---

ACADEMIC FREEDOM ON UNIVERSITY CAMPUSES
www.eff.org

---

"On a campus that is free and open, no idea can be banned or forbidden. No viewpoint or message may be deemed so hateful or disturbing that it may not be expressed. Rules that ban or punish speech based upon its content cannot be justified."

           2. Laugh uncontrollably for about 3 minutes & then
          suddenly stop and look suspiciously at everyone who
          looks at you.

           3. When your computer is turned off, complain to the
          monitor on duty that you can't get the damn thing to work.
          After he/she's turned it on, wait 5 minutes,turn it off again,
          & repeat the process for a good half hour.

           4. Type frantically, often stopping to look at the person next to you evily.

           5. Before anyone else is in the lab, connect each
          computer to a different screen than the one it's set up with.

           6. Write a program that plays the "Smurfs" theme song
          and play it at the highest volume possible over & over
          again.

           7. Work normally for a while. Suddenly look amazingly
          startled by something on the screen and crawl underneath
          the desk.

           8. Ask the person next to you if they know how to tap into
          top-secret Pentagon files.

           9. Use Interactive Send to make passes at people you
          don't know.

           10. Make a small ritual sacrifice to the computer before you turn it on.

           11. Bring a chainsaw, but don't use it. If anyone asks why
          you have it, say "Just in case..." mysteriously.

           12. Type on VAX for a while. Suddenly start cursing for
          3 minutes at everything bad about your life. Then stop and
          continue typing.

           13. Enter the lab, undress, and start staring at other people as if they're crazy while typing.

           14. Light candles in a pentagram around your terminal before starting.

           15. Ask around for a spare disk. Offer $2. Keep asking
          until someone agrees. Then, pull a disk out of your fly and
          say, "Oops, I forgot."

           16. Every time you press Return and there is processing
          time required, pray "Ohpleaseohpleaseohpleaseohplease," and scream
          "YES!" when it finishes.

           17. "DISK FIGHT!!!"

           18. Start making out with the person at the terminal next
          to you (It helps if you know them, but this is also a great
          way to make new friends).

           19. Put a straw in your mouth and put your hands in your
          pockets. Type by hitting the keys with the straw.

           20. If you're sitting in a swivel chair, spin around singing
          "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" whenever there is processing
          time required.

           21. Draw a pictue of a woman (or man) on a piece of
          paper, tape it to your monitor. Try to seduce it. Act like it
          hates you and then complain loudly that women (men) are
          worthless.

           22. Try to stick a Ninetendo cartridge into the 3 1/2 disk
          drive. When it doesn't work, get the supervisor.

           23. When you are on an IBM, and when you turn it on, ask
          loudly where the smiling Apple face is.

           24. Print out the complete works of Shakespeare, then
          when its all done (two days later) say that all you wanted
          was one line.

           25. Sit and stare at the screen, biting your nails noisily.
          After doing this for a while, spit them out at the feet of the
          person next to you.

           26. Stare at the screen, grind your teeth, stop, look at the
          person next to you, grinding. Repeat procedure, making
          sure you never provoke the person enough to let them
          blow up, as this releases tension, and it is far more
          effective to let them linger.

           27. If you have long hair, take a typing break, look for
          split ends, cut them and deposit them on your neighbor's
          keyboard as you leave.

           28. Put a large, gold-framed portrait of the British Royal
          Family on your desk and loudly proclaim that it inspires
          you.

           29. Come to the lab wearing several layers of socks.
          Remove shoes and place them of top of the monitor.
          Remove socks layer by layer and drape them around the
          monitor. Exclaim sudden haiku about the aesthetic beauty
          of cotton on plastic.

           30. Take the keyboard and sit under the computer. Type
          up your paper like this. Then go to the lab supervisor and
          complain about the bad working conditions.

           31. Laugh hysterically, shout "You will all perish in flames!!!" and continue working.

           32. Bring some dry ice & make it look like your computer is smoking.

          33. Assign a musical note to every key (ie. the Delete key
          is A Flat, the B key is F sharp, etc.). Whenever you hit a
          key, hum its note loudly. Write an entire paper this way.

          34. Attempt to eat your computer's mouse.

          35. Borrow someone else's keyboard by reaching over,
          saying "Excuse me, mind if I borrow this for a sec?",
          unplugging the keyboard & taking it.

