Extracto de Microserfs (1995) de Douglas Coupland:
Anatole told us this really great thing, how at Apple they used to have a thing called RumorMonger that allowed employees to anonymously input up to one hundred ASCII characters worth of gossip into the system. So Todd hacked together a quick in-house version for our network, called RumorMeister. It got way out of control almost immediately::
1) SUSAN SHOPS AT TARGET BUT PUTS HER STUFF IN NORDSTROM BAGS
2) DANIEL SELLS HIS USED BOXERS VIA MAIL ORDER . . . $5.00 PER DAY OF WEAR
3) BUG SWEATS TO THE OLDIES
4) DAN . . . THOSE DOCKERS . . . HIP!
5) TODD HAS SAGGY NIPPLES FROM TOO MUCH BODY BUILDING THEY'RE CALLED 'BITCH TITS'
5) TODD WEARZ DEPENDS WHEN HE BENCH PRESSES BECUZ UTHERWIZE HE'LL EVACUATE HIS BOWELS ON THE BENCH
7) KARLA PAID TO SEE "THE BODY GUARD"
8) BUG LAUGHS AT GARFIELD CARTOONS
9) KARLA CAN'T ACCESORIZE
10) SUSAN HAS COMBINATION SKIN
11) TODD SMOKES 'MORE' CIGARETTES
12) I CAN HEAR KARLA'S COLOSTOMY BAG SLOSHING
13) ETHAN'S FERRARI IS A KIT CAR
14) ETHAN BUYS TIRES AT SEARS
15) BUG LOVES BARNEY
16) KARLA THINKS SHE'S A SUMMER BUT SHE'S REALLY A FALL
17) BUG HAS 2 RAFFI CASSETTES
18) DAN HAS A YANNI CD IN HIS CAR
19) ETHAN'S VISA LIMIT IS $3,000
20) SUZAN'Z BOYCRAZY SUZAN'Z BOYCRAZY SUZAN'Z BOYCRAZY SUZAN'Z BOYCRAZY SUZAN'Z BOYCRAZY
21) DAN: LISTERINE KILLS GERMS THAT CAN CAUSE BAD BREATH
22) DAN STILL LIVES WITH HIS MOTHER
23) BUG SHOPS AT CHESS KING
24) MICHAEL'S SHIRT SMELL LIKE GERBIL PEE
Todd quickly removed the program from the system.
Esto se reinventaría quince años después.
