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A Look at Terrorist Tracking Technology; What Is So Appealing About Everquest?; Making Life Bearable for Zoo Animals
Aired July 13, 2002 - 13:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANNOUNCER: Today on NEXT@CNN: Spy tech. Get a look at some of the sophisticated technology used to track down bad guys in the war on terrorism.
Also, almost half a million people spend hours role-playing and interacting in the cyber world. Find out what's so appealing about Everquest.
And making life bearable for zoo animals.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think they like it a lot.
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ANNOUNCER: Find out what's going on beneath the surface of this polar bear pool. All that and more, on NEXT.
JAMES HATTORI, HOST: Hi, everybody. And welcome to NEXT@CNN, this week from the Fernbank Museum of Natural History in Atlanta, Georgia. I'm James Hattori, and this bad boy towering over me is argentinosaurus, the largest dinosaur ever discovered, weighing in at 100 tons, more than 125 feet long. Talk about making you feel small and threatened! But, argentinosaurus was a plant eater, and lived about 90 million years ago, long before the first members of the human family appeared on earth.
Just when that happened is the focus of some big news this week. At the center of all the excitement is a skull found in Africa. As Ann Kellan reports, paleontologists say it could be the oldest human- like skull ever found.
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ANN KELLAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Nicknamed Toumai (ph), the skull is believed to be six to seven million years old. Discovered in Chad, by an international team led by French paleontologist Michel Brunet (ph). He claims the skull has human characteristics and dates back to a time when our ancestors split from the apes. Toumai (ph) has human and chimp-like features.
It has a flat face and protruding brow of a human, but its brain and body is the size of a chimp. And they found human-like teeth. Published in the journal "Nature," scientists say this is one of the most significant finds in almost 100 years.
IAN TATTERSALL, AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY: This is a very exciting find. It expands our knowledge of early human evolution in a couple of ways, both in time and in space.
KELLAN: In time, it's the oldest human-like fossil found to date. And in space, it's the first specimen ever found in West Africa. Fossils like these were always found in East Africa, meaning hominids could have roamed throughout all Africa instead of just one isolated area.
Paleontologists have dug up a fair number of human ancestor fossils over the years. They say all of them are twigs on the human family tree, but none is the so-called "missing link," the first human-like creature, or hominid, to evolve from apes. If Toumai (ph) is a hominid, he comes closer to our ape ancestors than any of the others.
BERNARD WOOD, GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY: It could be in the human line. It could be in the chimpanzee line. It could be the common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees, or it could belong to a group which is extinct.
KELLAN: Right now, scientists aren't sure, but this discovery also gives them a new glimpse at what West Africa was like six and seven million years ago.
WOOD: They found evidence of other mammals, so that we know that there must have been woodland. We know that there was forest nearby. We also know that there were a few grassland animals.
KELLAN: If Toumai (ph) is, in fact, a hominid who lived in the grasslands and forests of Chad, that means the human part of the family tree branched off from apes and chimps about two million years sooner than we thought.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: Turning now to the war on terrorism. Not all weapons in that battle involve bullets or bombs. A new generation of high- tech intelligence tools helps military planers find enemy forces, and figure out what they're up to. David Ensor has more.
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DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): At the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics, security officials got high tech help from a little-known intelligence agency, the National Imagery and Mapping Agency. Three-dimensional maps to help plot out their efforts: Where to put observation posts, which facilities were vulnerable from where from a terrorist sniper.
But there are new intelligence-gathering technologies now under development that may soon be even more useful in the war on terrorism. Normal black and white spy satellite images tell a lot. Color images tell even more, but they cannot see what is camouflaged. Something new called hyper-spectral imaging can.
JOHN PIKE, DIR., GLOBALSECURITY.ORG: With hyper-spectral imagery, you are looking at literally hundreds of different colors, and minute differences in those colors can tell you the difference between leaves and a camouflaged command post.
REP. PORTER GOSS (D-FL), INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN: If you've got a campfire going in a cave, and you can't see the campfire or the smoke, maybe you can detect the heat. It's that kind of a thing.
