Piltdown Mashup

Exhibit A
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piltdown_Man

Exhibit B
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodtimes_virus

"Good Times" virus, a hoax or mere performance of a virus in the mid 1990s that uncannily created an effect very much like a real "worm" virus: it prompted users to pass on warnings about the fake virus that in themselves, through their sheer number created wormlike effects. [Alan Liu, The Laws of Cool: Knowledge Work and the Culture of Information p. 360.]

The timelines... Piltdown skull (some 40 years to expose) versus the viral speeds of the Internet propagation of an urban myth... seems like time to read Contagious Metaphor by Peta Mitchell. I've caught the bug.

And so for day 344
23.11.2007