FC: Russia attacks news site; Long Beach assails tarotreading.com

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,36731,00.html

   Strange Hazards of a News Site
   by Declan McCullagh (declan () wired com)

   3:00 a.m. Jun. 3, 2000 PDT
   WASHINGTON -- For most fledgling news websites, the biggest obstacles
   are mundane: Getting funding, recruiting reporters, then praying they
   won't ditch you for a pre-IPO dot com.

   Not so with Michael Tunick. Instead of battling venture capitalists,
   the 41-year old publisher of eurasia.org.ru is fighting the Russian
   secret police.

   Government agents stabbed one of his editors, forced an Internet
   service provider to block access to his website, and even created fake
   news sites to discredit the opposition party, Tunick claims.

   Tunick, who was in New York to speak at the International Network 2000
   conference organized by Rising Tide Studios and Silicon Alley
   Reporter, chatted with Wired News on Friday afternoon.

   "It's politics," Tunick said. "It's a very dirty business. Sometimes I
   do sort of think I should abandon politics and be more in business."

   [...]



http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,36703,00.html

   Online Card-Reader Out of Luck
   by Craig Bicknell

   3:00 a.m. Jun. 3, 2000 PDT
   Elaine Farrally lives in a nice house more or less like any other in
   the upscale Belmont Shore neighborhood of Long Beach, California.

   Like many of her neighbors, Farrally has young kids, and on any given
   day she's likely at home caring for them while her husband works. No
   one walking past the Farrally home would give it a second glance.

   But what goes on inside has drawn the attention of Long Beach
   authorities and the threat of police intervention: the reading of
   Tarot cards. Farrally does it for money, and that's against the
   Belmont Shores zoning ordinance. The tidy suburban community wants no
   seedy fortuneteller shops marring its Starbuckian aesthetic, Farrally
   says.

   But there is no seedy fortuneteller shop -- just Farrally, her kids,
   and the computer server that hosts Tarotreading.com. Surfers pay to
   enter their queries for the Tarot cards through Tarotreading.com;
   Farrally reads the cards and emails a response. It's a small, but
   profitable, enterprise.

   "There is no crystal ball, there is no neon sign, there is no foot
   traffic -- nothing but a computer," Farrally said. "It's just a little
   Internet business."

   [...]

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