~ Critics ~

				Critics

Updated February 2008

Criticism: An evaluation, both good and bad, based on prior knowledge

Comments, critics & awards

[Introduction] [Snippets] [Comments & critics]

[Awards] [Et ab hic et ab hoc ] [Farewells]

Introduction

Well... it is very important to use feedback to ameliorate & change... I believe that "awards" are less important than "critics", since you can better use the latter to ameliorate your work and -maybe- develop... yet some awards are sweet and anyway "Peu de gens sont assez sages pour préférer le blâme qui leur est utile à la louange qui les trahit" (François de La Rochefoucauld, Réflexions ou sentences et maximes morales, CXVVII, english version).

For various reasons I tend to neglect this section of my site; a list of all the feedback I got through email would be utterly boring. So I have decided to gather stuff directly from the web in a slapdash manner (in fact the latin et ab hic et ab hoc is more precise than "slapdash") publishing only "critics" that have teached me something and only snippet and "awards" that did move me somehow (note that some of the links below will disappear along the years, but searchers know how to find disappeared pages).

Snippets (mostly 'awarding')

professionalsecuritytesters.org
"Also extremely entertaining was the presentation by Fravia, whose full presentation titled "Wizard searching: reversing the commercial web for fun and knowledge" is already available on his website (see link). Fravia presentation at times seemed like a comedy show, this guy just rocks... can't wait to see him speak again. Most of the crowd just loved his "no worries" attitude along with his presentation on getting the most out of your search engine results, complete with effective p0rn and music searching examples.... Go through his whole presentation using the link above"

Tsehp+:
Fravia is still the same guy as before, with the same approaches and still writing such a good essays, only the main subject has changed : he's not dwelling with code anymore but interested by the global internet and how to search inside, and the main changes is that you don't have anymore such humoritic and concise essays about general subjects written by me, just because I really suck into writing such masterpieces, I prefer to remain silent and keep on programming rce tools, that's much better ;-)

Hendrik Scholz, "The Single Point of Failure named Google?"
There is no sense and need in dissecting search engines any closer in this paper since Fravia is running the excellent Searchlores website and users should make up their mind about search engines themselves.

Guru Juice:
Fravia's Search Lores is an amazing journey of learning about search techniques, and not necessarily the ones you will learn about from traditional sources. A few words of warning: the site is a labyrinth and can be quite a chore to navigate so when you come across something there that you know you will want to return to, make sure you bookmark the exact page. Do not let that put you off though, the information on the site is excellent!

Computer Security For the Home and Small Office:
Searchlores: A delightfully quirky site by the enigmatic Fravia+ filled with vast amounts of security and privacy information, and organized with much personal idiosyncrasy.

Ace1013:
Fravia, inspired by among other things the teachings of "the Old Red Cracker", +ORC, created the HCU (the Higher Cracking University) and a huge website mirrored in part and full all over the web containing teachings and research papers on cracking. The crackers, or reversers as they mostly preferred to be called, involved with his pages did not limit themselves to software cracking, they also performed society analysis they called "reality cracking" which has close ties to the analysis of "subvertising"; advertising aimed at people's unconsciousness. Without a doubt I can say his pages are the most important influence on (at least windows) cracking in the latter half of the 1990s. Some time ago he asked that all mirrors of his site be taken down, and shifted his focus to his new "searchlores" pages. What is left are many incomplete and discontinued mirrors, but still the wealth of knowledge on these pages is immense, although more specific to one and one case than general. The link is in fravia's spirit. Fravia is now busy with his Searchlores.

http://www.gci275.com/ searches.shtml:
Searchlores: Quirky resource with some esoteric knowledge

http://doginous.tripod.com/:
Link for the day: Fravia+'s Fortress
Fravia is a leader in the world of computer self-empowerment. If you have any experience with programming or are just curious about how things work on the web, you MUST look at this site. His site used to be all about software reverse engineering, which is how to look at the raw assembly of a program and modify it so the program registers itself. Recently, fravia+ has taken his site in a new direction, focusing on how to find information hidden on the web. (The reversing essays are still there too, you just have to search for them :).
Includes priceless essays on everything related to internet self defence and user empowerment. I only wish i had the skills needed to join the HCU+...