ENSOR: It may also find heat from vents leading to underground bunkers deep under Baghdad, used by Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. Hyper-spectral imagery is so sensitive, sources say, that it can even detect trace amounts of a particular chemical in the air.
PIKE: Now, the military can take hyper-spectral imagery and detect minute pollutants that might be leaking out of a clandestine chemical weapons factory.
ENSOR: There are also new intelligence tools developing for the National Security Agency, the eavesdropping branch of U.S. intelligence, known for listening in on potential terrorist phone calls and e-mails around the world. Now, they are improving something called traffic analysis, learning things from patterns in the volume of mass communication.
Take the Super Bowl. Telephone company executives can always tell you who's winning.
PIKE: They can tell you how the Super Bowl is going and who won the Super Bowl simply by looking at how many people are making phone calls at any given time. The National Security Agency uses this technique to monitor phone calls in Afghanistan or Pakistan, to try to predict an impending terrorist attack.
GOSS: If you see an uptick of electronic activity of a certain type in a certain area, you can expect that something is happening. It might be a nuclear test, it might be conversations on cell phones, it might be people warming airplane engines. It might be people getting ready to test rockets.
ENSOR (on camera): There are, of course, other implications of these and other developing technologies that officials do not want to discuss publicly. Suffice it to say that in the intelligence war on terrorism, technology is America's friend.
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HATTORI: Technology may be America's friend, but some officials are concerned that America's enemies are picking up a lot of high-tech knowledge at U.S. universities. Half a million student visas are issued every year, but no one really knows what the students do with their U.S. education after they return home. Here's Andrea Koppel. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Until he fled Iraq in August, 1994, Khidir Hamza was among Iraq's best and brightest, a nuclear physicist considered the father of Baghdad's nuclear bomb. For two decades, Hamza secretly worked to build Saddam Hussein an atomic weapon.
Hamza says he learned much of what he needed to know in the 1960s, as a young graduate student right here, in the United States.
(on camera): You came here to study nuclear physics. Did you have any intention to build a nuclear bomb?
KHIDIR HAMZA, FORMER IRAQI NUCLEAR SCIENTIST: No. At the time no.
KOPPEL (voice-over): Hamza got his master's at MIT and a Ph.D. in theoretical physics from Florida State University. At the time, Hamza says he expected his skills would go toward peaceful purposes. But Saddam Hussein had other plans for Hamza.
(on camera): How many of your colleagues who worked in the nuclear program with you had studied in the U.S. or in the West?
HAMZA: Actually, when I went back, most of them.
GEORGE BORAS, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: The question of whether foreign students use knowledge that they can learn in the U.S. and then go back home and turn that knowledge against us, it's actually become much more important, obviously, since 9/11.
KOPPEL: Harvard professor George Boras just completed a study of the student visa program in the United States. In the 1970s, the U.S. issued 60,000 student visas a year. Thirty years later, that number jumped six fold, to 350,000. In the 1980s, many of those students were Iraqis. Saddam Hussein wanted more Iraqi scientists to get an American education.
HAMZA: He gave us a huge budget to send people here to be trained to fill in the slots we needed in the nuclear weapons program. And we sent hundreds, probably up to a thousand or more, in the U.S.
KOPPEL: After Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, U.N. weapons inspectors were surprised to find plenty of U.S. trained Iraqi scientists.
CHARLES DEULFER, FORMER U.N. WEAPONS INSPECTOR: The pattern was the best people studied abroad, studied in the West and then their talents were applied for weapons programs.
KOPPEL (on camera): Do you think that Saddam's weapons program would be where it is today without U.S. training, Western training?
HAMZA: It wouldn't. No way. The leaders of the program, especially in biology and nuclear, were trained here. KOPPEL (voice-over): After the Gulf War, the U.S. withdrew the welcome mat for Iraqi students, but not for thousands of other students from countries in Asia and the Middle East.
(on camera): Since September 11 and the discovery so many al Qaeda members entered the U.S. on student visas, the Bush administration has only just begun to compile a nationwide database of foreign students. To date, though, there are no government records tracking these students, what they studied or how they used that knowledge back home.
