but we'll try. In a recent (or perhaps not so recent) issue of The Onion, a Supreme Court case was discussed. In this case, the Supreme Court ruled that Tennesseeans are sentient beings. Anna, being from Tennessee (or so she claims), is therefore a sentient being by ruling of the Supreme Court. This was the first part of her proof. The second part was a twisted and dazzling display of logic. As displayed in the movie "The Dark Crystal," females don't not have wings. Anna is a female. Furthermore, bats don't not have wings, so Anna is related to a bat. Vampires often take the form of bats, so this brings up the possibility of Anna being a vampire. Liberte confirmed this speculation by creating some holy water (within his power as a pope of POEE), and splashing it on Anna. As she winced in pain, he confirmed that she was indeed a vampire. The feeling of pain is a sensation. Webster's defines sentient as being able to experience sensations. Thus, since she experienced a sensation, Anna is sentient. SWIL once again decided to plan ahead, and make ready for the future. In particular, the future we considered is next semester, and, in fact, our Monday night movies. We took nominations for movies, then voted for our favorites. Here are the winning movies: Tron Clash of the Titans The Lathe of Heaven (if we can find it) The Mouse that Roared Who Framed Roger Rabbit? Mars Attacks (assuming it's out on video by the end of the semester) Miracle Mile Journey to the Center of the Earth The Wizard of Speed and Time Beastmaster The Last Starfighter Hackers and some anime yet to be determined with the following as backups in case one is not available: Big Trouble in Little China Johnny Mnemonic Westworld SWILCon proceeds apace, with Will and Andrea continuing to work towards their goal. Space has been confirmed for the Con, and an envelope stuffing took place Wednesday night, to invite people and dealers. (What I want to know is how two people can live in the same building and have two different zip codes. Sheesh. -F) The first of two animethons occured on Sunday, with 12 hours straight of anime classics provided by Larry Miller. The second one will take place early next semester, before we all have too much work to afford the time. The Saint Valentine's Day Massacre will be coming up soon after Winter Break, so be prepared! Remember to bring back appropriate garb with you from break if you haven't got any here. In case you aren't familiar with the Massacre, appropriate garb is what you would expect to see 20's gangsters and their molls wearing. Inauguration will be taking place the first Friday after Winter Break. Place and time are yet to be determined, since Bond would be preferred, but couldn't be used until 10 PM, which might be a tad late to start the festivities. We'll keep you posted. Thanks once again to Josh Smith for registering swil.org for us. For those of you who are not aware, there have been several mailing lists set up on swil.org for our benefit. They are: chit-chat - A list devoted to random chat and other silliness. Quite entertaining, though it can be high volume at times. fun - Looking for something fun to do some night? Try e-mailing the fun list. This list exists for the organization of random (or not-so-random) gaming and other fun stuff. sfdt - The Science Fiction Discussion Table, a mailing list for the discussion of various SF/F stuff. The current topic is Alien Cultures, with specific books as yet undecided. There may be more lists created in the future. We'll notify you of them as they come to be. And, finally, elections approach rapidly. This week was the time for nominations; next week (i.e. tomorrow) will be platforms and elections. In order to allow time for deliberations, platforms will be given at the beginning of meeting, and voting will be the last piece of SWILbusiness. Don't be late to meeting, or you might miss the platform of your favorite candidate! Speaking of which, the candidates are: Rumbles and Miranda Brocolli (Yech! -L) Melissa & Erik & Joe The entire class of '00. Jack (spokesman for the chain, Jack in the Box) Anna (all of them) Joel & Will Mello Jello Crunchy Cod and Keanu Reeves Megan & Jess Ross and Katie Jello and Pepper (Emits heat! Really!) Tupperware, Cockroaches, and a Thermonuclear Missle Grapenuts and Sprite Note that the Goat is not running. Josh Smith proclaimed himself a medium, and stated that the spirit of the Goat informed him that it never wanted to run again. Well... if you've managed to slog through all that, I'm sure you'll love a bit of... Non-SWILbusiness: Josh Miller is planning a Prisoner-thon some time in early February. More info as it comes in. We have now seen the first four episodes of season 4 of B5 ("Hour of the Wolf," "Whatever Happened to Mr. Garibaldi?," "The Summoning," and "Falling Toward Apotheosis.") If you haven't seen them yet, don't worry; you've got two months to catch up before new episodes begin again. The Philadelphia SF Expo is happening this coming weekend at the Adam's Mark Hotel. See _swat.org.swil for information. (Guests include Walter Koenig (Bester on B5, Chekov on ST:TOS), David Prowse (Darth Vader), Jeremy Bulloch (Boba Fett), and Ethan Phillips (Neelix on ST:Voyager).) Fun and gaming happened (surprise, surprise), and is likely to occur again towards the end of exam period, before people leave. Watch _swat.org.swil or subscribe to the fun list to make sure you don't miss out. Here my message comes to an end. I pray that my words will be received and read. Attendance (12/7): Will "Vendrizi, Virini... how do you tell the difference between Centauri ministers and the things from Exogenesis? They're both slimy bastards!" Quale Andrea "Six hours of sleep between 9 & 3" Hall Anna "From the chromosomal dumpsite that is the Volunteer State" Hess Kira "Queen of the Post-it Notes" Goetschius Heather "17 days until I can go home" Weidner David "Josh # of infinity and damn proud of it" Phillips Josh "this is _not_ my fault" Smith (No comment. -L) John "It is so!" Finkbiner (You tell 'im, John! -L) Larry "I might be a 2.5, I don't know" Miller Alice "Yes, I actually made it here" Unger Otavia "I'm still amazed y'all found a # for me" Propper Dave "I'm even more surprised you found a number for me!" Mimno Erik "I think we need more words like Wurlitzer" Rosolowsky Jeremy "This is _not_ an authentic woodchuck pen" Dilatush Melissa "Balloons have sentience" Binde Don't Blame Me, I voted Goat! Megan "I've had little food, little sleep, and _way_ too much caffeine!!!" Hallam Will "Mmmm... Caffeine!!!" Untereker Megan "I hope the ACWA people died in pain" Powell Jim "Integrate over roommates d(relationships), reduce the matrix..." Moskowitz Amy "No Quote" Swift Joel "Oops - forgot my Quote" McNary Sarah "?" Piatt ---Liberte