From: utzoo!decvax!decwrl!sun!gnu Newsgroups: net.books Title: Re: computers and books Article-I.D.: sun.219 Posted: Tue Mar 15 06:08:08 1983 Received: Fri Mar 18 08:58:10 1983 References: watmath.4730 watarts.1744 Actually, Heinlein has written several good books with computers as main characters. "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" was already mentioned and was about how easy it is to take over an organization if its computer is friendly to you. "Time Enough for Love" includes a character who begins "life" as a computer complex enough and with enough stimuli to become sentient, and ends up transplanting herself into a body created her own specs by genetic techniques common at the time. Since "T.E.F.L" his books have tended more towards modern-day computer capabilities (eg, programming the machine in "Number of the Beast" to respond with a parrot line upon being given a command) rather than sentient machines. As the ultimate teleportation book is Alfred Bester's "The Stars My Destination" and the ultimate time-travel book is David Gerrold's "The Man who Folded Himself", the ultimate datanet book is John Brunner's "The Shockwave Rider ". If you care what you are creating, read this book! John Gilmore, Sun Microsystems