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ANNOUNCER: Later in the show, lead-footed kids in go-carts.
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UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: I like going fast.
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ANNOUNCER: And technology that puts on the brakes.
And when we come back, are you afraid of gribble? If you lived in Seattle, you might be. We'll show you why.
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HATTORI: Congress has given its final approval. Now, the next hurdle for the proposed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada: The lawsuits. Tuesday, the Senate overrode Nevada's veto of the proposal, as the House did in May, but Nevada has filed several lawsuits challenging various aspects of the proposal. The repository would store highly radioactive waste from nuclear plants across the country.
In addition to the lawsuits, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has to review the project, a process that could take three or four years. The facility is slated to open in the year 2010.
A tiny creature is causing big problems for the city of Seattle. The flea-sized crustacean has an enormous appetite for wood, and that appetite could threaten the city's waterfront tourist area. Lilian Kim explains.
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LILLIAN KIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): With its breathtaking skyline and proximity to the water, Seattle is considered to be one of America's premiere port cities, but tiny crustaceans threaten this major metropolis. They're called gribbles, so small you can't even see them, only the damage they've left behind.
RICHARD MILLER, SEATTLE TRANSPORTATION DEPT.: Creates a lot of holes in the wood and weakens the wood, to the point where it just falls apart. KIM: These pieces of wood are what holds Seattle's seawall in place. At 60 feet wide and 8,000 feet long, the seawall is a tourist mecca, home to a ferry dock and adjacent to a major thoroughfare. But with gribbles chomping away at a rate of nearly an inch a year, the seawall, engineers say, will ultimately collapse, especially if another earthquake hits the Pacific Northwest.
MAYOR GREG NICKELS, SEATTLE, WASHINGTON: The seawall is just a critical place where we interface with the ocean, and it's important that that seawall remain intact, so that the activities built on the water are attached to our city.
KIM: The push is now on to construct a new seawall and rebuild the double-decker highway that runs next to it.
(on camera): If the city goes ahead and replaces the seawall, then the people who live and work here will have to endure years of nonstop construction, and the project is costly. Estimates run as high as $1.5 billion.
(voice-over): The decision will ultimately be left to Seattle voters, leaving the city on shaky ground for now.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: Another water critter is worrying folks in the state of Maryland. This one is so feared, some people have taken to calling it the Frankenfish. Natalie Pawelski explains.
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NATALIE PAWELSKI, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): What looks like peaceful pond is actually ground zero for an invasion. Carnivorous Chinese fish marching on Washington, or at least, potentially, walking around nearby.
PAUL DIMAURO, FISHERMAN: When I took it out of his mouth, he opened it and he had some mean looking teeth. I was like, I better not stick my finger in that one.
PAWELSKI: The creature in question, the Northern Snakehead. It may not look particularly fierce, though, at this size, but it grows into a ravenous gobbler of frogs and other fish. And it can actually ambulate, breathe air and move over land from pond to pond.
MIKE SLATTERY, U.S. FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE: If it is kept moist, it can live for very extended periods of time out of water.
PAWELSKI: Authorities say the Snakeheads seem to be breeding and must not be allowed to leave this pond alive.
ERIC SCHWAAB, MARYLAND FISHERIES SERVICE: Large scale electro- shocking is something that we can employ if we're able to deal with this, you know, the vegetation. Draining the pond would be one option. Poison is a technique that's used on a limited basis. PAWELSKI: In an age when tolerance is a virtue, officials make no bones about species profiling in this case. They are targeting this fish because it is an alien.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Very bad.
PAWELSKI: Not that kind of alien, although you can sort of see the resemblance.
But in the same way movie creatures from other galaxies have unusual appetites and unstoppable powers, alien species -- plants and animals that end up where they don't belong -- can feast on natives that don't have any natural defenses. And the alien's natural predators aren't around to keep them in check.
For now, Maryland has posted wanted posters, asking anglers, if they see any Northern Snakeheads, to terminate them.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If they're not going to do the job, we will.
