More Junkmail from Bob!
Wednesday, September 6, 2000Important Stuff.
Good news! Today's Junkmail is a short one, not to mention somewhat tardy.
Steam Rings
In 475 BC, on the island of Sicily, Mount Etna erupted. It has several times since then. Even now, it's pretty active. Last February, three guys (Jurg, Marco, and Roberto) noticed some smoke rings coming out of the mountain. Actually, these smoke rings are steam. They happen almost every day. They're around 600 feet in diameter, go up about 3000 feet, and last up to ten minutes. Try THAT with your cigar! Here's a picture.
To read the article, go to http://www.amnh.org/naturalhistory and search for "Hoopla".
Tuvalu Internet Service
Tuvalu is a string of 9 Polynesian islands east of Fiji. It's name means 8 islands, because the 9th used to be uninhabited. At least by people. I'm not sure about many people live in Tuvalu, but judging by their phone directory it's not very many.
They were recently admitted as a member nation of the U.N. They had been wanting to join for quite some time now, but the $30,000 entry fee was a little steep. Where did they come up with the cash? From a dot-tv dot-com.
Tuvalu, which got internet service about a year ago, has the domain extension .tv, instead of .ca for Canada, .fr for France, or .su for Saturn. A company some people started in California, interestingly enough called Dot TV, offered Tuvalu $50,000,000 for rights to sell .tv domain names. I think they've paid them about $17,000,000 so far. In addition to joining the U.N., Tuvalu plans to upgrade their airstrip and modernize the island.
If you happen to move to Tuvalu, here's where to get your internet service:
http://www.tuvalu.tv
Dot-Com Update
How are other dot-coms doing? About the same. Here's some from the past week or so. Steven Spielberg's Pop.com laid off almost everybody and is said to be shutting down. Maybe he's going to let his sister support him? (His sister is in the midst of a lawsuit against an airline. A plane hit some turbulence, so she sued, claiming she thought she might die because of the bumps.) Stiffs.com is pretty sick, and also pretty broke. Change.com laid off all but 8 employees. Getmedia.com is out of business. Affinia.com is out. xseeksy.com isn't paying employees. Oncourt.com is off court. Ezesurf.com is history. Savishopper.com -- gone. Womenconnect.com -- gone. Etc.
This could be the year of the dot-tv's.
For lack of other content, here are some Pictures of Today. Again today, bug pictures!
This is a big butterfly, landing, eating, and leaving.
This is a small brown butterfly, not to be confused with the medium-sized brown one in a previous Junkmail:
We used to call these cow killers:
They're hard to catch with a camera when they're moving. This one finally stopped when he got here and felt safe:
This is not merely a fly. It's a green bottle fly. I think.
Here's a horsefly in a losing battle with a garden spider.
Here's Matthew crossing Pryor Creek on its newest bridge. Ken Prather owes me lunch.
And finally, some cloud pictures, complete with interesting colors.
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