http://ww w.theregister.co.uk/content/8/16725.html:
Fravia+: Very original site devoted to searching/penetrating the Net with creativity.

http://directory.google.com/Top/ Computers/Internet/WWW/Searching_the_Web/Help_and_Tutorials/:
Web Searchlores - Very advanced searching strategies (ie design your own searchbots). Site is strange and almost un-navigable but many gems lurk within.

http://www. everything2.com/index.pl?node=fravia:
(thing) by SpongePuppy
Well respected resource with regard to all forms in internet person tracking, reverse engineering and reality cracking, all placed in a legal context. Website is located at www.fravia.org. Many of the resources posted here are made by real-life reverse engineers, reality crackers and spammer hunters. Shares a very similar sentiment to, but no allicance with SPUTUM.

(person) by brainwave
Fravia is a great teacher of many things obscure. Since this was first noded (he || she) has retired from reverse engineering. (He || She) maintains (his || her) studies on searching, anonymity, stalking (the opposite of anonymity), ad-busting (i.e. getting rid of advertisements), and software protection at http://www.searchlores.org/

http://radified.com/index2.html:
Every so often I stumble upon an especially interesting site. Today I came across such a site: Searchlores- Advanced Internet search strategies. Never seen a site like this. First thing to get my attention was on the Welcome page here, where he says, you won't find any advertisements whatsoever on this site... The site makes use of Latin verbiage & sparse but interesting graphics... The page on reality cracking is most interesting, too. Could easily spend a week at this site... seems like a whole sub-culture unto itself.

http://torini.free.fr/marco/links.html:
Fravia+'s Searching Lores
Fravia+ may well claim to be one of the first and most prominent civil rights' activists of the internet, promoting its intelligent use against insipid commercial abuse. His first page, www.fravia.org, served the net for almost five years and offered 25+ MB of security related material, including Micro$oft bashing, Javascript tricks, Anonymity and the famous Academy of Reverse Engineering. In addition, it transported with charm the radically anti- commercial spirit which used to prevail in the hackers and crackers of old, and which is mostly extinct nowadays, as it seems. Still one of my all-time- favourites, it was, alas, completely withdrawn from the web. Following the author's express wish, most of the mirrors closed down as well.

So I offer you Fravia+'s new pages instead, which specialize in advanced means and methods of searching the internet and grabbing hold of virtually ANYthing knowable (well, that's what he claims, at least). It is by far the best in-depth introduction to the less commonly known aspects of the web that you can get and, on top of that, it's extremely amusing to watch him stalk some of those self-declared experts who make use of anonymization techniques and faked identities just in order to spam shamelessly, play bad tricks on newbies or initiate undignified flame wars etc.

We need more non-conformists of his like, if we wish to prevent the web from sharing TV's sad fate!

http://groups.google.com/:

> Google on "Fravia"
> It'll make your head explode. Be prepared.
Fantastic,   That is exactly what I'm looking for,  thank you.

And I love this one...
http://radified.com/blog/archives/2003_11.html:
"For search-engines, I use Google and Fravia's page"

And this one about the past...
http://www.darkridge.com/~jpr5/local.html:

"Fravia's Pages of Reverse Engineering - the most elite online reference to reverse engineering there ever was. it was taken off the 'net because Fravia was pissed off with the general attitude of people using his stuff; he did this all for the sake of art and challenge, and everyone used it to just break and steal software. it lives on in other places, apparently.. (check out Fravia's new site)."

Comments & Critics

[Mammon_] [Kuririn] [Spiff] [Demitria Monde Thraam] [Tristan]

Mammon_ [February 2000]

Well well well, I see we have not been idle :)

The site is well laid out [style sheets ?!? ;) ]. I see you have not totally abandoned cracking-style stuff ['other stuff'], but have moved it far into the background where it will be unobtrusive. This is, in my opinion, a good move ... the cracking nature of the previous site tended to hold it back from plunging whole-heartedly in a new direction. It seemed people thought you owed them the right to publish their essays on your site...

