By Steve Marinucci
Published April 24, 1995, San Jose (CA) Mercury News
JUST BECAUSE THE COURT HAS CALLED A RECESS DOESN'T
MEAN THAT YOU HAVE TO, YOU KNOW
NOT GETTING YOUR O.J. FIX? TRY TACKLING THE TRIAL
ON THE INTERNET
O.J. IN your living room, O.J. in your newspaper, O.J. on your radio.
And for those who simply can't get enough of the O.J. Simpson trial -- and you know who you are -- there's even more on the O.J. Simpson double-murder trial out there in cyberspace.
Computer users with access to the World Wide Web and the Internet can tap into court documents, pictures and even humor with the simple click of a mouse. Although Web sites can change overnight, here's some of what we found recently:
The most impressive O.J.-related site with the most extensive information related to the case available on the World Wide Web is Dmitri's O.J. Simpson Trial Center (located at http://www.cs.indiana.edu/hyplan/dmiguse/oj.html).
Here you'll find all sorts of documents related to the case, from Simpson's initial interview by police, notes allegedly written by victim Nicole Brown Simpson to her ex-husband, a vast collection of evidence photos, transcripts of the preliminary and pretrial hearings and links to a complete library of all the transcripts back to the beginning of the trial. (The transcripts can be accessed directly at http://www.islandnet.com/walraven/simpson.html.)
You can also find addresses to write Simpson, prosecutor Marcia Clark, Judge Lance Ito and attorneys Johnnie Cochran and Robert Shapiro, along with an address for the Mark Fuhrman Defense Fund.
Another interesting site is Pathfinder's O.J. Central (located at http://pathfinder.com/pathfinder/features/OJ/). Pathfinder is the Web site for Time-Life, so it's not too surprising that you'll find audio excerpts (in downloadable WAV, AIFF and AU file formats) from Simpson's book "I Want to Tell You," which is published by the company. Also available is an O.J. Calendar with month-by- month developments in the case and the most recent transcripts from the trial, plus "The O.J. Files," with links to Simpson-related stories from Time, Life, Court TV, NBC News and Sports Illustrated. Craig Bromberg, assistant managing editor of Pathfinder, says O.J. Central has been a busy place, averaging approximately 325,000 hits (or visits) a week (plus or minus 10 percent).
But not everyone on the Web is taking the trial seriously. The Official Unofficial O.J. Web Page (http://www.best.com/rdc/roger/oj.html) takes a definite stand on the case. The Web page opens with "Get a Life. OJ is Guity (sic). Move on. Go Outside. Plant a tree. Say hello to the neighbors."
Additional clicks bring up a satirical cartoon, an address to write Simpson with some suggested remarks, including "Where can I get that dreamy Kato's phone number?" and a photo of the bloody glove.
Derek Cashman, a student at Old Dominion University, has directed a lot of humor at the Simpson trial. There are David Letterman's Top 10 O.J. Trial Juror Pet Peeves (http://www.cs.odu.edu/cashman/humor/OJjuror.html), the 1995 Oscar Winners -- OJ Special (http://www.cs.odu.edu/cashman/humor/oscar95.html) and the words to "The Ballad of O.J. Simpson," a parody on "The Ballad of Lizzie Borden" (http://www.cs.odu.edu/cashman/humor/OJballad.html). A list of O.J. anagrams can also be found at http://www.teleport.com/bwalter/oj.html.
There's also a lengthy collection of mostly non-PC jokes called the O.J. Simpson Canonical List of O.bligatory J.okes (http://www.cs.odu.edu/ cashman/ humor/OJ.html).
Cashman says when the joke page first went up last year, it averaged 5,000 to 7,000 hits a week in June and July, tapering off to 500 to 1,000 a week from September through the end of the year. He says traffic has increased again now that the trial has begun.
Setting your browser to http://tvnet.com/OJ/OJ.html brings up The O.J. Web, a selection of small pictures related to the Simpson case, including Simpson, his ex-wife, the Bronco chase and the murder scene.
At another spot on the Web, you can see an ad for ordering the O.J. workout video (with outtakes!) that includes some promotional pictures. This is located at http://199.170.0.48/home/
tornpage/simpson.html. You can also read a criticism of press coverage on the case, called "Murder Trial: Genre or Event-Scene" written by Anita Susan Brenner at http://english-
server.hss.cmu.edu/
ctheory/E-murdertrial.html.
Finally, those with only access to the Usenet newsgroups will find plenty of reading in the newsgroups alt.fan.oj-simpson, alt.fan.oj-simpson.die. die.die, alt.fan.oj-simpson.gas-chamber, alt.fan.oj-simpson.transcripts alt.fan.marcia-clark, alt.sex.
marcia-clark, and perhaps the most appropriate, alt.oj.coverage.gone.overboard.
