mike@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Mike Smithwick) (09/04/88)
[] Just when you thought it was safe to get back on net.news, comes. . . >>> AmigaTrek - The Next Generation 3.0 <<< Tonight's episode : Revenge of the Marketroids, part 3 - The Final Battle - ----------------------------------------------------------- In our last neuron numbing episode our (mostly) fearless crew had been captured by the evil Lord of marketroids, Generalissimo Akers, ruler of Businesslandia. Here they learned of his low- level plan to convert the entire universe into minions of "Oh-Oh-S-2", the "Operating System of the BrainDead". Next he created clones of Captain Dale and entire crew, (complete with Look and Feel of the originals), and quickly dispatched them in real-time to the DevCon being held at MouseFleet Academy. . . ========================================================== Chapter 0 It was a gala event, glitter, excitement and M&Ms were in abundance. Searchlights pierced the sky, scanf-ing back and forth playing hide-and-fseek with each other. The official MouseFleet punk band ("The Trashed Registers" playing their hit single "You May Have Misaligned Words, but I Have an Offset for You") welcomed bank after bank of delegates from here and abroad. Eager journalists from Blazing Computing, Amiga Whirl and other such rags jostled each other for the best posture behind the barricades. Then there was the frenzied throng of groupies, curiosity seekers and autograph hunters hoping for the chance to catch a mere glimpse of greatness. One by one the stretch limos pulled up at the entrance and one by one the celebrities stepped out to be greeted by a blinding explosion of flashes from the paparazzi. "There's Joanne Dow!!" screamed an excited software groupie. Flashes from the cameras followed the enigmatic Wizardess as she darted into the hall, her fur-trimmed cape fluttering behind. "Oh! Look! There's Robyn LaPasha, and no, it can't be, Fred Fish?", shouted one feverish groupie, Paula. Her harried friend, Denise, jumped up and down, clapping her hands together, "Oh, he's soooo cute!". Fred waved cheerfully to the mob. Still more limos DMAed people to the palace. Finally, after what seemed like forever, appeared the one many had come to see. "Oh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THERE HE IS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!", shouted Paula hysterically. "THERE'S MIKE SMITHWICK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!". They jumped, frantically waving their hands to catch his attention. "Wow, what a bod!!" Denise said. "Yeah, and isn't his Galileo program rad!". "I'll say, and I hear it won an award at the Chicago Consumer Electronics Show, too." Mike, never one to spurn the recognition he so richly deserved, swept into the crowd to shake hands, sign copies of his award-winning, rad program, kiss babies, and debug code people had brought. Hands thrust out from the crowd, from spectators wanting only to touch him. Beautiful women fainted at his feet. Ah, but he was used to this. Once they recovered the young women turned their attention back to the rest of the activity. "Who's that?" asked Denise. "Uh, I think it's Randy Spencer". "Oh". And still the pantheon of immortality continued to scroll through the evening. There was Jim Goodnow the 7.2x10^23th, Guy "I'm always" Wright and Tim Geniusson Lord of NewTekia with his band of cool guys. Next came the delegation from C-(un)Ltd, followed by groups from Nerd Perfect (the one's who brought you the combination Word-Food Processor), A-Cubed, MicroDellusions and many others. And the rabble nearly went Berserk. Finally, the real stars arrived, the crew of the StarChip EnterBoing. . . Out stepped Captain Dale, and all hell broke loose forcing the riot police to call for reinforcements. Immediately behind him was Ensigns Jimm, Dave, Bryce, followed by Lord Leo. But wait!! All was not right in Amiga-land. They were all wearing, gulp, >>> T I E S <<< ! All at once a murmur rippled through the crowd like the shock- wave from a small nuclear.device. ==================================================== Chapter 1 Even as the delegates were seg-loading up on the conference documentation, disks and Commodore Toy secret decoder rings, roomers began to spreadsheet around of an impending announcement. Some new vaporous-ware perhaps? The release of the long awaited 6502 daughter board? Would Manx announce their support for double-precision characters needed for those pesky extraterrestrial alphabets? Quickly enough the technical sessions began and everyone scatter- loaded into different meeting rooms. Topics such as "You and the BlitterCritter","Assembly Made Easy in 1598 single-Steps","How to Market your Bad Ideas", "Crappy Software: The Ultimate Copy Protection!", and "Effective Use of the Trashdisk.device". However, the highest priority event was expected to be at the general sessions, where all eagerly awaited to see Leo's "Latest Screen Hack". "What would it be" they eagerly