Fiction L
A Fake Internet Presence,
since 1994

---

Microsoft Acquires Higher Source

	REDMOND -- Microsoft Corporation has announced plans to acquire 
the Website and Internet development corporation Higher Source for 
an undisclosed fee.  "Higher Source has proven its commitment to 
strange mind-control cults and UFO religions," said Microsoft 
spokeswoman, Anita Klue,"Their willingness to kill themselves for 
the sake of their technology is the kind of dynamic that Microsoft 
wants to promote."
	In conjunction with the acquisition, Microsoft announced a new 
program called "Active Cult 97", which is expected to be in place by 
late 1998.  Active Cult aims to make the use of Microsoft technology 
more of a religion-driven decision as opposed to a technology-driven
decision.  "This isn't expected to be a big change for Microsoft's
customer base," explained Ms. Klue.  Details of Active Cult were not
disclosed, but it was suggested that instead of crashing with the
infamous "blue screen of death" or "General Protection Fault",
Microsoft's operating systems would merely display the message
"Windows died for your sins."
	Mike S. Brown, who writes about the industry in his PC Weak 
column "M.S. Brown Knows" responded enthusiastically to the 
announcement. "This really raises the stakes for Internet 
development. IBM may be content to kill its own products, like OS/2, 
but Microsoft is willing to kill its own developers and maybe even 
some customers.  That's the kind of bold difference that will make 
UNIX, OS/2 and the Mac completely irrelevant by the end of 1996!"  
When is was pointed out that 1996 was already over, Mr. Brown 
retorted,"No it's not!  If it was, then Microsoft would be behind 
schedule on Windows 97 -- which it isn't."
	An IBM employee, who asked to remain anonymous due to the fact 
that the whole issue was "extremely silly," said that "IBM is 
committed to the future of network computing and OS/2 is an 
important part of that future."  He added that,"IBM is not 
interested in promoting suicide. If you want to talk about promoting 
suicide, talk to Microsoft's ISVs.  Can you say `Citrix'?"
	Reaction amongst Windows users was generally positive.  Ben de 
Miover, CIO for a large company which recently switched its 
operations from the Apple MacIntosh to Windows 95, explained, 
"Windows is really cool because you can play Quake in, like, a 
window and stuff." He also cited a complete lack of Windows 95 
applications for the MacIntosh.
	"How can modern business function without Windows 95 
applications. Y'know, like Quake?"  In addition, he was pretty sure 
that OS/2 and UNIX were "new wave bands from L.A."