About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline
LOG IN
LOG IN

1994 Ann. Surv. Am. L. 471 (1994)
A Rape in Cyberspace or How an Evil Clown, a Haitian Trickster Spirit, Two Wizards, and a Cast of Dozens Turned a Database into a Society

handle is hein.journals/annam1994 and id is 547 raw text is: A RAPE IN CYBERSPACE OR HOW AN EVIL CLOWN, A HAITIAN TRICKSTER SPIRIT, TWO WIZARDS, AND A CAST OF DOZENS TURNED A DATABASE INTO A SOCIETY JULTN DIEBELL They say he raped them that night. They say he did it with a cunning little doll, fashioned in their image and imbued with the power to make them do whatever he desired. They say that by manipulating the doll he forced them to have sex with him, and with each other, and to do horrible, brutal things to their own bod- ies. And though I wasn't there that night, I think I can assure you that what they say is true, because it all happened right in the living room-right there amid the well-stocked bookcases and the sofas and the fireplace-of a house I've come to think of as my second home. Call me Dr. Bombay. Some months ago-let's say about half- way between the first time you heard the words information super- highway and the first time you wished you never had-I found myself tripping with compulsive regularity down the well-traveled information lane that leads to LambdaMOO, a very large and very busy rustic chateau built entirely of words. Nightly, I typed the com- mands that called those words onto my computer screen, dropping me with what seemed a warm electric thud inside the mansion's darkened coat closet, where I checked my quotidian identity, stepped into the persona and appearance of a minor character from a long-gone television sitcom, and stepped out into the glar- ing chatter of the crowded living room. Sometimes, when the mood struck me, I emerged as a dolphin instead. I won't say why I chose to masquerade as Samantha Stevens's outlandish cousin, or as the dolphin, or what exactly led to my mild but so-far incurable addiction to the semifictional digital other- worlds known around the Internet as multi-user dimensions, or MUDs. This isn't my story, after all. It's the story of a man named Mr. Bungle, and of the ghostly sexual violence he committed in the halls of LambdaMOO, and most importantly of the ways his vio- lence and his victims challenged the 1500 and more residents of Originally published in the VMWage Voice, December 21, 1993. Reprinted with the permission of the Vrd/age Voice 471 Imaged with the Permission of N.Y.U. Annual Survey of American Law

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Purchase Access

Contact us for annual subscription options:

Contact Us

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

Log In

profiles profiles most