          36. Bring in a bunch of magnets and have fun.

          37. When doing calculations, pull out an abacus and say that sometimes the old ways are best.

          38. Play Pong for hours on the most powerful computer in  the lab.

          39. Make a loud noise of hitting the same key over and
          over again until you see that your neighbor is noticing
          (You can hit the space bar so your fill isn't affected). Then
          look at your neighbor's keyboard. Hit his/her delete key
          several times, erasing an entire word. While you do this,
          ask: "Does *your* delete key work?" Shake your head,
          and resume hitting the space bar on your keyboard. Keep
          doing this until you've deleted about a page of your
          neighbor's document. Then, suddenly exclaim: "Well,
          whaddya know? I've been hitting the space bar this whole
          time. No wonder it wasn't deleting! Ha!" Print out your
          document and leave.

          40. Remove your disk from the drive and hide it. Go to the
          lab monitor and complain that your computer ate your
          disk. (For special effects, put some Elmer's Glue on or
          around the disk drive. Claim that the computer is
          drooling.)

          41. Stare at the person's next to your's screen, look really
          puzzled, burst out laughing, and say "You did that?"
          loudly. Keep laughing, grab your stuff and leave, howling
          as you go.

          42. Point at the screen. Chant in a made up language while
          making elaborate hand gestures for a minute or two. Press
          return or the mouse, then leap back and yell
          "COVEEEEERRRRRR!" peek up from under the table,
          walk back to the computer and say. "Oh, good. It worked
          this time," and calmly start to type again.

           43. Keep looking at invisible bugs and trying to swat them.

           44. See who's online. Send a total stranger a talk request.
          Talk to them like you've known them all your lives.
          Hangup before they get a chance to figure out you're a
          total stranger.

           45. Bring an small tape player with a tape of really
          absurd sound effects. Pretend it's the computer and look
          really lost.

           46. Pull out a pencil. Start writing on the screen.
          Complain that the lead doesn't work.

           47. Come into the computer lab wearing several
          endangered species of flowers in your hair. Smile
          incessantly. Type a sentence, then laugh happily, exclaim
          "You're such a marvel!!", and kiss the screen. Repeat this
          after every sentence. As your ecstasy mounts, also hug the
          keyboard. Finally, hug your neighbor, then the computer
          assistant, and walk out.

           48. Run into the computer lab, shout "Armageddon is
          here!!!!!", then calmly sit down and begin to type.

           49. Quietly walk into the computer lab with a Black and
          Decker chainsaw, rev that baby up, and then walk up to
          the nearest person and say, "Give me that computer or
          you'll be feeding my pet crocodile for the next week".

           50. Two words: Tesla Coil.

          Just in case you think you are TC ("Technologically
          Challenged"), the following is an excerpt from an article
          in the Wall Street Journal:

          1. Compaq is considering changing the command "Press
          Any Key" to Press Return Key" because of the flood of
          calls asking where the "Any" key is.

          2. AST technical support had a caller complaining that
          her Mouse was hard to control with the dust cover on.
          The cover turned out to be the plastic bag the mouse was
          packaged in.

          3. Another Compaq technician received a call from a man
          complaining that the system wouldn't read word
          processing files from his old diskettes. The customer had
          stuck labels on the diskettes, then rolled them into his
          typewriter to type on the labels.

          4. Another customer was asked to send a copy of her
          defective diskettes. A few days later, a letter arrived
          from the customer along with photocopies of the floppies.

          5. A Dell technician advised a customer to put his trouble
          floppy back in the drive and close the door. The customer
          asked the tech to hold on, and was heard putting the
          phone down,  getting up and crossing the room to close
          the door to his room.

          6. Another Dell customer called to say he couldn't get his
          computer to fax anything. After 40 minutes of
          trouble-shooting, the tech discovered the man was trying
          to fax a piece of paper by holding it in front of the
          monitor screen and hitting the "send" key.

          7. Yet another Dell customer called to complain that his
          keyboard no longer worked. He had cleaned it by filling
          up his tub with soap and water and soaking the keyboard
          for a day, then removing all the keys and washing them
          individually.

          8. A Dell technician received a call from a customer who
          was enraged because his computer had told him he was
          "bad and an invalid". The tech explained that the
          computer's "bad" command and "invalid" responses
          shouldn't be taken personally.

          9. A confused caller to IBM was having troubles printing
          documents.  He told the technician that the computer had
          said it "couldn't find printer". The user had tried turning
          the computer screen to face the printer, but that his
          computer still couldn't "see" the printer.

