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T A B L E__T A L K

Getting your parents online: It isn't easy, but it can be worth it. Discuss your experiences with hooking up the parental modem in Table Talk's Digital Culture area

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R E C E N T L Y

Beck to the future
By Milo Miles
Defying copyright, purveyors of "recombinant music" use the Net to make new sounds out of old shards
(04/02/98)

Microsoft throws in the towel
Salon staff report
Software giant capitulates to government, sets new course
(04/01/98)

Let's Get This Straight
By Scott Rosenberg
Media genuflect before Intel's royal-succession pageant
(03/31/98)

What's new is old
By Andrew Leonard
The NCSA "What's New" page is a time capsule from the Web's infancy
(03/30/98)

Tricks of the trade
By David Futrelle
A Web radio show gives porn-site webmasters a place to talk shop and schmooze
(03/27/98)

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BROWSE THE
21ST ARCHIVES

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The winning entry offered more than just a jaded view of technology; Randy Brown's plea included the right amount of fund-raising elbow grease to put the letter over the top. Everyone with a kid in school knows you can't raise money without some sort of crisis at hand.

Dear "Screaming Meemie" Booster:

As you know, our high school is very proud of its 20-workoutstation virtual gymnasium. This technology -- paid for by the sale of our wonderful Booster Club candies -- eliminated the costly infrastructure of our physical education program, and gave our Meemies a winning edge.

Recently, however, our football team's virtual training program was "infected" with the chess club's tournament database -- and with SimPogrom, used in Ms. Hess' Soviet Perspectives class.

WE NEED YOUR HELP! While a "virtual hygiene" class should prevent future incidents, we have no money for purging the Gym Operating System. Meanwhile, our quarterbacks are sacked daily by Cossacks, and our defensive line can only move diagonally. Selling Screaming Meemie Jelly Beanies has never been more important! Go Meemies!

(Randy Brown)

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Roberts,

We at Sonny Bono Middle School wish to apologize from the bottom of our hearts for the recent glitch that affected your son Destiny.

While the Learning Through Hypnosis system installed last year has been a great success, it has not been without its problems now and then. Who could have anticipated that the very students who installed the access firewall would be the ones who would go in and reprogram the lessons? Our team of child psychologists assures us that there will be no long-term issues with your son -- except perhaps that he may now and again wake up at dawn and chase chickens.

(Mark Miller)

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Dear Concerned Parents of Goosewood School:

A new technology has recently become available that is unmatched in the field of information transmission. This technology is unmatched in terms of price, portability and utility and is vital to the task of readying your children for the 21st century.

This technology is called "a book." For the price of wiring up one classroom for the Internet, literally hundreds of these books can be purchased. Surprisingly enough, they also have many large advantages over the computers currently installed in the classroom.

They are portable. Children will be able to take them home and peruse them at their leisure. They are cheap enough that each child can literally have one or more of these books all to his or herself. No more restricting access to only part of the day because of limited equipment. They are compatible with the most widely used information transmission format ever created. Literally all the world's literature is available in this format.

(Steve Burnap)

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Dear Tax Base:

As you know, "Kids Today" have an uncanny and intuitive grasp of technology. This is a resource that the Boomertown Public School District had never utilized -- until now!

Starting this fall, Boomertown students will be re-introduced to the world of computers in a curricular initiative we call "The Compu-Kids Project." Three full hours of every school day will be spent building essential technology fundamentals.

As we all know from our own educational experiences, nothing builds proficiency and confidence quite like drills. Through repetition, your children will gain mastery of elusive concepts like "Drag-and-Drop," "Num and Caps Lock" and "Brightness and Contrast."

With your support, your children's abilities can once again return to manageable levels.

(Eli Neiburger)

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Dear parents:

As discussed and approved in the last school board meeting, the calculator implant plan is still on schedule.

As you know, we will be surgically implanting a graphing calculator inside your child's arm in such a way that the buttons and screen are still visible through the skin. This will not only help us lower the cost in broken and stolen calculators we experience every month, but it will provide your child with a tool that will be with them for the years to come, even after college.

We hope you are as excited about this opportunity as we are.

(David Renteria)

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Dear Parents:

As you have probably heard by now, we are planning to replace our physical education program ("gym") with a curriculum that focuses less on 19th century fitness requirements such as strength and flexibility, and more on 21st century activities such as repetitive strain, day-long VDT viewing and workplace stress.

We are currently equipping our former gymnasium with 400 professional-quality cubicles and underpowered computers so that your children may be better prepared for the environment of the future. In a standard session, students will be expected to remain seated at all times and will be graded on ability to work around discomfort, malfunctioning equipment, buggy software and overbearing bosses.

Please direct any comments or concerns to our new Director of Education, Ned Ludd VII.

(Val Dodge)

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Thanks for all your submissions -- and check back in two weeks for the next Salon 21st Challenge.
SALON | April 3, 1998

Charlie Varon is a humorist and playwright. His works include "Ralph Nader Is Missing" and "Rush Limbaugh in Night School." Jim Rosenau is a writer, editor and software designer in Berkeley, Calif. Jim and Charlie are also co-founders of the citizen group Californians for Earthquake Prevention and partners in Mockingbird Productions, which offers a full line of comic services.