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T A B L E__T A L K Is free software finally gaining ground in the OS wars? Discuss Linux vs. NT and others in the Digital Culture area of Table Talk - - - - - - - - - - R E C E N T L Y Soweto online By Andrew Leonard Where millions don't have plumbing or telephones, who needs the Net? (11/16/98) "Griffin & Sabine's" letters go digital By Scott Rosenberg "Ceremony of Innocence" CD brings a postcard romance to your screen (11/13/98) The 21st Challenge No. 15 Results By Charlie Varon and Jim Rosenau Haiku for telemarketers (11/13/98) Martin Luther, meet Linus Torvalds By Thomas Scoville Linux and free software challenge the Microsoft papacy (11/12/98) Is there such a thing as a software monopoly? By Mike Romano Microsoft says no -- and its arguments could provoke changes in the antitrust laws (11/11/98) - - - - - - - - - - BROWSE THE 21ST FEATURES ARCHIVES - - - - - - - - - - 21st Log A patent from secretive Transmeta launches a buzz - - - - - - - - - - S A L O N E M P O R I U M FREE! 12-ounce bag of Salon Blend with a purchase of $30 or more. While supplies last.

------t o p  o f  t h e  f r a g  h e a p ---Can the pixel-pounding success of one Quake player named ------Thresh turn gaming into a true professional sport? BY JANELLE BROWN | Woody wants to be a professional computer gamer when he grows up. It's difficult to cajole an articulate reason out of him for this ambition -- he's just a 10-year-old boy -- but he says he thinks it's "exciting" and you can "make money" doing it. He's here in a San Francisco cybercafe at the third-season finals of the AMD Professional Gamers' League with his father, who let him take the day off school to watch the Quake gamer legends fight it out on a virtual battlefield. And at the moment one of those heroes is signing a PGL pennant for him: "Woody -- Keep practicing, and keep your faith. Thanks, Immortal." "Immortal" isn't all that much older that Woody: He's only a 15-year-old kid from Pleasanton, Calif., real name Kurt Shimada. But Immortal is the hero of the day; last night, he had the rare glory of beating champion "Thresh" at Quake II -- only the second person in the recorded history of the bloody game who has had that privilege. Immortal is here, along with 31 other finalists from across the country, in hopes of becoming the next Thresh: a legitimately professional gamer who is making more than $100,000 a year for his ability to "frag" -- blow virtual warriors into pixelated bits at incredible speeds. Of course, they have to beat Thresh first. Gaming is, by most measures, one of the most popular pastimes for pubescent males; the gaming industry as a whole, according to the Interactive Digital Software Association, brought in a whopping $5.1 billion in sales in 1997, not including hardware and peripheral sales. Online gaming is only a fraction of that market, but it boasts the most hardcore fans and fiercest competition. The year-old Professional Gamer's League, conceived and launched by online gaming site Total Entertainment Network and chip manufacturer AMD, was created to take advantage of that market. The idea: Create a kind of NFL for the gaming community, in which the best gamers can win huge prizes, the big gaming companies can promote their goods and the industry can encourage young boys to play (and spend) even more in their pursuit of becoming "professional gamers." The gambit seems to be working: The PGL drew in 1,700 contestants for the last biannual season, as well as $100,000 in prize money offered up by sponsors like Diamond Multimedia, Logitech, GTE and 3Com. The organizers boast they'll eventually turn fragging into a legitimate Olympic sport, broadcast gaming on ESPN and transform the best players into paid professionals on par with Michael Jordan. The only problem, so far, is that there's only one person who's really doing well: Thresh, aka Dennis Fong, a 21-year-old from Berkeley, Calif. N E X T_P A G E .|. Teens dream of dumping geometry to make money with their mice