asked themselves. "A ball juggling unicycles? A unicycle juggling balls?, A unicycle juggling unicycles?". A hush wafted through the room when the Leo clone entered. "That red tie, it still didn't look right on him" they all thought synchronously at the same time. It made him seem like a picture which was just slightly tilted. Leo took his seat. "Hey! Let's see a screen hack! We're die'n back here!" The Leo-clone looked up. "Huh? Screen wha. . . Oops, ahh, so sorry sir, I'm just too busy working on important stuff like 'office solutions'". A collective gasp of horror went up from the gathering. Later that nite a couple of representative from RSN Software and Regressive Peripherals were chatting at a classy nearby restaurant about unusual events. "So anyway, I saw Captain Dale playing with SuperDeluxe Paint-by- Numbers and the Flicker FixerUpper. . ." "Your pull-down menu sir" interrupted the waiter, double-clicking his shoes. "Thanks" replied the RSN delegate, nibbling on a roll, Byte-by- Byte. "Well, anyway, the system GURU'ed, and Dale said to himself 'What's a GURU?'. I tell ya, I sense a parity error here. . ." ==================================================== Chapter 2 In the darkness of their cell-block, Captain Dale and his crew remained Locked up in hash-chains. Stripped of their hacker- blasters there was little they could do. "Oh darn!" said Leo, "if only there as a way to call DisplayAlert() to tell people we're here". An agitated Jimm jumped in, "Pipe: down you dipswitch! They'll never find us!" All of a sudden, a blinding light appeared in the room. There stood a powerfully built figure, hands on hips, wearing blue tights. A brilliant cape danced behind him. On his chest was a handsome ray-traced "R". "Oh my!" Dale burst out. "It's >>> RENDERMAN <<<!!!". "You're so right oh shaggy one" Renderman decreed. "What are you doing here?" "Well, I was on my way to Pixaria, when I sensed that this stupid little story needed serious help." "Boy does it Renderman" the shapely Lauren exclaimed. "We hafta get on to our next and most exciting episode yet, to go were no pun has gone before. . ." "Here are your blaster thingies. And now, off with your chains". With one mighty sweep of his hand, the locks were XORed, and magically vanished from their wrists. "Ta ta gang", and faster than a screen-refresh, Renderman vanished. The crew hurried out the cell, blasters drawn, and scuttled down the darkened passageway. . . ================================================== Chapter 3 Now, in it's second day, the delegates filed into the main() hall. A note of anticipation hung in the air. On the long symbol-table in the front were a number of veiled boxes. The Dale-clone stepped up to the podium, wisps of vapor trailing close to his heels. Not only was he wearing a tie, but a fine Italian 3 piece suit. The picture was severly tilted now. Cuddled under his arm was a stack of viewgraphs. "Ladies and Gentlemen", he started, motioning for the crowd to quiet. "Over the past years, we've been intensely developing something to help you developers. Something you have all been clamoring for. We've listened, and we care. Therefore, I am here to announce the development of >>> A New Operating System <<<." The delegates looked at each other with eager faces. "Quiet please, quiet. We've heard your cries. Yes, we've gotten rid of BCPL. . ." The audience applauded enthusiastically. ". . . we've added memory management!" They jumped up cheering. ". . . it has advanced IPC!!" The crowd was now standing on their seats. "It's four times bigger, and is MS-DOG compatible!!!" Silence. "Uh. . ., well. . ., I introduce Oh-Oh-S/2!" With that, Dale yanked off the covers over the mysterious boxes. The audience dropped their collective jaw, for there stood some unimpressive small units, each showing a simple A: prompt. The delegates stared with a blank OpenLook. Dale continued on, "Uh, of course those window thingies will come when the 'Presentation Damager' is released, uh, one-of-these- days-in-the-near-future-real-soon-now". By now some of the attendees began to huddle around the machines, poking and probing every connector or on-off switch. One however spotted something odd on the back. "Hey, all of the Serial Numbers begin with '666'!". ===================================================== Chapter 4 Sneaking around the corner, the crew spotted a couple of marketroid sentries. Realizing they needed a disguise, they formulated some quick algorithms. . . Jimm emerged from the shadows and headed straight towards the guards armed with a request no marketroid could resist. "Excuse me guys, could you explain to me, a, ahem, 'power-user', office-solutions to fit my needs?" "You bet!" they replied in eager unison. One marketroid immediately pulled out a stack of viewgraphs and doughnuts from his briefcase. With their victims distracted, Dale and Carolyn snuck out of the darkness and clobbered them with a compatibility-box, knocking them out like a cold-reset. Kodiak and Dave scooped up the briefcases, and