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HATTORI: When snakes eat, they just swallow their prey whole, right? After all, it's not like they have hands or feet to hold their meal so they can take bites. Well, now scientists have found that a small tropical snake from Singapore does eat in bites. The snake's main prey is the soft shell crab. It loops its body around the crab to pin it down, bites the animal, then rips it apart swallowing in chunks. Researchers were able to record the feeding method by using an infrared camera in the dark, in a laboratory. Their findings were published in the journal "Nature."
In the Peruvian Amazon, conservationists will soon have more money for their work, thanks to a deal with the United States. As Gary Strieker reports, that deal also gives much-needed debt relief to the Peruvian government.
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GARY STRIEKER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): There's new protection for some of the richest rainforests on earth, thanks to a new agreement between Peru and the United States, a so-called "debt- for-nature" swap. The deal commits the Peruvian government to provide funding for local conservation groups, giving them the money they need for critical conservation work in 10 rainforest areas covering more than 27.5 million acres, about the size of Virginia or Cuba.
MEG SYMINGTON, WORLD WILDLIFE FUND: These areas are really the heart of the Western Amazon, the most pristine, the most rich in terms of the species they contain.
STRIEKER: The agreement cancels $5.5 million of Peru's debt to the United States, saving the Peruvian government about $14 million in future payments.
SYMINGTON: They, instead, will pay $10 million in local currency into a trust fund in Peru that will benefit conservation.
STRIEKER: And for the first time in a debt-for-nature swap, leading conservation groups joined forces with the U.S. government. Conservation International, the Nature Conservancy and the World Wildlife Fund committed more than $1 million to the deal.
SYMINGTON: And because the U.S. conservation groups are participating, we are able to provide technical expertise in how these funds should be used and where the most important places they should be spent.
STRIEKER: There are more than 20,000 species of plants in Peru, and nearly 1,800 species of birds, their habitats seriously threatened by destructive logging and agriculture, as well as mining and exploration for oil and gas.
Saving Peruvian rainforests from these threats is a major challenge for conservationists.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Ever wondered how you wash your hair in space? We've got the answer, and other tips about life in orbit, when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HATTORI: Would you want to travel into space? But before you answer -- what if it involved spending months up there, in cramped quarters, with no assurance about when your ride home would get there? Well, that's the situation for the current crew on the International Space Station Alpha. Miles O'Brien checked in on them this week, and got a tour of their digs.
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MILES O'BRIEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): Just about a month into their tour of duty on the International Space Station Alpha, the fifth full time crew, Expedition V, is busy at work working on some scientific experiments, working on the continued construction of the International Space Station.
Let's check out where they are right now as we go to speak with them. They are traveling along at 17,500 miles per hour, just over Canada, coming down in our direction here in Atlanta. During the course of this interview they will practical fly overhead some 250 miles above us.
And with that, let's go onboard and say hello to the crew of the International Space Station. To your left, Peggy Whitson, flight engineer. In the center, of course, the commander, Valery Korzun, and to his left, Sergei Treschev, another flight engineer. I know you're up to date on what's going on with the shuttle fleet. The shuttle fleet is on the ground for what could be quite a long time, unclear right now because of some cracks in some fuel lines. I think no matter which way it goes, it's going to mean more time for you in space. Mentally, what are you prepared for, how long could you go before you'd scream uncle?
PEGGY WHITSON, FLIGHT ENGINEER: Actually, before we launched, even though our mission was originally supposed to be four and a half months long, I assumed I would be here at least six months.
O'BRIEN: Peggy Whitson and the crew put together a tour for us not too long ago, and as they play the tape, Peggy is going to narrate for us and show us some of the highlights of what it's like to live onboard the International Space Station.
WHITSON: We're starting off with our world map, our computer. It shows us where we are over the Earth. And I am panning back, and as I do so, you can see the aft end or the rear end of the laboratory, and I just wanted to show you our little picture window in the lab, because everyone always asks, do you have windows and what can you see from them. Of course, unfortunately our video doesn't do justice to what you can actually see out these windows, but it is very a nice and interesting view any time we have some spare time.