Lots of stuff to read, though thankfully you do not yet have it all written. I assume you will cover all the archie/ftpsearch/usual channels, but are you going to move into the MP3/warez/p0rn world with discussions of Hotline, Napster, and other such 'undernet' protocols? They are proprietary in a certain sense, but are reversed and re-implemented on a daily basis. The reversals themselves --documented in many places, e.g. with Napster -- would make excellent advanced lessons. Also, Perl/Tcl/Java[ugh] -- some perl examples of ferrets etc would be good to throw into the intermediate section. I started a perl search-engine writing tutorial for Jeff awhile back ... if you are pressed for content [right! ;) ] I can finish it. I think it is still at
www.eccentrica.or g/Mammon/sprawl/jeff.doc
in rough form. Then there is the whole server-side Javascript mess, and servlets, and jhtml, and Dynamo/JavaApp servers, and DBIs, and ASP [remember the ? trick? :) ], and a host of other web-related junk I now have to deal with at work...

http://www.searchlores.org/evaluate.htm I like it :)

http://www.searchlores.org/trolls.htm ...I'll wait for you to finish it

well, enough page-by=page. It looks good. I don't know if you are planning to touch on the hacker end of the spectrum, vis-a-vis host scanning and such. Check TLC and PSS if you do.

Some tools you may want to check: Biew [a hex editor, like hiew, for dos and linux, with source, free], GoVest [a debugger for win32], and perhaps Qweb if it is ever finished [supposedly an ISO compiant web browser]. And I believe you know already proxyhunter, a win32 tool for finding proxies. Perhaps a lesson on using range [multi-IP target] port scanners to find proxies would be good. Much easier on unix than windows, natch, though Perl enables this to be implemented anywhere.

One more of my back-burner projects is playing with neural networks for unconventional applications [specifically, for decompiling and for web/archive/file searching]. The idea of a NN or expert system is that it can be trained to mimic human decisions -- thus, you 'train' it to mimic your own decision making process, whether that decision id whether a webpage is worth looking at, whether a block of code is a switch statement or a while statement, etc.

Knotty is looking into NNets as well for school, so I'll have to bug him for info :) But these projects will have to wait until I am a little more settled in , and for the linux debugger to get somewhat functional.

>> PS: Your comments / critics / new cloaths of the
>> emperor sarcasms / suggestions / proposals /
>> CONTRIBUTIONS / cheap remarks / helpful hints /
>> whatever... on my new site are WELCOME and NEEDED.

Heheheh...your certainly know my flavour of critique ;)

_m

Kuririn [February 2000]

Fravia+,
no, it's rarely important to reply in cases like this e-mail; consider it a message-in-a-bottle found on the beach. you may even spit into it and toss it back ;)

firstly: you have quite a beautiful study at searchlores.com, my compliments.

secondly: and perhaps useful, did you see the (non-technical) article written in the Feb. 2000 of Wired (perhaps an awful publication)... nevertheless the article may interest you (as a potential line of inquiry).

Start Making Sense
The world's smartest search engine took 250 years to build. Autonomy is here.
By Steve Silberman

Possible Keywords: Michael Lynch (founder)
Reverand Thomas Bayes (CF Bayes Formula: Probability)
Autonomy/University of Cambridge ...

PS: I was going to try an idea on your old mb, i.e., to speak of searching and writing (how one is limited as you say in their tools), and also how one is limited by the problem of needing a descriptor/description --for example trying to descrive a texture (or even to find a few relevent words about it--these to me are most difficult).
The natural approach to writing seems to be quite similar to the natural approach to searching... (at its most sophisticated) or perhaps I am muddled.

anyway, i've got to ...

kuririn

Spiff [February 2000]

Fravia+,
I am delighted to find your new site and endeavor since searching became my first love of the web. As I have time I will try to assemble some essays for you or at least pass on useful snippets of info for you to use as you see fit.

Having found your new site and some reference to the useful methods of searching with altavista, I did not see a reference to scooter's manual at
http://altavista.software.digital.com/docs/search/refe rence_manual.pdf
All serious searchers should obtain and read this manual, particularly those sections on searching the indexes built by scooter since they apply to using altavista's public search engine. While much of the text is related to using scooter to build indexes and making the required settings, quite a bit is about using the search and programming scooter's API. Those sections of building indexes and programming will help some searchers to better understand the spider itself.