          10. An exasperated caller to Dell Computer Tech
          Support couldn't get her new Dell computer to turn on.
          After ensuring the computer was plugged in, the
          technician asked her what happened when she pushed the
          power button. Her response, "I pushed and pushed on this
          foot pedal and nothing happened." The "foot pedal"
          turned out to be the computer's mouse.

          11. Another customer called Compaq Tech Support to
          say her brand-new computer wouldn't work. She said
          she'd unpacked the unit, plugged it in and sat there for 20
          minutes waiting for something to happen.  When asked
          what happened when she pressed the power switch, she
          answered, "What Power switch?"

          12. True story from a Novell NetWire SysOp: Caller:
          "Hello, is this Tech Support?"   Tech: "Yes, it is. How
          may I help you?  Caller: "The cup holder on my PC is
          broken and I am within my warranty period. How do I go
          about getting that fixed?"   Tech: "I'm sorry, but did you
          say a cup holder?" Caller: "Yes, it's attached to the front
          of my computer." Tech: "Please excuse me if I seem a bit
          stumped, it's because I am.  Did you receive this as part
          of a promotional, at a tradeshow?" Caller: "It came with
          my computer. I don't know anything about a promotional.
          It just has '4X' on it." At this point the Tech Rep had to
          mute the caller, because he couldn't stand it. He was
          laughing too hard. The caller had been using the load
          drawer of the CD-ROM drive as a cup holder, and
          snapped it off the drive!

          13. Another IBM customer had trouble installing
          software and rang for support. "I put in the first disk, and
          that was OK. It said to put in the second disk, and I had
          some problems with that disk.  When it said to put in the
          third disk - I couldn't even fit it in.."       The user hadn't
          realized that "Insert Disk 2" meant to remove Disk 1 first.

Homer's Brain Scan

   1. Describe your problem:
   ____________________________________________________________
   ____________________________________________________________

   2. Now, describe the problem accurately:
   ____________________________________________________________
   ____________________________________________________________

   3. Speculate wildly about the cause of the problem:
   ____________________________________________________________
   ____________________________________________________________

   4. Problem Severity:
   A. Minor__
   B. Minor__
   C. Minor__
   D. Trivial__

   5. Nature of the problem:
   A. Locked Up__
   B. Frozen__
   C. Hung__
   D. Strange Smell__

   6. Is your computer plugged in? Yes__ No__

   7. Is it turned on? Yes__ No__

   8. Have you tried to fix it yourself? Yes__ No__

   9. Have you made it worse? Yes__

   10. Have you had a friend who knows all about computers that can try fix it for you? Yes__ No__

   11. Did they make it even worse? Yes__

   12. Have you read the manual? Yes__ No__

   13. Are you sure you've read the manual? Maybe__ No__

   14. Are you absolutely certain you've read the manual? No__

   15. If you read the manual, do you think you understood it? Yes__ No__

   16. If Yes, then explain why you can't fix the problem yourself.
   __________________________________________________________
   __________________________________________________________

   17. What were you doing with your computer at the time the problem occurred?
   __________________________________________________________
   __________________________________________________________

   l8. If you answered nothing, then explain why you were logged in?
   __________________________________________________________
   __________________________________________________________

   l9. Are you sure you aren't imagining the problem? Yes__ No__

   20. Does the clock on your home VCR blink 12:00? Yes__ What's a VCR?__

   21. Do you have a copy of PCs for Dummies? Yes__ No__

   22. Do you have any independent witnesses to the problem? Yes__ No__

   23. Do you have any electronics products that DO work? Yes__ No__

   24. Is there anyone else you could blame this problem on? Yes__ No__

   25. Have you given the machine a good whack on the top? Yes__ No__

   26. Is the machine on fire? Yes__ Not Yet__

   27. Can you do something else instead of bothering me? Yes__

           * Make up fake acronyms. On-line veterans like to use
           abbreviations like IMHO (in my humble opinion) and
           RTFM (read the f...... manual) to show that they're "hip"
           to the lingo. Make up your own that don't stand for
           anything (SETO, BARL, CP30), use them liberally, and
           then refuse to explain what they stand for ("You don't
           know? RDFM").

           * WRITE ALL YOUR MESSAGES IN ALL CAPS AND
           DON'T USE PERIODS OR RETURNS SO THAT
           EVERYONE HAS TO SCROLL ACROSS THEIR
           SCREENS TO READ EVERY LINE ALSO USE A LOT
           OF !!!!!! AND DDOOUUBBLLEESS TO SHOW THAT
           YOU'RE EXCITED ABOUT BEING HERE!!!!!!!

