That thing called the World Wide Web (pardon me if I don't attempt to describe it, but I know it is there) is doubling in size every 55 days. From its pleasing IM Pei-designed building on the MIT campus close to the Charles River, the Lab has a mission to explain the new universe unfolding before all of us: the universe of personal computing, of the Net and the Web, of browsing and surfing, of chips and bits and of mice without tails.No wonder Nicholas Negroponte, founder of the Lab and the very prophet of digital hip, exudes an I-told-you-so air when he steps on stage. Needless to say, it is the 10th day of the 10th month and the programme began at 10 past 10. Clever and very cool. In the world of academe, there are few places as modern as the Media Lab. But then this whole day is dedicated to cleverness, not just in humans, although everyone here has more than their share, but in machines. This is the 10th birthday of the Media Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and we are at a symposium to celebrate the fact. The helium balloons are very clever; if you talk to them they answer back.
The wine is clever because it is bottled with its own electronic mail label: http://1010virtualvin . The food is clever (though rather disgusting) because it is wrapped in coloured squares of plastic sheet and concealed within aluminium tiffin boxes that we are invited to take home. At the Media Lab, even the lunch is clever. Mark Fuhrman, the racist LAPD officer at the centre of the case, was reported to be in Bermuda - a titbit that sent film crews scurrying there.But he proved to be one Mark Furman (without the "h''), a bemused New Jersey lawyer.. Mr Brokaw's historic statement was replayed in news bulletins through the evening, while the media have had another field day talking about themselves - a subject dearer to their hearts than any, except OJ.Elsewhere, the lunacy continues. Tom Brokaw - NBC's star anchorman, who was to have conducted the "no-holds- barred" encounter on Wednesday - interrupted programming to break the news of the cancellation with a gravity comparable to Franklin Roosevelt telling America about the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.The non-event created a furore nearly as great as the real thing. my apartment in New York."The saga of the interview denied and the interview granted marks another step in the passage of the Simpson affair from tragedy to surreal farce. Simpson denied he was about to marry his girlfriend, Paula Barbieri.
Nor had his "Dream Team" of defence attorneys bled him dry: "I still have my Ferrari .. my Bentley .. my home in Brentwood ... RUPERT CORNWELL Washington Hours after pulling out of a scheduled television interview, OJ Simpson called the New York Times to proclaim his innocence and give his first extensive comments on life after acquittal for double murder by a Los Angeles jury - though not by the majority of the American people.In a 45-minute conversation, the former football star told the paper's media correspondent, Bill Carter, that he had not killed his former wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend Ronald Goldman and that, despite polls showing up to 70 per cent of Americans sure of his guilt, "I don't think most of America believes I did it.''Explaining his decision to cancel the NBC interview, which would have been one of the most watched events in US television history, Simpson said he bowed to the unanimous advice of his lawyers, concerned that anything he said might be used in the civil suits against him brought by the Goldman and Brown families: "They told me I was being set up; they felt the interview would be tantamount to a grand jury hearing.''But he insisted: "I am an innocent man." He declared himself willing to "sit and debate" the case at any time with Marcia Clark, the lead state prosecutor. Last month John Deutch, the newly appointed head of the CIA, took the rare step of dismissing two of his senior staff, Terry Ward and Fred Brugger, and disciplining seven more for their involvement in some of the more murderous activities of the Guatemalan forces.Colonel Julio Alprez of the Guatemalan army, who had been trained by the US army and given a $44,000 payoff on leaving the CIA payroll, was found to have murdered a US citizen, Michael Devine, in 1990 in northern Guatemala.Col Alpirez also was found responsible for the death under torture in 1992 of Efrain Bamaca, a guerrilla who was married to an American lawyer, Jennifer Harbury.CIA staff kept their involvement and knowledge from Ms Harbury till she forced it out of them after staging a hunger strike outside the White House.Although US military aid to Guatemala was formally ended in 1990, the CIA continued it until December 1993 Ms Harbury is suing the agency.. The Government, he added, was breaking the 1993 declaration of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, banning the sale of arms that could be used for internal repression or could exacerbate existing conflicts.The British decision comes after a senior British diplomat and a police adviser visited the region recently for discussions with the Guatemalan authorities, who for decades were in armed confrontation with Britain over neighbouring British Honduras, now Belize. They point out that the United States has halted aid and military sales because of Guatemala's record, which also has entangled the Central Intelligence Agency in a continuing scandal in Washington."The measure is not supporting but undermining peace in Guatemala," said Lord Avebury, chairman of the Parliamentary Human Rights Group.