One example of the knowledge in searching they will learn is the variety of wildcards allowed, ie *, ? and ** While many may be familiar with the * which can be used after 3 leading characters to represent up to 5 characters they will also learn they may use the ? with the same restrictions to represent a single character which will sometimes help to filter the results. They will also learn of the double ** which can be used to represent an unlimited number of characters instead of the 5 represented by * alone.

Students of the art will also find much more about boolean queries, literal searches, ranking, filtering and more. Feel free to use this snippet if desired without credit if you wish. Pass along the url of the manual directly or test the students to find it if they can. Perhaps this url may be given with a challenge to the students to find the links of manuals for the other spiders of the web :-)
Servo

Demitria Monde Thraam [October 2001]
(Note that she was 'fished' trough my ["catching station"]

"Bored, waiting for a download to finish, I idly pulled up alltheweb to type in some randomosity and see what came up. I went there because I've recently abandoned Google now that they're selling off searchwords to advertisers - just think! for a few hundred bucks I could have a whole week or so when an Anodyne banner come zapping up whenever someone did a Google search including the word "psychotropic"! Uh, no thanks. And they were such a cool Search Engine.

Anyway, I put on the "all words" rule and typed "psychedelic" and "sysygy". What came up was one page: this one . Essentially, a dirty little trick that one such as I will usually hold no truck with...but, in the case of this fellow, I think I'll let the half-a-meg wordpile at the bottom of that page which serves as "the very 'net' (a list of words and 'angles') I have used to fish you out of the web..." What's more, he even attempts to warn you to hit the stop button and halt its loading to help you save time and mind-bits.

The site is called Searchlores and it's a sprawling hodgepodge of a compendium on search engine magic, lovingly pulled together by a dilletante of sorts by the name of Fravia . Dilletante, but a lovable sort of dilletante. Essentially, he's put together something like a two-semester college course in Finding Neat Stuff On The Web.

He is dedicated to the Old Ways of the Net, the sort of place it was (that I got to see a couple years or so of myself) before the influx of web economy buzzword-spewing idiots yapping about "leveraging best-of-breed branding solutions". He steadfastly refuses to charge fees or have any advertising on his site at all. Which I am very supportive of, in this disappointing and disheartening age of ever-increasing fee-requisite content.

I do find his fanaticism for the Opera browser a little wearing (from a guy who doesn't like ads, Opera has just about as many planted in its bookmark files as I would imagine there are in the AOL web browser) - I use MSIE (most of the time, anyway) because despite all its other problems it Just Plain Does CSS Right and this has the effect of Making Pages Look Good. I can ignore the things about it I dun' like, but bad CSS management in other browsers is harder for me to ignore.

I get the feeling Fravia sees the Web as primarily an information conglomeration. Which it - of course, is . But I also see the aesthetics of design and information organization in it. And well, I refuse to entertain the notion that either one of these things should have to be sacrificed to preserve the integrity of the other. Mostly, I guess, it's Because That's What I Do. I write AND design web pages. I am no fan of Microsoft, though, ESPECIALLY with this blight on the face of the net called WINDOWS XP that it's unloading on all of us. Frankly, I would continually choose to use Mozilla and maybe even Opera every so often if it didn't have just a few aggravating CSS bugs still mucking up things (justified text, for example, still only looks good in MSIE 4.* .) Opera also drives me nuts because while a page is downloading it comes down at 70% of the page size instead of 100%. I have not the slightest idea WHY it does this either, but it's annoying as hell.

I am pretty good at ignoring the aspects of the Big Bloatasaurus Browsers that are no good in favour of the parts of them that are precious nuggets of goodness. As for the data mining they always seem to be doing from me, that's a no-brainer: I just fill up all my data forms with FAKE CRAP anyway so that's all Micro$shafft's data miners (and all the OTHER data miners) are getting. Good old "Morgana Gondwanaland" will answer any questions you have about the Trend Towards Faking Form Data that's Sweeping the Land. (Aggregate THIS, demographic pigeonholers and "targeted" merchantizers...)

Getting back to Searchlores: the site's not all about using search engines. Nestled within it are globules of Other Things. Of particular interest to me - and perhaps you - is Reality Cracking, a super-sub-metaversive collection of tracts on resisting konsumer-kultura and living a juicy life in spite of its enforced dryness of mind. It'll take a while to get through this material...but it's definitely bookmark-worthy.

