92615_RAA_LooseCannon_Text_R1_PROOF

URL, who shows him the top secret DifferNet hardware and set-up. They kibitz for a bit until Estaban is left alone for a moment. Idly, he fingers the DifferNet keyboard (that looks more like a Giger-esque movie prop than a computer interface). Thinking the DifferNet hardware is a "normal" com puter, he dashes off an email to Zoe, thanking her for the pizza and using that as an excuse to try to see her again. Wanting a copy for himself, Estaban tries to duplicate the file by pressing the keys "Command" and "D". In a splash of color, Estaban ends up digitized in the DifferNet. Actually, it's not that simple. In fact, Estaban is still in the "real" world. But the DifferNet is subsuming his "normal" sensory input. His "essence," every thing that makes him unique, is transferred to another "place." And to make matters worse, for our addled and confused friend, we end the first issue as Estaban is greeted in the DifferNet by the smiling visage of his pal Happy Panda, as a panda. Issue two explores the DifferNet and the various inhabitants. Filled with the electric potentials of all of the world's animals, the DifferNet is popu lated by what can only be described as living data; metaphorically we might call them souls without bodies. This dark world of talking animals (like a Nick Park Creature Comforts animation gone tech-savvy) is a world of noir-ish conflict. Happy Panda (here, an actual panda and no longer an Asian man) leads Estaban through an energy-lit maze of eeriness, all the while explaining the rules governing the DifferNet. Although it has existed since the dawn of recorded history, the DifferNet has not always been such nor even been called such; its "form" changes with the introduction of each new information-handling paradigm. The metaphor-echo for Life mutates with each clear-cut shift in the dominant technology, and we are now at the cusp of such a change. This shadow-world of living data has evolved from the molecules of the ancient Egyptian's papyrus ("The Scroll"), through Gutenburg's printer's ink ("The Bound Volume"); from two-dimensional black and white electromagnetic television waves ("The Channel") to the present unique packages of ones and zeros ("The DifferNet"). While mis takenly accessing the DifferNet, Estaban causes the structure of the world to form out of the data the system has available; this, of course, is the Smithsonian's information and catalogues of all the animals in the zoos of North America. As a result, the denizens that were once animal-headed gods, bird-winged angels and scrappy game show contestants are now... talking animals. In his capacity as the DifferNet's ambassador to the "real" world, Happy Panda warns Estaban to beware the DifferNet's agents of chaos, hooded praying mantis-type creatures known both here and in the DifferNet as "Bugs." The Bugs are mischief for mischief's sake, and the animals don't abide the destruction of their data. It seems that this "place" with the talking animals and the Bugs has always existed, but, as noted above, the form has been suggested by the dominant technology. Moreover, it has always been governed by a human philosopher-king they call The Reasonable Man. The Reasonable Man is an office, and is always chosen

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