I don't know how genuine this is, but it's amusing. An employee emails her boss, hinting at a pay raise by writing every instance of the letter S as a dollar sign. Her employer cleverly declines in reply by highlighting the letters NO in every word.

Dear Bo$$,

In thi$ life, we all need $ome thing mo$t de$perately. I think you $hould be under$tanding of the need$ of u$ worker$ who have given $o much $upport, including $weat and $ervice to your company.

I am $ure you will gue$$ what I mean and re$pond $oon.

Your$ $incerely,
Marian $hih

Dear Marian,

I kNOw you have been working very hard. NOwadays, NOthing much has changed. You must have NOticed that our company is NOt doing NOticeably well as yet.

NOw the newspaper are saying the world's leading ecoNOmists are NOt sure if the United States may go into aNOther recession. After the NOvember presidential elections, things may turn bad.

I have NOthing more to add NOw. You kNOw what I mean.

Yours truly,
Manager

[Lava Forums via Jack918]

Neither email speaks explicitly - they merely hint at or imply - but the letters literally spell out the intended meaning: "I am $ure you will gue$$ what I mean." "I have NOthing more to add NOw." The last sentence has double meaning: I have nothing more to write and I have nothing more to add to your salary.

You often see the dollar sign in the word Micro$oft - it's a way of graffiti-ing the company name and snubbing the richest man on earth. If you Google the word micro$oft, you'll see nearly 2 million search results. Understandably, when you use Live.com (Microsoft's search engine), you only see some 160,000 results along with the helpful "Were you looking for microsoft?"

Perhaps the most invaluable aspect of Open Library is its attempt to preserve and present the old classics. Hard-to-find early editions are scanned to look like 3D animated virtual books in which you can turn the pages like a real book. Some even have scribbles in the margins and smudges showing their age. This is as close to a real reading experience as one can get. Later on, you will be able to magnify hard to read pages, listen to an audio recording if available, and even print/download the entire book.

Here are some samples from the growing collection:

• Shakespeare's Sonnets [1609,1927] (skip the first few blank pages)
• The Divine Comedy, by Dante Alighieri (Translated by Longfellow) [1869]
• Adventures of Tom Sawyer, by Mark Twain [1876]
• A Boy's Will, by Robert Frost [1915]
• The Complete Novels of Jane Austen (over 1,300 pages)

Some famous books on Korea in English (mostly dealing with Japanese colonization, the Christian mission and the Korean War):

• The Passing of Korea, by Homer B. Hulbert [1906]
• The Vanguard: A Tale of Korea, by James S. Gale [1904]
• Ewa: A Tale of Korea, by W. Arthur Noble [1906]
• Korea's Fight for Freedom, by F.A. McKenzie [1920]
• Korea Today, by George M. McCune [1950]

In addition to books about Korea, there are many books written by Korean authors translated into English, though they're not ready for viewing yet. These even include books by Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il.

Previously, I wrote about how major Korean portals like Naver and Daum are adopting a real-name policy in an effort to reduce the amount of 악플 in online bulletin boards. But what exactly qualifies as a defamatory or demeaning comment? The above graphic gives us some idea. A more detailed explanation with examples can be found in this report: 꼬맹이, 한심한 녀석, 3류 ××, 이런 악플 달면 '모욕죄' [Joins.com]

Smileys are 25 years old, apparently. Smileys were first used in Emails, then became widely popular in IM (instant messaging), and are now used in all types of communication, including mobile texting. According to a recent survey by Yahoo!, women use emoticons more than men, and most people find it easier to express feelings of love using emoticons than in person. [via Digital Inspiration - The Popular Text Smiley is Now 25 years Old]

;;)      batting eyelashes: to show shock or surprise
:|       straight face: showing no emotion
/:)     raised eyebrow: surprised or disapproving
=))    rolling on the floor:  laughing hard
=;      talk to the hand: slang phrase meaning "I'm not listening" or "I don't want to listen to your nonsense"
~X(   at wits' end: perplexed, not knowing what to do
:-t      time out: same as the Konglish "time," meaning "stop" or "wait"
#-o    d'oh: Homer Simpson's catch phrase, expressing dismay; surprised and disappointed at the same time
:-SS   nailbiting: anxious or scared

I think Asians use smileys more than Westerners. There must be tons of smileys that are specifically Korean.

Starting from yesterday, major Korean portals Naver and Daum have begun disallowing anonymous comments on their sites. Other, smaller sites will follow suit in a month or so. Read about it here (Korean).

This is a big change in Korean Internet culture. The new policy is aimed at cutting down on the increasing number of defamatory comments left by people who hide behind anonymity. We've all heard about defamatory comments leading to lawsuits and even suicides.

