"FWLS2" - читать интересную книгу автора (A Future We'd Like to See)

A Future We'd Like to See 1.2 - Burning Nonrecyclable Plastic
By Twoflower (Copyright 1993)

I'm resisting the urge to say 'It all started when', because
that's a really clicheic line, and if history has taught us one
thing, it's to avoid cliches.

Although really it did all start when Gosub and I were off
examining the defenses of some professor's home terminal.
Someone on campus came down from the dorms planetside and dropped
us a line at our office on the orbiting station, Freeport. "Be
nice chaps and up my Yttian Language grade a slot or two and I'll
make it worthwhile for you."

The netrunning business has been quite good lately. By now
just about every system in Terran space was hooked in some way to
VOSnet... that's Virtual reality Operating System Network for you
hicks out on non-tech colonies... making it quite easy for
college grads with nothing better to do an a degree in computer
science to slice into other people's systems and take whatever
they've got.

It's not THAT easy, really, since everybody's got some form
of defense on their system. Having a VR interface makes for some
really sick defenses, too, since you can expand puns to the
visual level. I remember once when breaking into the city sewer
control system to open hatches for some crook escaping the feds,
we had to climb inside this fifty-foot tall toilet to access the
flow controls. Some people have very deranged minds. The guy
even sensitized the odor of human feces and splattered it around
the system. I wasn't sure if I should be disgusted or proud of
the effort the guy put into his system. Of course, this wasn't
any easy run; Gosub flipped the wrong switch and triggered the
alarms, 'flushing' us out of the net. We're lucky the guy hadn't
put in brain scramblers to be especially nasty.

That's why defense cutters and various programs are
extremely handy. Progs to confuse alarms, cut security lines,
and generally mung the works up while you go about your dirty
work. There are sickos out there who actually take offense to
our little intrusions, and will gleefully mixmaster your
electrons, reducing your mental capacity to that of spam. Having
a direct mental link to your computer can be fun, but not all the
time.

Returning to the flashback, it all DID start that day we
were staking out the prof's terminal, waiting to check out what
he had behind his door.