I know, I know. "Grousing about rejected article submissions is off-topic." Bear with me for a second.

2003-03-25 19:58:35 War's latest casualty: aljazeera.net (articles,security) (rejected)

What was it that got rejected here? Only this:

AlJazeera.net, the online arm of the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera satellite news service, is apparently the victim of a massive distributed denial of service attack, which has closed the website down. Postings to the North American Network Operators Group mailing list confirm that not only is aljazeera.net off the air, but that their ISP has been forced to null-route even their nameservers in order to cope with the attack.

Ironically, aljazeera.net had just this week launched their English-language section (which had originally been schedule to go live in April). Whether by accident or design, just about the only direct source of live information on the web from the "other side" of this war has now gone silent.

News for nerds? Stuff that matters? Yeah right. A quick sample of what's currently gracing slashdot's front page:

• Spirited Away Set for 800 Theatre Rerelease
• Mandrake Linux 9.1 (Bamboo) Is Available!
• First Mandrake 9.1 Review Out
• Mac OS X: The Missing Manual (Second Edition)
• Apple: Adobe Says PCs Are Preferred
• Robots!

So let's review: unpaid ads for David Pogue and Sony, hollywood gossip about animated films, and yet another flamebait article about Apple are "stuff that matters." Another point release of an undistinguished linux distro from a bankrupt company matters so much it gets two stories in the same day.

But a story about the most popular and important Arab news source being DDOSed off the web by a bunch of script kiddies in the middle of a goddamn war is...apparently not that interesting.

This is, of course, the same crowd of people who are shocked, shocked when their point of view on political matters loses just about every major battle in the courts and legislature. Here's a free clue, slashkiddies: don't expect politics to pay attention to you if you can't do it the same favor.