Requiring you to register with your "citizen number" and stamping every word you write with your name will definitely reduce the number of demeaning remarks (and maybe even comment-spam!), but it will also discourage user participation in general and, to a degree, limit freedom of speech.

What if you have some emotional problems and you want some advice from your online peers? If you have to tell the entire world who you really are, you're less likely to speak up. Or, maybe you want to say something and have it considered for the view it expresses in itself - strong political or religious views, for example - without the entire neighborhood or parish knowing about it.

The big question is, what happens when search engines collect data by commenter names? One can imagine a situation where a cyber-stalker tracks down all of your comments and the websites they belong to. It's like following your footsteps and eavesdropping on every word. Or your boss finds questionable websites you frequent and uses that information in ways that can hurt your career.

Because Korea is a small, homogeneous country where everybody knows everybody, people have sometimes found solace and freedom in anonymity when they go online. But with all good things, there are those who abuse that freedom for unseemly purposes, and now the irresponsible behavior of some has led to a nationwide "soft" censorship. Now more than ever, people will have to decide between privacy and participation, between silence and speech.

What's a Web 2.0 homepage without widgets? Newsweek has already declared 2007 "Year of the Widget," much like 2006 was the year of online video. Sometimes the phrase "world wide widgets" or "the widgetization of the web" is thrown around, indicating just how prevalent widgets are these days.

Web widgets (as opposed to desktop widgets) are mini applications that can add all sorts of functionality to your webpage or blog. What's wonderful about widgets is that there are so many of them, anything from Dog Quotes to Lava Lamps. By hand-picking your widgets, you can create your own little web universe or at least carve out a small piece of the web just for you and your visitors. It's the ultimate way to customize the web.

There are already short descriptions of some of the widgets featured in the sidebar of this homepage-blog. I thought I'd add a few more widgets that seemed interesting.

• @ PostSecret : Won the 2007 Bloggie for best overall blog, as well as for best topical blog and best community blog. Handmade postcard confessionals from anyone who wants to anonymously share a deep, dark secret with the world. At times racy (semi-nudity, profanity).
• @ Grazr : Customizable RSS reader with sample feeds.
• @ Digg RSS Viewer : See what stories are hot at the moment, as they are voted by members of Digg.com.
• @ Korean Blog Search : Search blogs by expats (foreigners living in Korea, writing mostly in English)
• @ This Day in History : Little trip back in time.
• @ Joke of the Day : For your reading pleasure.

(For instructions on how to add Tistory keyword-widgets to the sidebar, see Tistory Hack: Keyword-Widgets.)

Blogs usually have half a dozen or so widgets in the sidebar - any more and you're testing the patience of your visitors with slow-loading pages. This homepage-blog currently has 30 widgets, perhaps as much as a personalized start page like iGoogle or Netvibes, which are made of widgets and nothing but. This is possible due to a "keyword" feature in Tistory blogs which uses JavaScript pop-ups. Because not many Korean blog systems allow code manipulation, this kind of hack would be impossible with competing blogs such as Naver blogs. (BTW: Happy Birthday to Tistory, which turned 1-year old last week.)

Here's a brief instruction on how to make a Tistory keyword-widget:

1. Find an interesting widget (see below). Customize the size and look, choose any other available options, then copy the code (usually <script> or <iframe>).
2. In Tistory, create a post as a "keyword" and not as a regular post. (You might have to enable this feature by activating the keyword plugin.) Give the keyword-post a distinctive title like "@ Joke of the Day." Paste the widget code in the html editor and publish the keyword-post.
3. In the Tistory control panel under skin -> sidebar, add a "code banner" module (again, the code banner plugin needs to be activated first). Click the module's "edit" button and enter the link-code of the keyword-post that contains your widget. The code looks like this:
4. <a onclick="openKeyword('/keylog/@%20Joke%20of%20the%20Day')" class="key1">@ Joke of the Day</a>
5. A keyword-link should now appear in the sidebar underlined with red dots. Click on it and your new keyword-widget should appear in a pop-up window.

Most sidebars to blogs are narrow. The advantage of using Tistory "keywords" as widget-containers is that you have much more real estate. Also, because it uses a separate pop-up window, it's ideal for web radios or jukeboxs - you or your visitors can navigate your blog pages freely without having the currently playing song end abruptly every time you navigate to a different page.

There are many sites that offer free web widgets. Here's a list of the major ones:

• Google Web Gadgets
• WidgetBox
• YourMinis  
• Sniperoo
• SpringWidgets