Site of the Week -- March 13, 2000
ar Jar Binks as a Borg? ("Yousa gonna be assim'lated!") Error messages on
the Enterprise's main view screen? ("This starship has performed an illegal operation and
will be shut down.") Spock and T'Pring on Jerry Springer? ("I killed my
captain for this?!") You can't do that on Star Trek!
Mining how open Star Trek is to both devotion and ridicule,
You Can't Do That on Star Trek! features hundreds of original images
depicting situations and juxtapositions that will never be seen on any of the
shows or films. Many of these compositions mix Star Trek with other
cultural touchstones, from Worf romancing Dax in a revisited Gone With
the Wind to the Scooby Doo gang in classic Trek duds. Some are
truly inspired and not a little bizarre, like Kirk fighting a Gorn that
looks a lot like a certain singing purple dinosaur, or Forrest Gump
reimagined as a Vulcan mystic.
The site is organized in chronological galleries, and there are
seasonal polls leading to the celebrated You Can't Awards. As the site
has gained fame (or notoriety), it's attracted ever more creative and
accomplished submissions. For those who want to imagine the Enterprise
soaring among X-wing fighters--or who just want to see the poster for
Seven, Warrior Princess--You Can't Do That on Star Trek! is a
command imperative.
-- Mark Wilson
Site of the Week -- March 6, 2000
aptain James T. Kirk should have died a great, noble death on the bridge
of a starship, with the fate of the galaxy in his hands and phasers
scorching space around him.
Instead, he was killed by scaffolding in the movie Star Trek: Generations.
The Bring Back Kirk Campaign seeks to remedy that mistake by bringing
Star Trek's best captain back from the dead. William Shatner already
accomplished that goal in his Star Trek novels, but those books aren't part of the "official" Star Trek universe. The BBK campaign wants Kirk
back on the deck of the real Enterprise, if not on the big screen,
then at least on the small one.
The campaign's Web site includes information about where to send letters of protest, a place where visitors can submit letters online, links to other
"Bring Back Kirk" Web sites, and a discussion board where people can vent
their rage over Kirk's untimely death.
-- Kenneth Newquist
Site of the Week -- Feb. 28, 2000
hese days the space program seems to get attention only when NASA
commits a blunder; the rest of the time Americans remain blithely unaware of
the various ongoing projects and active missions quietly adding to
the collective understanding of the Earth, the solar system, the galaxy
and the universe.
Spaceref.com is a large and richly informative site with a broad array of
news, analysis and photos profiling the headline grabbers as well as all those little-known missions. Some examples of what the site is currently covering: Right now a NASA spacecraft, the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous, is sending back the first color pictures of Eros, the largest
asteroid to travel inside the orbit of Mars. And remember Galileo? It's
still tooling around Jupiter, getting reading for its closest flyby yet of
the volcanic moon Io.
In addition to the latest news on American and international space efforts,
Spaceref.com features pages that discuss particular topics in depth, a
calendar of upcoming events and launches, and detailed guides to recent and
future space shuttle missions. There's also a Yahoo-like web directory for
space-related sites and a bulletin board for discussion.
As an added bonus, the site offers a news tracker feature, allowing users to
get automatic space news updates.
For space junkies--and everyday folk wondering what's happening in space these days--Spaceref.com is the place to go.
-- Mark Wilson
