Rodent of Unusual Size <Ken.Coar@MeepZor.Com> wrote:
>On Tue, Jan 02, 2001 at 07:18:49AM +0000, Tony Finch wrote:
>> Lisa Dusseault <lisa@xythos.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > - The title-virus itself is problematic. It made me cringe when I read
>> >about a virus that put people into comas just by displaying a certain
>> >"snow" pattern on (part of!) their screen.
>>
>> Neal Stephenson wasn't the first author to use that idea -- I think it
>> dates back to an 80s short story who's name and author I can't
>> remember right now and my books are 6000 miles away.
>
>Vernor Vinge, "Press Enter". Showcased in IASFM.
I have remembered the one I was thinking of.
There was a frivolous Dave Langford story published in Interzone
recently (and also Nature, it seems) called "comp.basilisk FAQ" which
is a sequel to the story I had in mind. There was also an item in
Ansible Link #83 which quotes from Greg Egan's "Permutation City"
where one of the characters types "Whoever you are, be warned: I'm
about to display the Langford Mind-Erasing Fractal Basilisk, so ..."
This lead me to Dave Langford's bibliography which reminded me of the
title of the story I was originally thinking of: "What Happened at
Cambridge IV". It's the second in the series of stories which goes:
"Blit": SF in Interzone 25 (Brighton, UK, September/October 1988,
reprinted in Interzone: the Fourth Anthology, 1989).
"What Happened at Cambridge IV": SF in Digital Dreams ed. David V.
Barrett (London, NEL, November 1990).
"comp.basilisk FAQ" -- short non-fact piece. (London, Nature, 2
December 1999).
"Different Kinds of Darkness" -- short sf (New York, The Magazine of
Fantasy and Science Fiction, January 2000).
Tony.
-- f.a.n.finch fanf@covalent.net dot@dotat.at "Dead! And yet there he stands!"
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