ied.
He carries his notebook of press clippings wherever he goes.

Phiber Optik makes fun of Neidorf for a Midwestern geek, for believing
that "Acid Phreak" does acid and listens to acid rock. Hell no.
Acid's never done ACID! Acid's into ACID HOUSE MUSIC. Jesus. The
very idea of doing LSD. Our PARENTS did LSD, ya clown.

Thackeray suddenly turns upon Craig Neidorf the full lighthouse glare
of her attention and begins a determined half-hour attempt to WIN THE
BOY OVER. The Joan of Arc of Computer Crime is GIVING CAREER ADVICE TO
KNIGHT LIGHTNING! "Your experience would be very valuable--a real
asset," she tells him with unmistakeable sixty-thousand-watt sincerity.
Neidorf is fascinated. He listens with unfeigned attention. He's
nodding and saying yes ma'am. Yes, Craig, you too can forget all about
money and enter the glamorous and horribly underpaid world of
PROSECUTING COMPUTER CRIME! You can put your former friends in
prison--ooops....

You cannot go on dueling at modem's length indefinitely. You cannot
beat one another senseless with rolled-up press-clippings. Sooner or
later you have to come directly to grips. And yet the very act of
assembling here has changed the entire situation drastically. John
Quarterman, author of The Matrix, explains the Internet at his
symposium. It is the largest news network in the world, it is growing
by leaps and bounds, and yet you cannot measure Internet because you
cannot stop it in place. It cannot stop, because there is no one
anywhere in the world with the authority to stop Internet. It changes,
yes, it grows, it embeds itself across the post-industrial, postmodern
world and it generates community wherever it touches, and it is doing
this all by itself.

Phiber is different. A very fin de siecle kid, Phiber Optik. Barlow
says he looks like an Edwardian dandy. He does rather. Shaven neck,
the sides of his skull cropped hip-hop close, unruly tangle of black
hair on top that looks pomaded, he stays up till four a.m. and misses
all the sessions, then hangs out in payphone booths with his acoustic
coupler gutsily CRACKING SYSTEMS RIGHT IN THE MIDST OF THE HEAVIEST LAW
ENFORCEMENT DUDES IN THE U.S., or at least PRETENDING to.... Unlike
"Frank Drake." Drake, who wrote Dorothy Denning out of nowhere, and
asked for an interview for his cheapo cyberpunk fanzine, and then
started grilling her on her ethics. She was squirmin', too.... Drake,
scarecrow-tall with