HERE鈥橲 a touching story of the times. The Boulder, Colorado, Daily Camera reported a couple of weeks ago that an armed police SWAT team had to be called when a 32-year-old man from Boulder was overheard screaming threats to a 鈥渂itch鈥� he wanted 鈥渢o kill鈥� in his apartment. The man, who had earlier opened his patio door because of the unusually warm weather, was seen brandishing what appeared to be a handgun.
As a precaution, officers evacuated the apartment building and closed the surrounding streets to traffic before moving in on the man 鈥� only to discover that the 鈥渂itch鈥� he was shouting at was his computer. The 鈥済un鈥� he was waving was a plastic pellet gun.
The man, whose name was withheld because he had committed no crime, was 鈥渟urprised, embarrassed and apologetic鈥�, said deputy police chief Dave Hayes.
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IN 1902, the anarchist Emma Goldman had this to say about free speech: 鈥淲e shall soon be obliged to meet in cellars, or in darkened rooms with closed doors, and speak in whispers lest our next door neighbours should hear that freeborn citizens dare not speak in the open.鈥�
Goldman was deported from the US in 1919 after spending two years in prison for opposing conscription to the First World War. And now, more than 60 years after her death, she has been in trouble with the authorities again. The University of California鈥檚 Emma Goldman Papers Project was recently prevented by the university from including quotes by Goldman about free speech and her opposition to war in the fund-raising appeal it regularly sends out. 鈥淭he university,鈥� The New York Times reported, 鈥渄eemed the topics too political as the country prepares for possible military action against Iraq.鈥�
Happily, Goldman is now out of the cellar. The Emma Goldman Papers Project is based in Berkeley, famous in the radical 1960s as the home of free speech. Reaction to the university鈥檚 action was so damning, both on and off the campus, that it has said Goldman鈥檚 quotes can go back into the letter.
THE 鈥淵ear Ahead in Science鈥� newsletter put out by GlaxoSmithKline and the Association of British Science Writers is a useful month-by-month list of scientific meetings, conferences and other events taking place in the course of the year. The most recent newsletter begins:
鈥淲elcome to the Year Ahead in Science 2002 monthly alert 鈥� letting you know what is happening in the world of science next month鈥�
鈥�1 Feb 2002: Science Museum 2002, Alfa Romeo 鈥� Sustaining Beauty 鈥� 90 years of art in engineering.
鈥�1 Feb 1905: Birth of Emilio Gino Segr猫.
鈥�1 Feb 2002: Awareness Meeting 鈥� Food Standards.
鈥�1 Feb 2002: Raynaud鈥檚 & Scleroderma Awareness Month鈥︹��
And so it goes on for several pages. Some mistake, perhaps?
READING New 杏吧原创 is, we hear, more enjoyable than stripping off. On 11 January, The Independent newspaper in London ran a list of 鈥渢he 50 best ways to make you feel better instantly鈥� in its Saturday magazine. In at number 39 was 鈥淪ubscribe to New 杏吧原创鈥�, two places ahead of 鈥淭ake off all your clothes鈥�.
Sadly, however, we were beaten to a higher ranking by pleasures such as eating chocolate, buying a work of art, and learning to drive a steam engine.
MICKEY MOUSE will not slip into the public domain this year after all. Last week the US Supreme Court upheld a 20-year extension to all US copyrights, which means that the Disney corporation鈥檚 rights over the celebrated mouse will continue to be protected until 2023.
Corporate owners of copyrights on films, books and music are all cheering at the news. Not so happy are observers who note that copyright is supposed to provide an incentive to creators, not an everlasting cash cow for corporations.
Walt Disney himself is, of course, beyond incentives. He produced his first animated short, Steamboat Willie, in 1928 and died in 1966.
YASAMUSA Kanada has calculated 蟺 to 1.24 trillion decimal places. It took 400 hours of supercomputer number-crunching to churn out this many digits 鈥� of which no more than the first thousand or so are of any conceivable practical use.
Sadly, Kanada is no nearer to completely revealing the value of 蟺 than he was when he started, as it extends to an infinite number of decimal places. Kanada has broken his own world record with this new and longer version of 蟺, but as the digits after the decimal point are thought to occur randomly, we wonder where he intends to stop.
FINALLY, when the library service at North Tyneside in north-east England sent out an email advertisement for a 鈥減roject worker for digitisation of children鈥檚 learning materials鈥�, surely it wasn鈥檛 supposed to end up in reader Matthew Searle鈥檚 inbox as 鈥淧roject Worker for Digitisation of Children鈥�. Or does this mean you can now email the kids to school each morning?
Meaningless technospeak from Towsure, the catalogue devoted to accessories for those who want to tow things: 鈥淒eluxe Towing Mirror 鈥� the ultimate towing mirror with wind resistant dynamic hole鈥