Happy New Year!

Remember my comment back in May about the effect that The Event Which Shall Not Be Named had on our web server? It is apparently the gift that keeps on giving. I guess it must have started making the rounds again in late December, because we served four times as many hits in December as in November, almost all of them in the last four days of the month.

This is what the last two years looked like:		This is what December looked like:

The audience wasn't skewed in favor of the Japanese and Nether-regions this time. Go figure.

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We're running out of spare trackballs for the kiosks. Can you help us find some?

We really like the ones we've been using: the clear plastic ones that light up. (Pictured here, though we prefer them unaccessorized with chewing gum.) These were called the "CompUSA Crystal Trackball" and were about $20, but CompUSA no longer sells them. Jonathan bought out the last few the local store had back in 2002, and we've survived on those until now.

We've got one that's similar that says "Quasar Crystal Trackball" and also "Quasar Tracks", and may or may not have the part number MA-9004-00 or 70310-10001. We have no idea who actually makes it or where to get more of it, or anything like it. If you do, please let us know.

The biggest constraint we have is that whatever model we use, it must not be possible to remove the ball without tools. With most trackballs, the ball just pops right out. The ones we have are nice in that the ball stays in unless you unscrew the bottom.

We could go with "industrial" or "arcade" trackballs, and some of those are pretty sweet looking, but the good ones are hundreds of dollars each, so that's not really gonna work (because they are not indestructible, trust me).

Photos are up of the Specimen + Flatline Transmissions + Deadfly Ensemble show. This was intended to be a 20th anniversary reunion show for Specimen, except that it was the whole band except for the lead singer... so they decided to call themselves "Azoic" instead (the name of one of their albums, ignoring the fact that there's an existing band called that already) And then... two days before the show, we (DNA) got a very pissed off email from Olli, the original lead singer, wondering why nobody even contacted him. Um, oops. That's pretty lame, guys...

Despite that, it was a good show. Tobias (the replacement) did a good job; they sounded just like Specimen to me.

(Olli's actually performed here on three different occasions: he does psytrance now, and sells a line of fluorescent rave clothing.)

This April is the 100th anniversary of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, and the Bancroft Library has a new online exhibit about it, including a bunch of photos I hadn't seen before. In the vicinity of DNA Lounge, there are three pictures of the Jackson Brewery (the building at the corner of 11th and Folsom that now contains The Public and some condos):

There isn't a picture that shows the spot that DNA now occupies, but there is one that roughly shows what you would have seen looking out out door and to the left: this is 11th and Harrison, looking toward the southwest (where the taxi lot is). It doesn't look all that different!		Also, here's 4th and Bryant looking south: I think the building on the right is between Bryant and Brannan; I think it's a bit south of the location of Glas Kat / Trocadero. It looks like it might actually be the building that the Six Apart / LiveJournal offices are in.

I've taken this opportunity to fix the recently-broken links on my Ancient History page (if you haven't seen that one before, check it out: it describes the goings-on in the DNA Lounge building over roughly the last century and a half.)