After a lively and quite serious discussion of
digital free-speech issues, the entire crew went to
dinner at an Italian eatery in the local mall, on Kapor's
capacious charge-tab. Having said his piece and listened
with care, Kapor began glancing at his watch. Back in
Boston, his six-year-old son was waiting at home, with a
new Macintosh computer-game to tackle. A quick phone-
call got the jet warmed up, and Kapor and his lawyer split
town.
With the forces of conventionality -- such as they
were -- out of the picture, the Legion of Doom began to
get heavily into "Mexican Flags." A Mexican Flag is a
lethal, multi-layer concoction of red grenadine, white
tequila and green creme-de-menthe. It is topped with a
thin layer of 150 proof rum, set afire, and sucked up
through straws.
The formal fire-and-straw ritual soon went by the
board as things began to disintegrate. Wandering from
room to room, the crowd became howlingly rowdy, though
without creating trouble, as the CyberView crowd had
wisely taken over an entire wing of the hotel.
"Crimson Death," a cheerful, baby-faced young
hardware expert with a pierced nose and three earrings,
attempted to hack the hotel's private phone system, but
only succeeded in cutting off phone service to his own
room.
Somebody announced there was a cop guarding the next
wing of the hotel. Mild panic ensued. Drunken hackers
crowded to the window.
A gentleman slipped quietly through the door of the
next wing wearing a short terrycloth bathrobe and spangled
silk boxer shorts.
Spouse-swappers had taken over the neighboring wing
of the hotel, and were holding a private weekend orgy.
It was a St Louis swingers' group. It turned out that the
cop guarding the entrance way was an off-duty swinging
cop. He'd angrily threatened to clobber Doc Holiday.
Another swinger almost punched-out "Bill from RNOC,"
whose prurient hacker curiosity, naturally, knew no
bounds.
It was not much of a contest. As the weekend wore on
and the booze flowed freely, the hackers slowly but
thoroughly infiltrated the hapless swingers, who proved