I'm also going to grab-and-save the textfile of "capture net list" of words, as I was looking at them and I dunno if it's just me and my Weird Brain seeing things that Aren't There, but it just...seems to me...that these words were specifically chosen for inclusion in the "net trap" to draw in the adventurous and intelligent among us. It got me, that it did, so draw your own conclusions. Maybe this bunch of words will help me forge through a bout of writer's block sometime.

Now, I've been webbing since 1995. Surely there's nothing more I could learn about search engines. But one never knows. I do know I've been terribly amiss with attention to the META tags of Involution's pages as of late: even the front door page has...none at all! Egad!

Oh blast. I...Must META-stasize!"

http://involution.org/anodyne/

Tristan [March 2004]

Hello Fravia,

I thought i'd send you a note to thank you for your site. I have been reading it for many years, from when it was on geocities and was moved from place to place and onwards. :)

I used to do some cracking but my real interest has always been the "reality cracking" side of things. I have, after reading your suggestions, spent much time learning the techniques of classical rhetoric. Of course I have had to do this privately, since universities are in a state of such degeneracy that are neither taught nor understood. :) You might be interested to see www.textkit.com, a site that provides many older (and therefore superior, as you'd say ;) greek and latin textbooks for free.
There is also a decent forum for people learning the immortal languages.

Are you familiar with the writings of Julius Evola, such as Men Among the ruins? I feel that you'd find his works interesting, if a little too mystical.

Anyway, I notice a touch of despair in your discussions of exegesis and reality cracking. Fear not, because many of us are privately and secretly studying - and teaching - such things, in spite of the decadence of our educational systems :)

By the way, some interesting things are happening politically, especially in france and russia with the rise of the right there, and at the same time the rejection of certain destructive forces... any opinions about that?

Regards,
Tristan.

Awards

Well I consider the following snippets "awards", sortof, yet I hope they may be of some use for the readers and not only an expression of my useless egotrips...
[Forseti+] [Tapu] [Jeff] [Kathleen] [Et ab hic et ab hoc]

+Forseti's email (March 2000)

Fravia+,

I was just now reading your pages when I realized how beneficial it has been to me to re-read the many sections and essays therein. While each initial reading provides tools to take out into the world to reverse it, (I remember going to the market after reading +ORC's supermarket [essay], what a scene!) re-reading is even more helpful.

Amidst the chaos of my life, I find bits of knowledge and experience coming to light to aid my works at the most opportune moments, a constant mixing of 'now' and experience mingling to provide a path and a solution. Surely I am not alone in this, but new information and situations often obscure or resist reversing by their 'newness'. Just as listening again to a favorite piece of music or re-reading a favorite book or watching a favorite film will place me in a reflective mindset, so does re-reading the essays and tips and tools of our reversing lores. Then a bit of info picked up in a new email or read in the paper suddenly fits into a puzzle I was not aware of on the edge of my mind, and a new understanding happens. "If your life does not seem strange to you..." A constant stream of reversing matters present and re-present opportunities to understand and learn.

I think you too realize this, and re-read things almost unconsciously as a linguist, and of course as a wanderer in the codewoods. Yet perhaps this intuition is so deep you have not mentioned it 'out loud' so often in your writings. Of course the 'lores' pages are quite back to a state of 'you'll never be able to count them all' or maybe it's been staring me down through my electron gun the whole time :) but I think it's easy to underestimate reviewing and re-reading as valuable practices,

A most important 'tip' for beginners and ~S~ alike:

Read, comprehend, go away and live, then re-read and know.

wisdom and life met on the road time stopped, did you see?

+forseti

Tapu's email (March 2000)

Fravia+,
I saw your searchlores site and it is wonderful!
It fills a much-needed gap, you know the web passed the 1 billion mark a few months ago, according to news reports, although how this figure was arrived at is anybody's guess. you may remember it had already been established by the same News Lords some time before that the search engines only have a fraction of it in their databases. (altavista was the winner, with 16%, but that was before they got bought, changed their algorithm, and apparently discarded 60 or 70% of whatever they did have).

It is enlightening and frightening to see search techniques so all grown up and quantified. I continue to rely on the tried and true psi tracking factor, and plain old fashioned Voodoo; I believe the latter is used extensively by the search engines themselves.

