[1456] in Humor
HUMOR: Off Line!
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Andrew A. Bennett)
Thu May 23 19:34:13 1996
To: humor@MIT.EDU
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 19:29:50 EDT
From: "Andrew A. Bennett" <abennett@MIT.EDU>
From: Jonathon Weiss <jweiss@MIT.EDU>
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 19:21:22 EDT
From: Mark Eichin <eichin@cygnus.com>
America Offline: Welcome Back to Reality!
Every day you hear more and more people talking about it. You hear
about it at work, in restaurants, even on the bus. More and more
Americans are discovering how much more free time they have, how
much easier it is to manage their finances and personal & business
relationships. They have discovered the joys of being ...
* * * O F F - L I N E * * *
Our free software includes utilities to seek out and destroy all
remnants of communications software on your computer (also works
over a network). It even removes that pesky little winsock.dll from
your hard drive once and for all! Say good-bye to the World Wide
Web and hello to the friends and family you forgot you had! Our
software, once run, remains memory-resident, and like a background
virus checker, protects your computer from re-installation of
telecommunications software.
Here's how the program works:
1. First you run the good-bye letter generation program that
automatically logs you into all your favorite on-line services and
posts good-bye notes to the news groups and message areas of your
choice. It encourages people to call or even write you if they want
to talk to you, and lets them know that you're going to be okay, but
that you're just going offline. (It even logs you into your
favorite chat areas and makes witty parting comments, and leaves
requests with systems administrators to cancel your account.)
2. Our program recognizes every version of every known communications
software package for DOS, Windows, Windows 95, Windows NT, OS/2 and
Unix, (and there's even a special version for you Mac Users).
[Editor's Note: Right: the "special Mac version" comes on a single
disk, and has a smiley-face icon that says "Click Me!" -- instead of
*seven* disks and a 235-page instruction manual. :-) </vs>]
[cont'd] ... It will remove all of these programs and overwrite
your hard drive with null strings so they can't be undeleted. And
just so you don't try to sneak in through a back door -- like an
automated check payment window in a program like Quicken -- our
software also removes the serial communications abilities of all
financial and related software.
3. Hardware reconfiguration. Our software alters your system
configuration so that no device that even remotely resembles a
modem or other communications interface will ever work on your
computer again. It installs a "listening program" as a permanent
TST so that even if your computer somehow encounters a modem tone,
it will immediately reboot, thereby keeping you effectively offline,
even in a network environment.
4. Hardware destruction. The next step is to destroy your modems.
This is best done with a hammer. We recommend a hammer because we
know you will start to feel, in that destructive release, the first
real joy of your new life offline. With each crushing blow, we
encourage you to think of the countless hours you've wasted, the
completely irrelevant information you have gathered, and the many
people who completely mis-represented themselves to you when you
were online.
5. Finally, our software brings you a brief lesson on meditation to
help you begin to relax without being online. It also includes a
list of things that you can do offline, like feeding your cat that
you forgot you had, watering the plants, doing the dishes, seeing
your friends in person, writing notes on pieces of paper, calling
your parents on their birthdays instead of sending e-mail. The list
includes more than 1,000 offline living tips.
We're sure you'll agree that this software is the best of its kind
for getting offline quickly -- and staying that way!
To get your free software, please send a hand-written note to
America Offline, Inc., 7489 Setting Sun Way, Columbia, MD 21046.
Include a stamped, self-addressed envelope.
Please specify your operating system and 3.5 or 5.25 inch disks.
Note: Our software is not available on CD ROM, and we do not have a
support BBS or a Web page or even a fax machine.
OUR SOFTWARE IS NOT AVAILABLE ONLINE. UPLOADING IT IS EXPRESSLY
FORBIDDEN!
