Grand Challenge ends not with a bang but a whimper. The requirement to complete the qualification course was waived. The final route was reduced from 200 miles to 142. But still there was no winner. The odds on favorite, CMU's Team Red's Sandstorm, had a control failure at mile 7.4 leading to vehicle damage. None of the other bots did any better. DARPA posted a preliminary description of the results (MS Word file). Some initial press coverage: Early problems knock several robots out of Mojave Desert race, Teams Struggle in Pentagon-Sponsored Robot Race, Defeat Wins, and Desert Terrain Proves Too Rough for Robotic Racers. Sounds like DARPA may run the event again in two years.

FCC sued over broadcast flag: several public interest groups (EFF, The American Library Association, Public Knowledge, the Consumer Federation of America, and the Consumers Union) filed suit against the FCC's attempt to suck up to media barons, trample consumer rights and stifle technological development by enacting the broadcast flag requirement.

eVotes versus the real world: California state Senators Don Perata (D-Oakland) and Ross Johnson (R-Irvine) moved to ban paperless electronic voting machines from the November presidential election. Dan Gillmor points out that candidates in one Orange County race are separated by only five votes, but a recount is impossible due to black box voting machines.

Microsoft helps SCO harass Linux users but tries to claim it was merely coincidence that steering BayStar Capital to invest in SCO helps Microsoft against the Linux threat. This story was mentioned here last week and I don't think there is any new news, but fortunately for Linux folks it is moving up the media food chain: New York Times: Microsoft Said to Encourage Big Investment in SCO Group, BusinessWeek: SCO's Suit: A Match Made in Redmond?, Microsoft behind $50 million SCO investment and (OK, The Register is pretty low on the food chain, but still funny) Microsoft encouraged anti-Linux investment - shock!

Infectious Blogs: Wired's Warning: Blogs Can Be Infectious describes the flow of memes in the blogosphere. The epicenter of this research is the Blog Epidemic Analyzer from HP's Information Dynamics Lab. Nice diagram and discussion here: How News Travels on the Internet.

Technobits: good science, bad marketing: Bristol Study Proves Rival Drug Better --- RIAA setback: One File Swapper, One Lawsuit --- whence came the Quiznos "Spongmonkeys"?: Internet Animation Goes Mainstream --- way cool swimming robot.

[ The Top 5 List www.topfive.com ]
[ Copyright 2004 by Chris White ]
====================
Selected from 82 submissions from 31 contributors.
Today's Top 5 List authors are:
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David G. Scott, Kansas City, MO -- 1 (12th #1)
Greg Preece, Toronto, Canada -- 9
Paul Schindler, Orinda, CA -- 9

Starsky & Hutch

I confess that I have never seen an episode of Aaron Spelling's 1970s ABC series Starsky & Hutch. But the film, starring Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson in the title roles, hardly needs that context. It is a wonderful send-up of everything to do with that era's popular culture - fashion, hairstyles, television, music, film, cars, sex. Casting is clever, with Snoop Dog, Carmen Electra, Fred Williamson, and an uncredited Will Ferrell. Though it is little more than an expanded sketch, Starsky & Hutch is entertaining and amusing.

Spartan

David Mamet's latest is an episode of West Wing on steroids (and I mean that in a good way!). Spartan is a tightly-paced thriller that follows the hunt by a special ops team for the President's missing daughter. Val Kilmer heads the search, and he is the perfect blank page for Mamet's dialogue - terse, quietly kinetic, hyper-macho speech laced with lovely literary and arty overtones. Derek Luke (Antwone Fisher) is fine as Kilmer's protégé, as is Ed O'Neill (Al Bundy on Married...With Children) as a top Presidential operative; the normally reliable William H. Macy is miscast as another of the President's aides, and wasted in the role. Mamet continues to struggle with the differences between stage and film but, in Spartan, the difficulties are minimal and do not lessen the impact of a compelling effort.

The Post''s magazine guy, Peter Carlson, notices that big-time prof Samuel Huntington has started a bit of a controversy by arguing in the latest Foreign Policy that the "most serious challenge to America's traditional identity comes from the immense and continuing immigration from Latin America, especially Mexico, and the fertility rates of these immigrants." Among the reasons these folks shouldn't be let in. Huntington says, is that they stick to themselves and cluster in their own neighborhoods. Carlson says the prof is right:

#26: Tass Expands Into American Market
In 1982 the Connecticut Gazette and Connecticut Compass, weekly newspapers serving the Old Lyme and Mystic areas, both announced that they were being purchased by Tass, the official news agency of the Soviet Union. On their front pages they declared that this was "the first expansion of the Soviet media giant outside of the Iron Curtain." The article also revealed that after Tass had purchased the Compass, its two publishers had both been killed by "simultaneous hunting accidents" in which they had shot each other in the back of the head with "standard-issue Soviet Army rifles." The announcement was bylined "By John Reed," and the new publisher, Vydonch U. Kissov, announced that the paper would be "thoroughly red." In response to the news, the offices of the Compass and the Gazette received calls offering condolences for the death of the publishers. One caller also informed them that he had long suspected them of harboring communist tendencies, and that it was only a matter of time before all the papers in the country were communist-controlled. When the publishers tried to explain that the article had been an April Fool's prank, the caller replied, "You expect me to believe a bunch of Commies?"

Ashcroft Funds Under Scrutiny
Money Raised for Fine, Legal Costs Related to Senate Campaign