If I had any money I would come to Europe tomorrow. I am becoming less optimistic about the US as an appropriate home for people who do not see Rwanda as the societal ideal to which we all should aspire.

On behalf of earth, thank you for existing and sharing yourself.

Tapu

Jeff's 'poem' (December 2000)

hummmmmm; a contest...
I take it this is the basis of the contest:
---> Further on I was wondering if you could take some times to show this
---> e-tribe what Fravia+ represent to you be it in image or in words.

of a ghostly voice i've never heard
from ashes comes this fiery bird
of cultures ideas languages and lore
he sends me places I never looked before
from music litature code and text
I never know where I'll be off to next
and when I'm lost and shake my head
I know a place, it's deep it's said
where answers sleep but wide awake
they shake you up for your own sake
These archived halls of knowledge there
for those who come for those that dare
contain some answers, and riddles too
these ghostly tendrils guiding you
maintained with care you SEE its pride
just knock n open come inside
imagine the time to move each stone
and placed just so, becomes a home
the walls are warm and filled with sound
of voices invited from all around
above the rest the host is, I think
a teacher who gives to me a half full drink.

Kathleen's praise (Mai 2001)

Hi Readers...
...our research task is daunting. I thought that you would be interested in the website, searchlores by Fravia. The site will inform and amuse you about the World Wide Web.
It includes beautiful illustrations along with in depth articles. It's an intelligent and sophisticated approach to searching the web. I've learned so much... from researching, surfing, cookies, to reading headers and some pitfalls to avoid when meeting folks from the underbelly of cyberspace.
One warning though...you will be glued to your computer.
The URL is: http://www.searchlores.org So who is this "guy"? In cyberspace sometimes you never know. Fravia is Finnish, lectures in many languages, is witty...exudes lots of savoir faire... And knows his stuff. If you click on the URL below, it features some of his recent lectures. Am I a fan? You bet. I pass on his name and knowledge to you. http://www.searchlores.org/info.htm
Kathleen

Frank Mitchell's praise (November 2002)

Author's Note: Obviously, much of the text, syntax, and gramatical structure you'll find here is borrowed from Searchlores.
My thanks goes to Fravia+ for providing such a wonderful resource.
For this assignment, I used The Yoyo Wand, a lesser known searching tool and not an engine in its own right. I asked it to querry Google with the string +"search engines" +"how to search".
These are the results:
Search Engine Watch came first, which is not surprising in the least, since the golden rule still applies to the commercialized corners of the Web. A Searchlores reference did not come up until link number 257, which I found slightly odd as I had structured my querry with the idea of targeting Fravia+'s pages. Still, three of Fravia's pages appeared at links 257, 752, and 761. Of these, I found number 761, Hints & Tips, to be the most useful. Fravia+'s sixteen points, while not a primer on web searching per se, are useful for those who have already searched Altavista and are looking for better results. His page loads quickly and cleanly, is easy to navigate, and it's printer friendly too.
Search Engine Watch on the other paw, is a commercialized bastardization that makes me more than greatful for The Proxomitron and Junkbuster. The headlines and articles on the left side of Search Engine Watch caught my eye, but I soon realized that I'd seen that same information before on Ebenezer's, and it didn't have ads attached.

Of interesting note is that a search for "searchlores", "fravia", or "yoyo" on the Search Engine Watch site wide search engine turned up nothing.

Et ab hic et ab hoc (2001-2002-2003-2004)

(¯`·.¸(¯`·.¸ ¸.·´¯)¸.·´¯)
http://www.exciton.cs.rice.edu:41080/Lists/Resources/AllItems.aspx

Searchlores: Way more than you'll ever need to know for finding common information like what we want. But the "Basics" section is still very useful.
Advanced topics will allow you to find on the Internet things that you wouldn't think are on the Net, or things that shouldn't be on the Net, or even things that aren't legally publicly accessible on the Net. Pretty anti-consumerism, anti-commercial, anti-corporate; and the webmaster tends to think of himself as something of a guru sometimes (himself still a student of his own "guru" though), so he can get a little cocky sometimes.
Also goes into things like "reality cracking", anonymity, reverse-engineering if you're interested. This webmaster's views have somewhat shaped my own, since his reverse-engineering site (now down) was one of my earliest web obsessions... 1997 or so?

