E-mail privacy

There’s a worthy new entry into the free Web-based e-mail games:
Hushmail offers the standard set of
features one expects from such accounts, with the very notable addition
of Java-based 1024-bit encryption. On the downside, major
complications to using
Hushmail currently exist for Macintosh users, though a fix is expected
imminently. And, of course, you’ll have to set up a new e-mail address,
which I’m here to tell you can be a serious pain in the neck if it means
you’ve got to pound the new address into the thick heads of your friends
and family.

If you absolutely already have too many e-mail accounts,
you may prefer to use ZipLip for your e-mail
security needs. Unlike Hushmail — which is a complete Web-based e-mail
system and requires you to set up a new independent e-mail account —
ZipLip works with your existing e-mail addresses. However, it does
require that the person you’re writing have Web access, since he or she
will have to come to the ZipLip site and provide a password in order to
pick up your SSL-encrypted message. Once picked up, the message is
automatically deleted from the site’s servers. A major strength of this
service is that you don’t have to register with ZipLip in any way to use
it — these people really understand
privacy.

Make your house pets nervous

Lang Elliot’s downloadable RealAudio sound
files feature the calls of common North American songbirds
or, if you prefer, frogs
and toads. Sounds are
indexed to Lang’s own color photographs of the respective species for
your greater bird-watching or
frog-spotting convenience. The frog pictures, by the way, have some
comedy value; Lang seems to prefer capturing on film what you might call
the systolic or balloon-like phase of the “ribbit.” (Macintosh users,
this is a great place to augment those five or six boring “beep” sound
choices — that duck quack can get old after a few years.)

Get up — get on up

You’d think bikini season would motivate you to exercise (whether
you’re a man or a woman) but, unfortunately, those shaken-not-stirred
crises inspired by the sight of yourself in a bathing suit tend to occur
around eleven at night, when you’re packing your bag for the next day’s
beach trip. It’s too late by then, Buckwheat. So where to start looking
for online help? NetSweat, which has
extensive links pages that can point you toward Internet fitness
resources of every variety. I don’t care how much you love your couch,
there’s got to be something on these lists that floats your boat. If you
haven’t the patience to browse, one adequate and not-too-overwhelming
general fitness site is
FitnessLink , which offers an accurate
and frequently updated assortment of inspirational news, resources,
chat, and random tidbits to keep you going.

Camera lucida

It’s absolutely remarkable what innovators are doing with the Web
these days. Here’s a site that’s beta-testing a
CyberCamera that will actually take your photograph, in real time, as you sit in
front of your monitor. There are a few bugs still being worked out, but
it’s blindingly obvious that these guys are onto something major — and
it’s even more fun than you might think. You’ll want to e-mail this one
to your friends, family, and stockbroker.

Vote your favorite books

The Random House Modern Library’s notorious selection of what it
considers the 100 best nonfiction books written in English and published
in the twentieth century lives
on in cyberspace.
The books on the list were chosen “for their literary and intellectual
merit” by the voting members of the Modern Library editorial
board,
who start at
“A” with Maya Angelou and don’t get much better: Caleb Carr, Jon
Krakauer, Gore Vidal. Who in the name of all things good, true, and
beautiful decided these people were qualified to make judgments of
literary and intellectual merit? Of course, no conceivable list of the
hundred best 20th century anything exists that won’t annoy people both
by its inclusions and by its omissions. And, of course, that doesn’t
change the fact that it’s kind of fun to make such lists.

At the Modern Library site you can weigh in
on what books you
personally consider worthy of a spot on the honor roll. The readers’
list appears next to the board’s list and is updated every twenty
minutes based on current surfers’ input; WorldNetDaily’s own
Claire
Wolfe
is holding steady in fifth place
as of
this writing.

Feeling hot, hot, hot?

Dog days of summer still getting to you? Plan a cool vacation … a
very cool vacation. Oh, how I long for
the oodles of time and disposable income I could happily devote to the
utterly and profoundly appealing recreational opportunities this site
dangles before me! Someday. Someday.