I wanted to show you my sleep station. It -- and this is me inside of it -- just to give you a feel for the skies. But inside there, I have any computer, as well as photos and books and things from home.
As we exit the laboratory, at the aft, we enter the node, and we have our exercise gear here, our resisting exercise device, called the red. One of the other really great things for us in the node we have is the IT (ph) phone, and this phone allows us to call folks at home.
Here, further, we are entering into the SUB (ph). Valery is showing you how we wash our hair on orbit.
And here we see the treadmill. And Valery working out on the treadmill. And here's our table. We have access to water right next to the table so we can rehydrate our foods as necessary, and here's Valery showing you how we eat in space.
O'BRIEN: All right, Peggy Whitson, thank you to you, Valery Korzun and Sergei Treschev for your time and for the extra special tour stem to stern of the International Space Station, now one month into your tour of duty, four or maybe five or maybe even longer months to come in space.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: Coming up in our next half hour, found a Web site offering an incredible investment opportunity? It could be a fake set up to scare potential scam victims. Find out who's behind these warnings.
And we'll show you how a bear can swim for miles without getting anywhere, and why he should. First, we'll take a quick break, and then get the latest news from the CNN newsroom. Don't go away.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK) HATTORI: Welcome back to NEXT, this week from the Fernbank Museum of Natural History in Atlanta, Georgia. Turning now from the Stone Age to the information age. The Internet is full of opportunities and opportunists. How do you tell the difference? Well, as our Ann Kellan reports, sometimes help comes when you least expect it.
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KELLAN (voice-over): You're searching the Web for a good investment opportunity, maybe something that could even help fight the war on terrorism, or protect yourself. Here is a portable biohazard detector that can test for weapons-grade hazardous material from 50 feet away. What peace of mind for a family and what a great investment -- except the device and the company don't exit.
ERIC WENGER, FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION: So this particular Web site and all the teaser Web sites that we have, these are topics that rip from the headlines of our cases.
KELLAN: The Federal Trade Commission created the fictitious McWhortle company Web site to warn all of us about investment scams that are rampant on the Internet.
WENGER: When people are searching for particular topics, our site will come up hopefully and be prominently featured in the search engine results just right next to the sites that may represent scams.
KELLAN: Surf for college tuition deals, even cures for arthritis, and you'll stumble on other FTC bogus sites with a message.
Looking for free dream vacations? Or the ubiquitous work at home schemes? A quick click and you'll get similar advice to watch out.
WENGER: Whenever you have a downturn in the economy, you have people who lose their jobs, and those people are often looking for ways to make money. If they can't easily find a job or while they're looking for a new job, they may be looking for other lines of work. So they may be particularly receptive to offers that would allow them to work from their homes.
KELLAN: Whether you stumble upon counterfeit sites featuring vacuous virility boosters or fake fat busters, the consumer agency doesn't want Web surfers to feel like they've been had.
WENGER: We want to make sure that people feel educated and not fooled after they view these sites. When they open these sites and click for more information, then they are provided with very detailed consumer information, tips that will help to avoid being scammed in the future.
KELLAN: Better to be warned than to be ripped off. You can get more information and advice at www.ftc.gov.
(END VIDEOTAPE) HATTORI: Maybe you're not looking to the net for a get-rich- quick scheme. Maybe you're looking for some help with a hobby, say bird watching. Well, if that's the case, you'll definitely want to flock to this week's "Nothin' but Net." Here's Natalie Pawelski.
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PAWELSKI (voice-over): Birding may be the most popular hobby in America. An estimated 16 million people do at least a little bird watching now and then. If you're interested in joining them, you can log on to several Web sites. One for beginners is Birdzilla.com.
SAM CROWE, BIRDZILLA, COM: All kinds of topics are covered, including field guide selections, selection of the proper optics, binoculars, spotting scopes and where to go and what kind of birds you might see when you get there.