(¯`·.¸(¯`·.¸ ¸.·´¯)¸.·´¯)
http: //www.surviveall.net/computer/pages/9598apps.htm
Fravias pages of reverse engineering: Here is a data warrior from 'ye 'ole days. Internet Extorter users will experience browser difficulties. Fravia believes in Opera as a matter of obsession. Netscape users of older versions will be safe. These pages will leave you mentally gasping for air. No kidding, all the tools you need to get started finding what your looking for on the Internet. Still think you know what the Internet is and what it can mean to people all over the world? Think again.

(¯`·.¸(¯`·.¸ ¸.·´¯)¸.·´¯)
Fravia's web-searching lores ...BRILLIANT - more useful information than any site I've found on the net. The most comprehensive source of information on how to search things on the web, offering thousands of specific project instructions. Unlike search engines, which direct users to aggregated external information, searchlores is a true Web destination. It offers many step-by-step searching "lessons". This is one incredibly useful web site!

(¯`·.¸(¯`·.¸ ¸.·´¯)¸.·´¯)
http://www.ra ygirvan.co.uk/apoth/thought6.htm
Yesterday I managed to get sucked into a 'search trap': a page packed with thousands of keywords designed to draw in users searching for other things. Normally, I think the technique stinks, as it dilutes the usefulness of search engines, and sites that use it tend to be garbage anyway. However, this one led to Fravia's Web Searchlores (Advanced Internet searching strategies & advices), which is packed with interesting stuff. Despite a tendency to lapse into Tolkienesque metaphor - can't people just admit they're computer techies, not elven warriors? - Searchlores contains high-quality guidance on how to use the Web to find what you want. A particular gem is a new search engine, WebTop.com, that I'd never encountered. Furthermore, along with hacking stuff that doesn't interest me, there's a lot of intelligent material about 'Reality Cracking', which takes the premise that if you can understand, crack and subvert computer code, you can do the same with the codes that underly culture, such as body language, the symbols of advertising, marketing propaganda, newspaper bias, and so on. (This is arguably memetics - see below - in another guise). It also covers exegesis ('text-cracking'): an important skill, when the Internet contains as much misinformation as information. Searchlore gives valuable tips on how to raise your critical level above the level of being hoaxed, to the point where you can use the medium of the hoax to a purpose.

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http: //www.scmags.net/issues/200101/200101mc_b3.shtml
Fravia's Web-Searching Lore: This site is a goldmine for those looking to search effectively. Indeed, it will probably force you to rethink your current searching habits in favour of better practices.

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http://www.xtermin ight.de/devellinkz.htm
Searchlores.org: Fravia's Site of Reverse-Engineering ist down. Aber es gibt eine neue Seite (siehe links) von Fravia, die mindestens genauso gut ist bzw. wird wie die legendäre Alte. HINWEIS: Fravia war nie ständig online, vermutlich weil Reverse-Engineering nicht 100%ig legal war und Fravia ständig massiven Angriffen von cleveren Hackern ausgesetzt war, da auf den Seiten von Fravia (zu) viel detailierte Information über die Machenschaften großer Softwarefirmen, v.a. Microsoft zu lesen war. Ob dies bei der neue Seite nicht der Fall sein wird ist sehr zu bezweifeln, denn es ist anzunehmen das Fravia immer noch viele Feinde hat, deshalb gibt es auch von dieser Seite mehrere Mirrors von denen einer (fast) immer online ist:
http://www.2113.ch/fravia/ http://crazyboy.com/fravia/searchlores.org/
http://fravia1.virtualave.net/ http://magick.org/searchlores.org/
http://qu00l.net/s/www.searchlores.org/
Im übrigen in Insiderkreisen wird von Fravias-Seiten gesagt, sie seien diejenigen Webseiten für die sich das Online-sein (die Kosten), am meisten lohnt. Also wer die nicht kennt ist selbst schuld.....

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www.searchlore.org - The ultimate REAL KNOWLEDGE site. Do get lost in this bottomless labyrinth! This site is an excellent resource for both students and teachers! And this excellent resource carries comprehensive, easy-to-understand information and "riddles" that will help you understand how the web works.