           * When replying to your mail, correct everyone's
           grammar and spelling and point out their typos, but don't
           otherwise respond to the content of their messages. When
           they respond testily to your 'creative criticism," do it
           again. Continue until they go away.

           * Software and files offered on-line are often
           "compressed" so that it won't take so long to travel over
           the phone lines. Buy a compression program and
           compress everything you send, including one-word
           E-mail responses like "Thanks."

           * Upload text files with Bible passages about sin or guilt
           and give them names like "SexyHouseWives," then see
           how many people download them. Challenge your
           friends to come up with the most popular come-on. Take
           bets and calculate odds on the results of each upload's
           popularity.

           * cc: all your E-mail to president@whitehouse.gov so
           that he can keep track of what's happening on the
           information Superhighway Internet.

           * Join a discussion group, and tie whatever's being
           discussed back to an unrelated central theme of your
           own. For instance, if you're in a discussion of gun
           control, respond to every message with the observation
           that those genetically superior tomatoes seem to have
           played an important role. Within days, all discussion of
           gun control will have ceased as people write you
           threatening messages and instruct all other members to
           ignore you.
 

Hello.

Yes, you. You, looking at this screen for hours on end, online. You, bleary-eyed. You, an addict. Have you looked in the mirror lately? Been outside? Know what day of the week it is?

Your name was given to us by a spouse or family member who is concerned about your internet addiction. At Internetaholics Anonymous, we can help. We're a  non-profit society of recovering addicts like yourself that provides support and counseling through weekly meetings designed to help you cope with your problem.

We feature a twelve-step recovery program and in extreme cases, interventions. Although it is our firm belief that you are never "cured", you most certainly can recover.

We have designed a brief checklist to determine if you are an addict. Do you:

          1) Have twitches of the hand when you walk by your terminal?
          2) Check e-mail more than five times a day?
          3) Spend more time chatting than eating or sleeping?
          4) Surf aimlessly with no direction, if only to be online?
          5) Leave your name and information at countless sites if
          only to hope you'll receive a reply one day from a
          company you'll never do business with anyway?
          6) Log on before important personal habits, such as meal
          preparation, hygiene or bodily functions?
          7) Have red, swollen eyes that hang halfway out of your head?
          8) Spend hours online on a holiday from work, where
          you'd usually be griping about your carpal tunnel syndrome?
          9) See smoke arising from your computer or WebTV box?
          10) All of the above?

          If you answered yes to four or more questions (or chose #10), you have a problem.
          Please call us at Internetaholics Anonymous at:
          1-800-LOGOFFNOWFORYOUROWNSAKE.

          We're here, we're free, and we're confidential.
          The first step to recovery is admission that you have a problem.
          Call us today. If you can power off to free up your phone line, that is.

---

How To Build A Web Page In 25 Steps

---

           2. Think about what you want to write on your Web page - 6 weeks.

           3. Download the same piece of Web authoring software, because they have released
                3 new versions since the first time you downloaded it - 20 minutes.

           4. Decide to just steal some images and awards to put on your site - 1 minute.

           5. Visit sites to find images and awards, find 5 of them that you like - 4 days.

           6. Run setup of your Web authoring software. After it fails, download it again - 25 minutes.

           7. Run setup again, boot the software, click all toolbar buttons to see what they do - 15 minutes.

           8. View the source of others' pages, steal some, change a few words here and there - 4 hours.

           9. Preview your Web page using the Web Authoring software - 1 minute.

           10. Try to horizontally line up two related images - 6 hours.

           11. Remove one of the images - 10 seconds.

           12. Set the text's font color to the same color as your background,
                    wonder why all your text is gone - 4 hours.

           13. Download a counter from your ISP - 4 minutes.

           14. Try to figure out why your counter reads "You are visitor number -16.3 E10" - 3 hours.

           15. Put 4 blank lines between two lines of text - 8 hours.

           16. Fine-tune the text, then prepare to load your Web page on your ISP - 40 minutes.

           17. Accidentally delete your complete web page - 1 second.

           18. Recreate your web page - 2 days.

           19. Try to figure out how to load your Web page onto your ISP's server - 3 weeks.

           20. Call a patient friend to find out about FTP - 30 minutes.

           21. Download FTP software - 10 minutes.

           22. Call your friend again - 15 minutes.

           23. Upload your web page to your ISP's server - 10 minutes.

           24. Connect to your site on the web - 1 minute.

           25. Repeat any and all of the previous steps - eternity.