Chatterbox

You're all invited to Salon's dress rehearsal this week on the Web. The official launch date for the magaziney Web site (www.salon1999.com) is Nov. 20, but the staff -- mostly former Examiner writers and editors -- wants to sieve all of the bugs out of the punch bowl before they serve it to the masses. Salon's chief, David Talbot, promises a weekly readerly experience with an emphasis on books that fans out to encompass arts and culture. "We don't think of it as anti-HotWired," says Talbot, who was Style editor at the Ex, "but as post-HotWired." Talbot promises "punchy, provocative" op-eds, features, comics, and reviews for people who are new to the Web, and hopes that content will seed conversation areas inhabited by Salon's readers and writers. "I see it as a talk magazine," he says. But why is the site's URL www.salon1999.com instead of www.salon.com? "An Austin, Texas, hairdresser reserved www.salon.com and wouldn't give it up," says Talbot. "We thought up new names for him -- hairnet.com -- but he wouldn't give it up." ... Chronicle music critic Joel Selvin screwed the pooch in his Nov. 6 review of the Pearl Jam show, referring to a song called "What" that caused fans to flick their Bics. The song in question was correctly identified by the Examiner's Craig Marine as "Black.