This summer sees the launch of a new service that offers Britain's teenagers free calls and texts provided users are willing to receive adverts on their phones.

"In a survey of a thousand users, Orange found that up to 23% had purchased or were more likely to purchase the product advertised and more than half said they would be happy to see more advertising on their mobiles. Less than 6% of those surveyed said they disliked advertising on mobile phones."

Teens to get free mobile calls - with adverts

Christopher Hampton, "Free Radical"

"I started out on the side of the rebellious, teenage Rimbaud, but gradually came round to Verlaine. Verlaine always knew that Rimbaud's modernity was vastly superior to his own old-fashioned lyrical verse and did everything to protect and preserve his young lover's work. I've invented the final scene in which Rimbaud's sister comes to Verlaine and tries to claw back her brother's poetry. But it's perfectly true that Rimbaud's family wanted to destroy all his manuscripts. If it weren't for Verlaine's generosity, Rimbaud's reputation simply wouldn't exist."

Even if the sympathy shifts, the play is based on a visible contrast between Rimbaud's wild genius and Verlaine's cautious orthodoxy. What is astonishing is that, at the age of 21, Hampton was able to see both sides of the case.

"I've always been fascinated by the opposition between radicals and liberals," he says. "It's a tension that exists in all my plays, but there is never a final decision."

"word-of-mouth (WOM) marketing, already established in the US and Canada, is coming to the UK"

"It means the banter we enjoy with our mates down the pub on a Friday night could soon shift into sales patter."

"WOM is when unpaid volunteers are sent new products and, as they go about their everyday lives, are encouraged to tell their family and friends - even strangers - what they think of them. The products can be anything from mobile phones to sausages."

The (sponsored) word on the street

Blimps that swim through the air like fish

Blimps steered by artificial muscles may one day swim through the air like fish, suggest recent flight tests. Researchers believe artificial muscles – plastics that stretch when a high electrical voltage is applied – could be a way to mimic nature's efficiency at accomplishing tasks. Using the technology, future robots may be able to "run on Mars like a cheetah, climb a mountain or a cliff like a gecko, or fly like a bird", says Yoseph Bar-Cohen, a physicist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, US.

Now, a team from the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Testing and Research in Dübendorf have developed a 6-metre-long blimp steered by artificial muscles. Silvain Michel, head of the electroactive polymers department at the laboratory, hopes to fly a blimp that is not only steered but also powered by artificial muscles within two years. The blimp's tail would wriggle like a trout to propel it through the air.

a wide-ranging two-year study of Britain's drug laws concluded today that "The evidence suggests that a majority of people who use drugs are able to use them without harming themselves or others. They are able, in that sense, to 'manage' their drug use ... The harmless use of illegal drugs is thus possible, indeed common,"

Describing the Misuse of Drugs Act as unwieldy and inflexible, the report says: "It sends people to prison who should not be there. It forces people into treatment who do not need it"

"Drugs policy should, like our policy on alcohol and tobacco, seek to regulate use and prevent harm rather than to prohibit use altogether,"

Illegal drugs can be harmless, report says

Paleo-Future
A look into the future that never was.

Since September 11th, depictions of torture have become much more common on American television.

Before the attacks, fewer than four acts of torture appeared on prime-time television each year, according to Human Rights First, a nonprofit organization. Now there are more than a hundred, and, as David Danzig, a project director at Human Rights First, noted, “the torturers have changed. It used to be almost exclusively the villain who tortured. Today, torture is often perpetrated by the heroes."

The politics of the man behind “24.”

ARCHIVE...

"in our names"

"Alleged bomb plotter claims two and a half years of interrogation UNDER US and UK SUPERVISION in secret prisons abroad"

"One of them took my penis in his hand and began to make cuts. He did it once, and they stood still for maybe a minute, watching my reaction. I was in agony. They must have done this 20 to 30 times, in maybe two hours."

"to stop the pain you will tell them anything they want to hear. anything."

"the argument favouring limited use of torture is contradicted by all of our experience. When torture is no longer absolutely prohibited, law enforcement attitudes change. Over time, the mentality that torture is acceptable comes to infect the entire system, and even persons accused of normal crimes get the same treatment as suspected terrorists…"
....Basil Fernando, the Executive Director of the Asian Human Rights Commission, a member of the world organisation against torture (OMCT) network

i feel better after i type to you

an un-edited reproduction
of the search queries of AOL user 23187425
from May 2006

Silvio Lorusso Bathroom Works

"every object the dominant-hand uses is photographed once and while used."

alberto frigo

WHY WORK?

"a pro-leisure and anti-wage-slavery group of people dedicated to exploring the question: why work? This site provides information, support, and resources for those looking for alternatives to traditional employment."

"We actively promote alternatives to the wage slavery mindset and what we call "The Cult of the Job" which automatically equates having a job with making a living......."

postcard polaroids