As if we didn't have enough problems, it now looks like we'll have to contend with rabid, lawsuit-hungry Australians who want to take you to the courtroom cleaners if they don't like what you say about them.

The bad guy this time is a Melbourne mining mogul,Joseph Gutnik, who somehow managed to sue the New Jersey-based financial publishing powerhouse Dow Jones over a Barron's article that he claims was unflattering to his reputation. What makes this so serious is that the article merely appeared on the Barron's Website.

Dow Jones countered that since the Webpage is created and published in the U.S., the suit would logically fall under U.S. law, which is less stringent than the Australian version. But Australia's high court seems to feel that a Webpage is fundamentally equivalent to a newspaper, and thus vulnerable to Aussie law.

Mr Gutnik was delighted by the ruling.

"It will certainly be re-established that the net is no different than a regular newspaper, that you have to be careful what you write and if you offend somebody or write malicious statements about people... then you can be subject to being prosecuted," he said.

Illness du Jour

Seems like the medical community never runs out of stuff to diagnose you with. But just in case, they reserve the right to make up whatever they need right on the spot. For instance, the hot new calamity is Hurried Woman Syndrome.

You gotta read this one. The story tracks a Mrs. Lee who was feeling a bit run down. She saw her doctor, Brent Bost, an Ob-Gyn in Beaumont, Texas, and "the author of The Hurried Woman Syndrome." Three guesses what he diagnosed Lee with. Aw, you guessed right!

The four major symptoms associated with the syndrome are weight gain, low sex drive, moodiness and fatigue. Over the course of time, experts believe, these symptoms can trigger changes in brain chemistry that are very similar to depression, although not as severe.

So what do you do if you suffer from Hurried Woman Syndrome? If you listen to Bost, he'll charge you $250 an hour to tell you to slow down. The Raven offers the same advice, gratis. My gift to humanity.

Dept. of Modern Aphorisms

This is a new section, in which I will convey that which I have learned about leading a fulfilling and self-actualized lifestyle.

• In the Mariachi band of life, you want to be the guy who occasionally yells out, "Ai-yi-yi-yi!"
  
• If you're involved in a kinky sex game that involves a whip, hold the whip.
  
• Avoid eating things labled "new and improved."
  
• Cutting someone off only feels good momentarily, but it's a good feeling.
  

7:14:24 PM       

Too much to round up this morning. Like over at the NYT they've got a story on the CAPTCHA Project.

The acronym stands for "Completely Automated Public Turing Test to Tell Computers and Humans Apart," and is used by services like Yahoo! that are under pressure from scripts and data mining programs. Yahoo doesn't want to deal with you unless you're a human being, so they set up a CAPTCHA, like the graphic at the right and ask you to type what you see into a window.

You've probably had to pass one of these already—I have—and isn't it interesting that instead of trying to create interfaces that are machine-friendly, we're now working on ways to confuse them?

Rogue computer programs masquerading as teenagers were infiltrating Yahoo chat rooms, collecting personal information or posting links to Web sites promoting company products. Spam companies were creating havoc by writing programs that swiftly registered for hundreds of free Yahoo e-mail accounts then used them for bulk mailings.

The Check-Out Aisle

Good news if you're a frequent flier. According to Nando the TSA is easing up on airport security restrictions, at least while we're at ThreatCon Yellow. Different levels of security are in place depending on which airport you go to, but in general, expect that:

• You can now park closer to the terminal.
  
• There will be fewer, if any, gate screenings.
  
• Random gates will be "screen-free."
  

Korean Hospitality

Every now and then, some U.S. serviceman stationed in Okinawa does something dumb and criminal, like attacking a native. Then the Japanese picket the base, the commander apologizes, and everybody waits for the next one. Now it's happened in Korea.

In this case, however, the protests are looking more forceful and the U.S. government (probably in the guise of the President) ought to address this immediately and sincerely:

The protesters, many of them students, demanded an apology from President Bush over the deaths of two South Korean teenage girls last June in an accident involving a tank driven by American soldiers.

11:25:16 AM