Alrighty, with Further Confusion 2003 just about a month away, it's that
time of the year again! FC will once again be hosting a variety show. This
is the general call for all persons that wish to participate to step up to
the plate and submit an act. Acts should be roughly 2-3 minutes in length
(they can be longer but you'll have to talk to me about it). I would also
ask of course that the acts be considered "clean" in nature. As our rules
have stated for the past few years "no costume is still 'No costume"

Please submit your ideas for an act to fvs@furtherconfusion.org

The Moon Bear Rescue Centre in Sichuan, China has helped save 17 bears from the horrifying practice of "bile farming". The full story is here.

The centre has saved over 80 bears since 2000, but these are only a few among the thousands suffering throughout the country.

The December 2002 "Chronicle: SF, Fantasy & Horror" announces (pg. 23) that "Raven's End" by Ben Gadd, a novel 'in the tradition of Watership Down' about ravens, which is currently getting excellent reviews in Germany (the German edition is "Rabens Ruh", published in September by Kindler Verlag in Munich), has just been sold to Sierra Club Books for a U.S. edition.

"Chronicle" does not mention that the German edition is not the original one. It was originally a Canadian novel: "Raven's End: A Tale from the Canadian Rockies" by Ben Gadd (McClelland & Stewart, February 2001). It is almost two years old now; if it is this good, has anyone in Furry fandom read it yet?

You'd think that after ER, the TV producers would have forgotten about the Furry Fandom...

2002 Anthropomorphic Recommended Reading/Viewing List
3rd Update - December 15th, 2002

The 2002 Anthropomorphic Recommended Reading/Viewing List was first posted on November 1st. This is the third update, adding most of the new recommendations sent in. (There are problems with some of them; see below.) There were complaints that the 2001 Recommended List got confusing with too many separate updates, so this year all the additions are being added to the same List.

According to this story on Eurekalert, a group of scholars and scientists in Flanders said, "The so-called right to be born with a human genome that has not been modified by artificial means, was not recognized here as being a clear and a compelling right." The link contains the group's complete statement.

"fur.com" and ".org" pointed thousands of Indiana fourth-graders to an Internet site for adults instead of one dedicated to the state's history in fur trade.

Laura Nirenberg, an animal activist, discovered the misprint in a recent issue of "Indiana Studies Weekly" after reading several statements about fur trade that upset her.

When Nirenberg went to the only Web site listed in the issue -- promoted as "a good place on the Internet to find information on the fur industry" -- she realized it was not about the fur industry at all.

Instead, it was an entryway to an adult chat site for people who call themselves "furries."....

Read full news article here.

Conifur Northwest will return to the Sheraton Hotel and Convention Center in Tacoma, Washington, September 26 through 28, 2003. We are very pleased to announce that Brent "Grrrwolf" Spotswood and Chuck Melville will be our Guests of Honor.

Snowdrop, perhaps the first albino penguin in captivity was hatched at Bristol Zoo reciently, just in time for the holidays.

Southwest Airlines has been named the official airline for ConFurence 2003: "The Furry West".

When flying Southwest into any of the 4 major airports in the area, use our "Nogotiated Corporate Rate code" of J8534 and you will receive a 10% discount off Southwest's already low airfare.

Behind the scenes at Radio City Music Hall, Bambi Brook is responsible for the well-being of the four-legged stars of the "Christmas Spectacular".

Below the stage and across from the donkey pen, she keeps an eye on camels, sheep, donkeys, and a horse, 24 hours a day.

"Her company, Dawn Animal Agency, provides creatures for film and television. The animals in the Christmas show rotate with others that live on 250 acres in Westtown, N.Y., about 75 miles from Manhattan. "

It's @ Fur Thing, a non-profit pending registration, has started up a webpage featuring a fund that will go towards forming a think-tank and a research council that hopes to develop procedures and technology that will someday produce real-life furries. The homepage of the fund is http://www.clasheerian.com/furthing/.

Poor Rudolph isn't going to be joining in reindeer games of any sort now...

http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_727239.html

Science is constantly looking to the natural world for clues on how to built the better machine. The flight of the butterfly is paving the way for tiny aerial machines . The erratic looking flight of the butterfly, on closer examination, is a total mastery of the air, where the insect can use 6 different sorts motions of the wings to stay aloft, changing as needed from wingflap to wingflap. It was compared to the way a horse can change gait effortlessly.
The beautiful brittle star isn't where most people would look to for superior eyesight, but they are literally covered with perfect lenses, allowing for a total wrap around view. The lenses are much better than what we can make, thanks to the perfect use of chalk-like calcite crystals in its skeleton.

You know what they say. "Dog bites man, that's just gossip, but man bites dog is NEWS!". Well, I can only imagine man bites croc is even better. Mac Bosco Chawinga was swimming in a lake in northern Malawi when the crocodile attacked him. Fighting back, with his arms pinned, he decided to chomp on the beast's snout, which caused the surprised croc to retreat.