removed their power-ties. Within minutes, everyone was suitably outfitted, and on their ways to Generalissimo Aker's office. ----- "Do you have an appointment?" yawned the secretary. "No, but we'll be just a minute" replied Lauren. With that, they coolly raised their blasters and fired at the door. ===================================================== Chapter 5 "GET THEM!! THEY'RE IMPOSTORS!" shouted an angry Randy Spencer. The clones, fear filling their eyes, dashed out of the room and scrambled down the hallway. The frenzied horde thundered close behind. Fred Fish heading the pack, launched disk after disk towards the clones like so many tiny frisbees. The Lauren Brown clone was the first to fall, followed by the Jimm clone. Both were disassembled immediately. The Dale clone tripped over a bunch of hunk-headers scattered in the hallway, and wacked his ROM on the floor. The remaining clones scurried around the corner, barely out of reach from the slavering mob. Hands grasped for their ties. Directly in front of them at the end of the hall stood an enormous menacing woman. With her arms crossed she stood squarely in the way of the elevator. "Oh no!" shouted the Leo clone, "It's FAT-AGNUS!". Surrounded, the clones gave up their resources and were lead off to judgment. ==================================================== Chapter 6 Generalissimo Akers didn't know what hit him. Kodiak blasted away with a liberal dose of RGB rays. Aker's flesh became strangely rubber-like, causing his legs to fall out from under his frame. Next, Dale synced his beam, and coolly fired off a series of killer demos. The Lord of Marketroids crashed to the floor. Dave knelt down to the body and looked into it's eyes. "He's BrainDead Jim". "HA, HA, HA, I always wanted to say that!" ==================================================== Chapter 7 They're duty completed in Busnesslandia, the crew was now faced with the task (or is it 'process'?) of getting home. "Hey, hi guys!" came an unlikely, but familiar Chicago accent from off the set. "RJ?" "Uh, yeah. Boy, you guys seem like you really needed some help as does this story. So, I got my secret new StarChip out back. . ." "How did you know we were here?" inquired Carolyn. "Oh, let's just say that I used my 'Intuition'. Ha! Ha! Ha! I always wanted to say that!!" "So let's go!" shouted Leo. "Not so fast, you'll have to sign these non-disclosure forms first, then well be on our way, on a journey of, heh, heh, 'Epyx' proportions." After filling out exactly 157 pieces of paper, and answering questions such as "what arn't your favorite colors" and "honestly, have you really played all Zork games all the way through without cheating?" they were out the door. Soon enough, RJ and the crew were escaping Businesslandia is his as yet unreleased [[technical descriptions of this vehicle have been removed to avoid possible legal complications]] that will blow your socks off!! ======================================================= Chapter 8 "Captain's log, Boingdate: 2001-20-20. After our harrowing adventure and subsequent escape from the hands of the crazed marketroids, I thought my men deserved a little R&R. So we've set course for the planet of NewTekia. Now, NewTekia is a bountiful garden paradise, perfect in every way, except for one tiny little problem. . ." ------- Jimm stared at the scintillating globe they were approaching. "Message coming in Captain" reported Bryce. "Put it on the screen ensign". On the forward DigiViewer appeared the most majestically beautiful woman anyone has ever seen. Her eyes darted like little fires, her hair radiant as burnished gold. "WOWEE ZOWEE, GETTA LOAD OF THAT STACKWARE!" hooted Jim. Bryce added, "yeah, dig her form-factor!". "Hi!" said the woman, "wel-wel-welcom to. . .Hi! welcome-come to N-N-New-New. . . Hi! wel-welcome to-to N-NewTekia!" "Captain, something appears to be wrong with our receiver". "No ensign, that's the way they normally talk". ====================================================== Chapter 9 Choosing sanity over lust, the EnterBoing continued past NewTekia, and sailed to the outer reaches of normalized-vector space in search of future gags. Meanwhile the surviving clones were sentenced to 80,386 years in "marketing hell" where they were forced to sell Commodore Plus Fours, C-16s and B128s to bank managers in Medford, Oregon. And who says there aint no justice. ====================================================== Glossary : OpenLook - A hoped for windowing standard being peddled by Sun Microsystems. If defines the appearance of windows, menus, use of sliders, spam, etc. Renderman - a curiously named 3-D rendering standard developed by Pixar. The above null-sense is Copyright 1988 by Mike Smithwick. If ya wanna re-post it, ask me first. Thankyouverymuch. %-) -- *** mike (starship janitor) smithwick *** "You can fool some of the people all of the time, or all of the people some of the time, but you can't fool Mom". [disclaimer : nope, I don't work for NASA, I take full blame for my ideas]