PAWELSKI: The there can be as near as your own backyard. Put up a good feeder, add the perfect seeds and watch the birds stop by for a snack. As for figuring out who these new feathered friends are, Birdzilla suggests a field guide and a few basic techniques.
CROWE: There are certain elements that you start with, and many people start looking at size, and then you look at colors of the back, color the head, colors of the grass, whether there are wing bars, whether there are eye lines or eye rings -- all of those are key traits that could be used to identify different species.
PAWELSKI: Looking for those key traits, called field marks, is the brain child of naturalist Robert Torry Peterson. His legacy lives on at PetersonOnline.com. Peterson's field guide set the bird identification standard back in 1934. Today's PetersonOnline suggests learning the shapes and sizes of a handful of common birds to start, and then learning clues to identifying other birds.
As you learn to tell your golden eagle from your great blue (UNINTELLIGIBLE), you can join the bird world tradition keeping a life list of every species you've seen.
CROWE: Many birders like to keep their life list on the Birdzilla Web site.
PAWELSKI: Also on Birdzilla, the wild bird omnibus stuffed with information.
CROWE: You'll find over 800 species description, 400 or 500 range maps, and hundreds of different pictures of birds and birds songs.
PAWELSKI: You can also send a fine-feathered postcard. You can watch birds wherever you are, whatever your age. The Web can help you fulfill this flight of fancy. But don't spend too much time glued to the computer. You can't really go birding unless you look outside.
I'm Natalie Pawelski, and that's "Nothin' but Net."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: For more on the birding sites and a lot more stuff from our program, check out our Web site, at cnn.com/next.
ANNOUNCER: Coming up, it's not your father's bumper car. We'll bring you up to speed on what's happening inside Hong Kong's go-cart mall.
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HATTORI: What if Tonka Toys started making real trucks? Well, in Japan a toy maker is making real cars. The company, called Takada (ph), put four models on display this week. They're one seater electric vehicles called q-cars (ph). Some might say they're barely bigger than the toys they're based on. Q-cars (ph) are so small, Japan classifies them as motor bikes. The company says the vehicles can go for nearly 50 miles on a single charge. Q-cars (ph) will be available in Japan starting in November for the equivalent of $11,000 to $17,000 U.S.
Imagine a bunch of 10-year-olds racing around the track in high- speed machines. I know it sounds scary, but at some modern go-cart malls the grown-ups have a secret weapon to keep youthful speed demons under control. Kristie Lu Stout from Hong Kong now.
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KRISTIE LU STOUT, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): They may not have a license to drive, but these kids definitely have the need for speed.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: It's fast and it's really cool when you do turns.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: You can go fast and you can ram people.
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: It doesn't even matter. I just want to be able to track and race.
STOUT: Thankfully these road warriors are off the highway and in the Hong Kong's Karting Mall, where tires squeal and engines roar, the sound of today's high-speed go carts.
PETER THOMPSON, CHAIRMAN, KARTING MALL: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) very sophisticated. (UNINTELLIGIBLE) not indoor but outdoor these carts give us speeds of up to 130 miles an hour.
STOUT: Before the engines rev, the pit crew outfits each driver with a racing suit, helmet and driving instructions. A clear sign that safety is paramount.
(on camera): There are thrills but no spills here at the Karting Mall. In fact, each car is equipped with a seatbelt, an extra-wide body to prevent roll over, even the emergency off switch. But perhaps the most impressive safety feature is something I can't show you.
(voice-over): It's off the track: A radio operating control system that links each cart to the race controller.
(on camera): I see you're looking at the times, and Thomas (ph) is just going a little bit too fast. What can you do?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If Thomas (ph) is driving outside his capabilities, we have a radio link to the cart with a device here in the control center.
STOUT: That device right there.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This device right here. This is a radio speed controller. We have a receiver on the cart, and if we press go it means they're on full power.
STOUT: Used in control of the car, all by wireless.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We can -- yes, all by wireless.
STOUT (voice-over): So even when Thomas (ph) spins out of control, his wheels can roll to a gentle stop.
And how does that mix with the speed demons?
