[crackmonkey] Howdy neighbor! Can I borrow an egg, some sugar, and a SCSI cable?

[Nick Moffitt]

----- Forwarded message from glen mccready <glen at qnx.com> -----
Forwarded-by: Nev Dull <nev at bostic.com>
Forwarded-by: "Kevin D. Clark" <kclark at cabletron.com>

Source: http://online.guardian.co.uk/theweb/911396071-geekville.html

Leander Kahney inspects a des. res. for hackers 

House fit for a mouse 

TO RENT: apartment; sleeps 2.8 computers; unique address (on the Web);
Linux in all rooms; only geeks need apply.

This isn't quite how Walden Internet Village advertises itself but it
is how the complex sees itself: 'run by geeks for geeks'. The
12-building complex in Houston, Texas, boasts pleasant decor and
beautiful landscaped gardens but for the tenants it is trying to
attract the most important feature will be the way it is wired for the
future, offering the kind of high-speed Internet access enjoyed only
by big companies and universities.

"It's a community for hackers," says Alan LeFort, marketing director
and network administrator. "It's not easy to find a place where your
neighbours are Perl programmers or Linux freaks."

Every apartment has a 10 Megabit per second pipe to the Internet -- a
connection about 175 times faster than the standard 56k modem. It also
has assigned its own unique Web address, so residents can run their
own Web sites from inside their apartments.

"We don't care what they run as long as its not a porn site," LeFort
said.

All apartments also have wiring built into the walls for their own
little home network. "The average resident has 2.8 machines," LeFort
says. "They like to connect them together." The complex also offers
several big computers on an internal network, one dedicated to the
game Quake and another for storing the GNU/Linux software favoured by
most tenants. The few running Windows NT will have to be "educated",
LeFort said.

At first sight, Texas with its cowboy image, might seem an unlikely
place for a geek community. But Houston is home to Nasa's Johnson
Space Center, Compaq, and a major axis for the engineering, medical,
and, of course, the oil and energy industries. Already geeks have
snapped up about half the 200 apartments. The company hopes to fill
the rest with geeks as non-hackers' leases expire. Rents range from
$675 (L409) per month for a one-bedroom flat to $1,400 a month for a
three-bedroom, two-bathroom home.  The complex boasts an active social
life. Every fortnight is party night when up to 50 people turn up with
their computers and hook them into a fast Local Area Network for
playing games.

Walden is a pilot project. The company owns five other complexes in
Houston and is considering re-wiring three of them for hackers.

Visit Walden Internet Villages at http://www.waldenweb.com and two of
the complex's game sites at http://www.gamerscircle.com,
http://www.quake2.com

18 November 1998

----- End forwarded message -----

-- 
 * Progress (n.): The process through which Usenet has evolved from
   smart people in front of dumb terminals to dumb people in front of
   smart terminals.  -- obs at burnout.demon.co.uk (obscurity)
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