[We wrote about Iraq's first ever Internet café. It's amazing. Just not very useful and a little scary. And no, we don't think this letter is either big or clever]

Iraq's first Internet café opens up the world

Shouldn't The Register be in the forefront of the Iraqi e-revolution? Why don't you have a contest to name the Bhagdad Internet Cafe?

Some suggestions include "The Internet of the Chaldees", "The Sargon Connection", "The Internet Ur Us", "Gilgameshnet", "The Fertile Croissant", "The Old Woman of Ba'ath", "Kish and Tell", "The Little Nippur","Ninevah On Sunday", and"Hammurabi Alley". Frequenters of the cafe will also be able to send messages via "Ishmael".

The lucky winner whose entry is used to name the "Mother of all Internet Cafes" will be a guest at a Scud and poison gas party hosted by the Overclocker of Bhagdad, himself, Saddam Hussein. Please don't Hittite me for making the suggestion.

Yours Faithfully,
Robert M. "To Ur is Human" Schwartz

[Stephen King is to sell his latest book online. The odd thing is you buy the chapter once you have read it. A reader tries this out and found one fundamental flaw]

Stephen King's online book sales wilt

Of course only a mean spirited bounder would suggest that sales are not that hot because the book's not actually very good. (And yes, I have read it - and paid for it, too.) I've read my fair share of King books, but this online effort's really a bit crap.

Plus, looking at the maths side of things, for your $1 you get approx 20 pages (a lot of which are very spaced out pages). So for an average 300/400 page book (and his books have a habit of going on for more than that) you might be looking at $15-20.

Hmmm - I think I'll wait for the £4.99 paperback at WHSmugs.

Kind regards

Charlie Robin

[Bluetooth's great ain't it? The stuff you can do with it. It's just incredible. Change the world. Now where the bloody hell is it?]

More Bluetooth hype...

Maybe it's just my cynical side but I think we have been hearing this statement from researchers all too often:

"The researchers indicate that demand for the products will be consumer driven..."

Oh really? Well PRAISE JESUS, I didn't know that I had so much power (says the consumer). Actually what them there researchers all want to say is this (more like the way of the World Federation of Wrestling):

"Man, your business is just going to up and die if you don't use our BlueFANG technology. Every refrigerator, every vacuum cleaner every thing on this whole damn earth is going to be networked to the FANG. The consumer?...ha....ha...ha, we tell them bastards how to eat, how sleep and how to beep. We're going to ram this stuff down their throats and they are going to like it!!!"

And of course only after it doesn't work, after they have spent millions marketing, manufacturing and shipping...only then...in the case that it doesn't turn out the way they planned, do they fall back on their previous statement about the all-knowing consumer and his/her demand. No researcher ever says this: If they don't want it; we can't sell it. And why is this the case?

Because they'd look like indecisive little pansies that don't know anything--Of course they have to be reserved in front of the press so they say something lame like "demand for the products will be consumer driven". Every one of these researchers have a completely different jargon at the office away from the press. They mostly act like people the World Federation of Wrestling as I mentioned above.

Isn't that the reason why Scott McNealy of SUN is so exciting to listen to? He doesn't give lame press statements. There. I feel much better.

Bill

[Linda witnessed first hand the passing of the much-contested RIP Bill, which will effectively allow the police to snoop on the UK Internet traffic. She was seriously underwhelmed by the perfomance]

Blair gets RIP thanks to a few sleepy MPs

This has to be the most disgusting political scene I have ever witnessed.

There should be an immediate lynching of all politicians - it is now open season - shoot on sight!

What a lousy, lazy, superficial, dishonest bunch of lowlife scabs they are. Where were the 90+ per cent of the "elected" representatives? Off screwing the taxpayer?

If only 4.5 per cent even bothered to attend to the vote in such a half-arsed manner, what signal does that send to the rest of the world? Britain outdoes Australia for stupidity - Australia relinquishes the crown. Or - Third world rejoice - mass exodus of high tech

[Email ends suddenly. Another turns up 17 minutes later]

Damn - hit the send key before being finished...

From here in Australia, watching the absolute bullshit espoused by ignorant, overpaid politicians (same in Australia), I am absolutely amazed that such a low point could be achieved by the country that founded one of the fairest legal systems in the world.

This is a very dark day for British people. You are going to have to get militant to fight for rights that the government has absolutely no mandate to abuse. From now on, any correspondence to my British friends will always be encrypted to the max.

As we might say - "This just ain't British".

Jeff

My PGP public key is attached, just in case the Gestapo try to stop you from replying.

Subject: last orders is still last orders

Not at the House of Commons bar it isn't - it's open 24 hours so that out hard-working representatives can relax after a long day counting their backhanders.

Neil Boyle

If you want to check out what happens when we empty our sack go to

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