(on camera): These guys can actually slow your cart down if you go out of control. Doesn't that bother you?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILDREN: No.
STOUT: No?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: Yeah, it does.
STOUT: It bothers you? Why does it bother you?
UNIDENTIFIED CHILD: Well, I like going fast.
STOUT (voice-over): Some kids want just one simple thrill: Putting the pedal to the metal without being pulled over.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Next on NEXT: A wildly popular online fantasy game, and the competitors that hope to knock it from the top of the heap.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HATTORI: You may not know it, but some of your friends and co- workers may be leading a double life as maybe a knight in armor, an elvine wizard or perhaps an ogre thief. No, we're not talking about anything kinky. They're playing Everquest, the wildly popular online game that has hundreds of thousands people glued to their PCs. Natalie Pawelski talked with gaming expert Marc Saltzman about Everquest, and what's next in online gaming.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) PAWELSKI: So this summer, while some people are out at the lake or out getting some sun, there are other people in a whole other world.
MARC SALTZMAN, GAMING EXPERT: That's right, literally. They're in the world of Everquest. It is the most popular online only role- playing game sensation that has -- get this -- 430,000 people each paying $13 a month to play this game.
What you do in this game is when you log on, you create an avatar, an online representation of yourself. Then you can customize everything from your race and class and skills right down to your hair and eye color. And you go out and you set out in this virtual world. You ban together with other online players, and you accomplish any number of tasks.
PAWELSKI: When you say ban together with other online players, you mean you are actually somehow in connection with other people playing this game?
SALTZMAN: That's right. It seems like a very solitary experience. You're inside your house at your personal computer playing a game by yourself. But really, you're joining hundreds of thousands of others online.
And you go out and you accomplish a number of quests. And you can't do lot of them by yourself. You form alliances and then you go and you accomplish a goal. For example, say a slay dragon or something.
The appeal of this game is that it's always online. We call this a persistent online world. So all the events in the game continue to take place even after you've logged off, and that's one of the reasons why so many people are addicted to this game. It's called Evercrack, actually.
PAWELSKI: Well, how addicted are people?
SALTZMAN: Well, the average player logs 21 hours per week. Average. Not on the high end. So Everquest is doing extremely well.
PAWELSKI: But I've also heard there are a lot more women playing this than a lot of other role-playing games.
SALTZMAN: There are. You know, it's not just a male phenomenon. They have all these kinds of interesting statistics on who exactly -- who is playing this game. And they find that people meet in the game and then they get married in real life. They have Everquest fan fests and conventions where people can dress up and go around and meet other people that they've only seen their online name, or avatar.
Last year, Everquest players were spending real money to buy characters on Ebay. So instead of investing a few months' worth of time and effort in this game to get to, say, level 48, you can buy a character for a few hundred dollars and import that into your account. But then Sony put a stop to that because it's unethical, and you know, it's jeopardizing the integrity of the game.
Sixty percent of all the people that started Everquest in '99 are still playing together.
PAWELSKI: Are there other online worlds you can visit?
SALTZMAN: Yeah, there are a couple of online only games right now. Everquest just happens to be the most popular in North America. But coming soon, we've have got the Sims online. Based on the best- selling computer game of all time, which takes that same concept of managing the lives of these little simulated people, but blowing it up into this beautiful world where, you know, you customize your home, then you can create worlds that others can join. And you can either be a spectator or you can jump right in.
PAWELSKI: So, you have shown us how we can visit a world that we create. What if you're feeling lazy and you want to visit a world you are already familiar with?
SALTZMAN: Right. Well, what better world for a fantasy fan than "Star Wars"? And there is going to be an online role-playing game coming out soon called "Star Wars Galaxies: An Empire Divided." You can be any number of the races and classes that are familiar to "Star Wars" fans -- with limitations. You can't be Darth Vader. Of course, everybody would want to be Darth Vader or Luke Skywalker. It takes place on multiple planets, just like in the film, and you can actually fly from one to another in an add-on pack that will be coming out after that.
PAWELSKI: So these online only interactive games, is this the way of the future?
