Investigators found that rock star KURT COBAIN committed suicide in 1994, but conspiracy theories persist, particularly on the Internet. Recently they've shown up in more mainstream media--in the book "Who Killed Kurt Cobain?" by Canadian journalists Ian Halperin and Max Wallace and in Nick Broomfield's documentary film "Kurt and Courtney." As a result, the Nirvana Net-heads are nattering again.

The Internet, where the Cobain conspiracy first got legs, is buzzing with basic discussion group chatter and revamped, content-heavy Web sites. Private investigator Tom Grant--who claims to have been hired by Courtney Love to find her husband after Cobain left a California drug rehab clinic days before his death is credited by many Net-heads with creating the conspiracy theory. The new interest has put him back in business.

His massive site (www.tomgrantpi.com) included long-winded personal accounts of the events leading up to Cobain's death, police files and evidence, photos and copies of various notes (including the alleged suicide note) and audio files of conversations with his personal prime suspect, Love.

Grant and others posting their opinions via the Web have said the Internet audience has definitely been vocal, and sometimes more negative than they'd like. Boston-area writer Toby Amirault said his mission to get the Cobain investigation re-opened has become "extremely dangerous" since posting information on his Web site (www.tiac.net/users/tobya).

"I and many others who have stepped forward to speak out have met with death threats, break-ins, intimidation and other illegalities," said Amirault, whose alleged troubles began within weeks of launching the page.

Discussion boards and newsgroups--from alt.music.nirvana to alt.conspiracy to the Matrix conspiracy message board (www.parascope.com)--have been peppered with new messages from the suspicious to the angry. But the most heated debates have been on alt.fan.courtney-love, where fans and detractors alike go head-to-head over the theorists' top suspect. One user calling herself Freakgerrl in Seattle asked readers to call her local radio station to protest its promotion of the "Kurt and Courtney" film, writing: "Please call . . . and yell at my station 107.7 for promoting and giving away tickets. Just yell at them and say something like, 'Does this station promote [the] murder theory?'"

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