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1997 SEP 4
Web Hunter
NORM LARSEN, USA
Received as email
from Norm Larsen, Weatherwood Company Inc:
New Superheroes for the New Century
Weatherwood Company Inc., a Minneapolis-based Web design
firm, has produced Spectacular Adventure With Web Hunter and
Donna Matrix!, a short novel in fourteen parts. Strongly
influenced by the pulp novels and adventure serials of the '30s
and '40s, yet still absolutely contemporary, the novel charts
the adventures of the titular superheroes as they battle
their arch-nemesis Doctor Luddite.
"...Web Hunter and Donna Matrix's adventures concern the
advancements of technology and how these advancements can be
used for both just and unjust purposes."
The two new heroes make an unusual pair. Web Hunter is a
down-to-earth man in his early 40s, who spends much of
his free time drinking beer and hunting. Donna Matrix is an urbane
young woman, fashionably dressed and more at home in the city than
the great outdoors. This odd couple finds common ground in their
mutual thirst for justice. Using knowledge, street smarts,
high-tech weaponry and gadgets, as well as substantial
physical prowess, Web Hunter and Donna Matrix protect the
innocent from the encroachments of evil. Set among the contemporary
information landscape, Web Hunter and Donna Matrix's adventures
concern the advancements of technology and how these advancements
can be used for both just and unjust purposes. As technological
advances become integrated into the lives and minds of humanity,
it becomes ever more important to have heroes who understand
what this means and how best to deal with it.
Norm Larsen, president of Weatherwood, views the story in this way:
"Comic books and movies these days are full of super-powered
heroes, but who are they? Batman, he's been around for fifty years. So
has Superman. And newer heroes like this Spawn or the Mask, are they
really contemporary? Do they really reflect current concerns and
issues? I doubt it. But Web Hunter and Donna Matrix are heroes for
the millennium. They're connected to the heart of what's going on
right now."
Pat Harrigan, writer of Spectacular Adventure, describes the story as
a direct descendent of earlier pulp fiction: "I find much to
admire in pulp adventure writers like Lester Dent and Walter Gibson,
because those writers knew how to keep a story moving, and how to
keep readers turning the pages."
Spectacular Adventure will be released in printed form and on the
Web, one chapter per week for fourteen weeks beginning September 2,
1997.
"Chapter One: Dilapidated Warehouse of Doom! --
With his bare hands Web Hunter had been known to tear
inch-thick sheets of steel plate in half. He could
crush two-by-fours into pulp with his mighty
grip."
Web Hunter
www.webhunter.com
Weatherwood Company
www.wwcoinc.com/news.html
Trillium Arts Lists
BRYAN TRUSSLER, CANADA
Received as email
from Bryan Trussler, Trillium Arts:
ArtsCanada and ArtBiz
Listservers are almost as old as the Internet itself, but they have
fallen into disuse in recent years because the thronging multitudes
of new netizens have not been properly exposed to them. They were
invented as a way of getting single messages out to large numbers
of people without the need to post each message individually.
"...a traditional listserver looks more like a roundtable
discussion forum, where anyone on the list is given a voice to
speak..."
Sound like a spam list? Well, that is a recent abuse of this
technology -- listservers are used to force messages onto
people who did not choose to receive them. Listservers are also
used to broadcast newsletters to subscribers who have requested
such information. In both cases (spam and newsletters) the traffic
goes one way only -- from the list owner out to the thousands
of passive recipients... But a traditional listserver looks more
like a roundtable discussion forum, where anyone on the list is
given a voice to speak to the whole group and everyone receives
all the mail posted to the group.
Sounds like Usenet, right? Almost: Usenet mail expires after a
few days, but listserver mail accumulates until it gets read. And
Usenet is a wide-open system with no audience controls while
listservers are all privately owned and sponsored entities with
membership controls but little outright censorship. The atmosphere
is that of a pleasant cocktail party. And they are ideal venues for
serious business networking and relationship building.
ArtsCanada: Listserver group dedicated to the art scene within
Canada in all its forms: artists, galleries, theatre troupes,
literary societies, community arts councils and public arts
administration.
ArtBiz: Listserver group dedicated to global business networking among
online art galleries and dealers, and self-promoting artists.
Trillium Arts Gallery: One of the larger regional galleries in Ontario,
Canada. Art offerings are eclectic in style and created both by some of
Canada's best-known artists (Danby, Heine-Baux, Herchenrader)
as well as several less well-known artists.
Trillium Arts Lists
www.trillium-arts.on.ca
Trillium Art Gallery
www.trillium-arts.on.ca/gall-en.html
Weatherwood Company
and Trillium Arts are two commercial firms with innovative, unique
ways to market their creative products and services. Good fun and
good information, delivered freely, creates a point of attraction
for surfers and awareness for their business. Smart marketing on
the Web -- a cool medium where simply hanging a for sale
sign just isn't enough.
Image clips from Weatherwood Company and Trillium
Arts. Texts from email and Web Hunter. Used by
permission.
Would you like to see your work in Zn?
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