SALTZMAN: Absolutely. And not just for computers. But console systems are all going online. You know, the ones you're playing on your TV -- even PalmPilots and cell phones are now supporting these massively multi-player role-playing games.
PAWELSKI: Can you imagine that? I mean, instead of people just driving and calling, they will be driving and calling.
SALTZMAN: And slaying a dragon at the same time.
PAWELSKI: It is going to make the real world just as dangerous as that world online.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Still ahead, the endless pool was designed for people with lots of money and not much space.
But look who's got one now. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HATTORI: Hedgehogs on a few remote islands off Scotland can breathe a sigh of relief, at least for now. The hedgehogs are in trouble because they eat so many birds' eggs that the bird populations are threatened. Scottish wildlife officials were considering killing all 5,000 hedgehogs. But faced with protests from hedgehog lovers, they're now looking at alternatives, including sterilization and relocating the hedgehogs to the mainland. The threatened birds are native to the islands in the outer Hebrities (ph). A few hedgehogs were introduced in 1974, and their population has exploded since then.
If zoo animals could talk, they might sound something like these guys. Kids on summer vacation. I'm bored, there's nothing to do. Well, it is up to zoo keepers to find ways to keep animals active and interested. Our Jeanne Moos checked out one innovation in New York's Central Park Zoo in the depth of the polar bear pool.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): What do you get for the polar bear who has everything? How about an endless pool? They normally sell to humans for around 17,000 bucks. Now the manufacturer has donated one to Gus and his two girlfriends at the Central Park Zoo.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It is like watching a kid in a water park, you know, with a water slide.
MOOS: The press has dubbed Gus "the neurotic, bipolar bear." It started eight years ago when Gus was swimming around and around so obsessively that the zoo hired the animal behaviorists who trained the whale in "Free Willy" to try and help Gus. A couple of wise guys even published a humor book called "What's Worrying Gus?" You'd worry, too, if you were mistaken for a turtle.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Giant turtle.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Polar bear.
MOOS: But Gus was no more neurotic than many bored zoo animals, and Gus's keepers have been going out of their way to spice up his life.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's writing Gus' name right on there.
MOOS: In peanut butter. Keepers now routinely hide treats for the bears, so they can forage for food. They encase food in ice and supply toys such as the polar bear log. And now --
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They put in a new special swimming pool for them.
MOOS: Actually, it is a pumping propeller that creates enough current to hold a bear in place. So you swim but you don't go anywhere. You still have exercise?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Like a hamster wheel?
MOOS: Well, sort of like a hamster wheel. UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And when it's on, they -- Gus likes to swim below it; he swims against it. Ivy just floats on it. She doesn't push right to the back of it -- I think they like it a lot.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Maybe it is a massage for a polar bear.
MOOS: Or at least a place for a bear to scratch its head. But if the bears get an endless pool, what do the sea lions get? Coming soon, car wash strips. Keepers plan to anchor them to the bottom of the sea lion exhibit.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To replicate the long algae beds that you find in nature.
MOOS: This is a zoo where they even play taped toad mating calls to encourage breeding.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Like little toad love music, we call it, to get the females in the mood, basically.
MOOS: The maker of the endless pool has put the bears to music on his Web site. A Jacuzzi may make things bearable, but heaven is a polar ice cap.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: Well, Gus' pool may be endless, but our time here is not.
Before we go, though, here's a look at what's coming up next week.
If you've ever had a bad airplane meal, and what air traveler hasn't -- now you can warn your fellow globe-trotters. We'll tell you how.
Plus, take a ride on the wild side with Patty Wagstaff (ph), the first woman to win the National Aerobatic Championship.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Here we go.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Show me what you got.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, my God. Oh.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HATTORI: That and a lot more coming up on NEXT.
Until then, let us know how we're doing. You can drop us an e- mail. Our address is next@cnn.com.
Thanks so much for joining us this week. And thanks to our friends here at the Fernbank Museum of Natural History. For all of us on the sci-tech beat, I'm James Hattori. We'll see you next time.
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