X-Message-Number: 6649
From: Peter Merel <>
Subject: Hoax
Date: Wed, 31 Jul 1996 08:53:13 +1000 (EST)

John Bull writes,

>The virus is known as "Good Times", it always travels to new computers the
>same way,  in a text E-Mail message with the subject line reading "Good
>Times" Avoiding infection is easy once the file has been received simply by
>NOT READING IT! The act of loading the file into the mail server's ASCII
>buffer causes the "Good Times" mainline program to initialize and execute.

"Good Times" is indeed a virus, but it is not computer virus. It is a
mind virus, which is to say that it is a hoax. There are no known e-mail
viruses, or at least there haven't been ever since e-mail adopted 7-bit
encoding back in 1983.

No one knows exactly where this hoax originated, but the thing has been
kicking around on the net since 1994, and it will probably continue to
kick around on the net for quite some time. It's regrettable but
unsurprising that this hoax has finally reached cryonet; probably the
best thing to do, if you've propagated the hoax anywhere else, is to
send along a letter of apology along with a pointer to the Good Times
FAQ, which explains the history of the hoax. You can find this FAQ at

http://www.hr.doe.gov/goodtime.html

It would also be very nice if you could send a pointer to the FAQ back to
whoever passed the hoax on to you - they may find the whole thing funny,
but for most of us this joke is getting very stale. 

Oh, and if you hear anything about a sick little boy named Craig Shergold,
pay no attention!

Peter Merel.


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