Wednesday April 19, 2006
Book 7: Emperor Pius Dei — Part V: Glamour Assault
Note: Some of you may be mentally pronouncing "5er0" as "Sero" or "Zero." That is incorrect. The A.I.'s name is pronounced "Vernon." See, the "5" is converted to the roman numeral "V," and the "0" (zero) is converted to the synonym "none," which is phonetically reduced to "non." This scheme for creating names that are difficult to verbally decode is common with some artificial intelligences. 5er0 has a co-worker named Ga6n, and friends named 10a6er, A50ger0, 1000a100ey, 6100tor, A5050en, 10001100hae50, and 500a6500.

While it may be a lot of things, this particular naming trend is clearly neither a compression nor a disambiguation algorithm, as both 10001100hae50 and his batch-sister 10001100he5050e can attest.

Transcript

Narrator: Meanwhile, at R.A.C. Security Dispatch. . .
5ER0: Boss, this needs your attention.
RAC Dispatch: Didja break something, 5ER0?
5ER0: No. We've been hacked. Dispatch for customer account ilx920 has been re-routed.
RAC Dispatch: Well quit yammering about it and send a team over. Those guys spend almost ten million a year with us.
RAC: Faster, Mick.
Mick: This is probably a wild goose chase.
RAC: Okay then. Goose it, Mick.
Mick: Everybody wants to be a comedian.