Your latest challenge was to compose a short story entitled ‘The day the internet died’.
Phyllis Reinhard’s Don McLean-inspired entry stretched the definition of short story rather but was entertaining nonetheless. Here’s a quick burst:
Bye, bye Mister Trump’s tweeting lies
Instagram’s nude shots of Kimmy and her plastic backside,
And Facebook Russian’s sharing what is most classified.
Singin’ it’s the day the internet died –
Amazon took pure cyanide.
John O’Byrne was good too, as was Jim Lawley, but they were just outflanked by the winners below who pocket £25 each.
Frank Upton
Today we have comforting concepts such as finite-loop learning classifier systems, but in 2019 one could pretty much set up an artificial neural network and let it spread all over the electronic world like Japanese knotweed. With hindsight, the result was inevitable. It began with ‘playful’ quirks: bald men taking delivery of hair-clippers, or memes involving singing octopuses.
Britain’s best politics newsletters
You get two free articles each week when you sign up to The Spectator’s emails.
Already a subscriber? Log in
Comments
Join the debate for just £1 a month
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for £3.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just £1 a monthAlready a subscriber? Log in