We’re not that Chet.

The WSJ is reporting another email worm making the rounds, this one with a 9/11 theme and named “Chet.”:

‘Chet’ Computer Worm Carries Sept. 11 Theme A WALL STREET JOURNAL ONLINE NEWS ROUNDUP Computer antivirus experts said Wednesday that a Sept. 11th-themed computer worm has emerged which spreads via Microsoft Corp.’s e-mail programs. Network Associates Inc., the big U.S. antivirus company, rates the “Chet” worm a low-profile threat. The worm was discovered Tuesday and was apparently written in Russia. The worm resides in an e-mail attachment file called “11september.exe,” which when opened, attempts to send itself to each e-mail address listed in the Windows address book. The e-mail has “All people!!” in the subject line and appears to come from a sender at “mail@world.com.” The e-mail contains the message: “Dear ladies and gentlemen! The given letter does not contain viruses, and is not Spam.” It describes a conspiracy theory about the terror strikes on Washington, D.C., and New York, and urges readers to open the photos and documents attached. Japanese software company Trend Micro Inc. and Finnish computer-security company F-Secure Corp. issued warnings Wednesday about Chet. F-Secure said the worm isn’t a big threat to computer systems since it “contains serious bugs.” Mikko Hypponen, manager of antivirus research at F-Secure, said in a press release: “This seems to be a poor attempt from a wannabe virus writer to exploit the commemoration of September 11,” “However, as the worm seems to crash regularly, it won’t go far.” The most successful viruses use e-mail to propagate, often sending out copies of themselves to addresses saved in users’ Microsoft Outlook programs. Some notable recent virus outbreaks include Klez, Code Red and Nimda. Updated September 11, 2002 12:33 p.m. EDT

Rest assured if I wrote a virus, I wouldn’t rely on Outlook, okay?

What’s worse than a greatest-hits tour?

The inevitable barrage of cheap slag pieces complaining about said tour, that’s what. This time it’s the Rolling Stones, of course. Yes, they’re pushing sixty. Yes, they’re touring again. Yes, they’ll make millions doing it. And yes, again, somehow this just pisses some people off.

Case in point: I just read this piece from the New York Times. With essentially no exceptions, it is more or less exactly the same piece that’s run somewhere every time the Stones have toured since about 1975. Columns like this are as tired and boring as they say the Stones are, if not moreso. It’s a knee-jerk response calculated to resonate with the inevitable hipper-than-thou types who find the Stones repugnant because they’re not the cutting edge of cool anymore. I read the same bit in 1989, and again in 1994 — and went on to enjoy the Stones tours both years, as did thousands of other people.

The only shocking thing about this particular piece is the author. Neal Pollack is a regular contributor to Dave Eggers’ McSweeneys.Net online literary magazine, and typically his pieces are interesting and well-considered. This is a flaccid retread of something a hundred men and women have written before, and it takes us nowhere new. So he’s got his panties in a wad that Jagger, et. al., will pocket millions by playing this tour, and he feels it Important to insist that they “have nothing to do with Rock and Roll.” Whatever, man. I hope the NYT check was big. What are you now, the Comic Book Guy? |*|