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Thanks again for not using any commercials on your site, fravia.
Its good not being visually assulted every time I click. I swear, it's like were being trained like lab monkeys. We get blasted with a million killowatts of trash every time we press a button. It's a wonder were not constantly convulsing with apolectic sezures. Anyway: great site.
my name isn't joey, long story

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Fravia's Web Searching Lore A site very useful for webmasters and searchers. An overall extremely useful site! From the expert to the beginner, they have resources, tips, and lessons that will assist you in your searches. New information added almost daily! Following the advices contained here will generally mean more dependable results. Very useful site for Webmasters and Web Surfers Everywhere!

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http://www.vector star.net/~ash/links.html
Searchlore: Guides, strategies, and tips covering a range of subjects vital to the successful internet wayfarer--highly recommended.

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http://reactor-core.org/
Fravia, a mysterious European, is possibly the greatest living exponent of the art of Reverse Engineering, or "reversing" as he calls it. If you know how to read between the lines, his SearchLores make the most educational reading available.

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http://www.infoanarchy.org/wiki/wiki.pl?How_To_Search
[How To Search]: This topic may be too large for just one page, so I will suggest an excellent website, Fravia's Web-Searching Lore. A warning though, Fravia thinks deep and comes from a background of reverse engineering, so this site my be more in depth than what most people want. There are no simple solutions, but it provides great strategies.

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W_b
I fearlessly post the following link: www.searchlores.org/trolls.htm Caveat: Fravia is a most 'leet guru in the finest unix tradition. Prepare yourself for an unique educational experience

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Zimpol
+ORC was a genius, and I am sure he will appear on history books soon or later. I owe him (and fravia+) more than one: my job among many other things…

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James (aka hoverboards don't work on water's profile)
Fravia is a legend, but his site is consciously designed not to give up its deepest secrets without the reader putting some effort into it. Ironic considering it's mostly about searching.

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(personal) by Matthew Zimmer
Dear Mr. Fravia. I have been pouring over your site ever since I stumbled upon it very, very early in the morning two days ago. I am amazed at what you have created, and have helped others to create! Your website is a forum for some of the most interesting discussions (about programming, politics, ethics, life, language, etc) that I have seen in a while. I am literally blown away. I had always considered myself quite the master of the "little black box", but now I see that I know nothing. Thank you for publishing this website. This is the most useful place I've ever been on the internet. Please don't ever give this up! We really need people like you out there. I have a sad feeling that there are not nearly enough... I think I know what I want to do when I grow up!

Farewells

[Kuririn]

Kuririn's farewell (September 2001, some time after the 11/09/01 WTC attack)

Well fravia+,
in the off chance that you still recall "who" i am i feel it necessary to write (also it has been a long time). The recent events have pressed hard on my mind - and i feel your words more than ever.
As the media giant looms i can hardly deny anymore that it will (has!) conquered humanity and bled the minds out of our friends and family. There is no longer any doubt that the media's tactics render familiar minds confused and barren.
I see it even now around me - and it is simply horrible. sometimes i feel it is better to forget all.
I write also (since i will inevitably fail to make it a public) - i am flying off on a holyday which may be permanent.
It seems appropriate to address a few words to a you, a web presence i have "followed" for many years now (hard to believe that i was a child, more or less, when i first found myself transported into your labyrinths via Escher ;)
I simply wish to extend my feelings: i have admired your work and it has for me (and countless others) been a wind of freedom ordinarily so difficult to believe in these days.
I want to say; however i may have spoken in the past and in various quarters, i consider the last sentiment to be the worthiest.
And i say with certainty that however much my weaknesses courted insanity, and however much indignation has brought my talents to necessary ruin: i can still recognize beauties, i can never be indifferent to beauties. And to that end i will bid you a farewell.
One day, who knows? Even these hardships will be grand things to look back on. ;)
kuririn.

Finally

Oh gosh: am I a h4x0rz? Is it a compliment?

Famous hackers include Fabrice Bellard, Ian Piumarta, Richard Stallman, Linus Torvalds, Steve Wozniak, etc.
Famous h4x0rz include +Fravia, Kevin Mitnick, ORC+, u4ea, etc. See the huge difference?