《Kiosk》作者： - Bruce Sterling 【EPUB】

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Kiosk by Bruce Sterling Bruce Sterling reports that in 2005 he received an honorary doctorate from Art Center College of Design in California. He also teaches sometimes at the European Graduate School in Switzerland. So nowadays, he says, “I’m ‘Professor-Doktor Sterling,’ but I didn’t even shine my shoes or get a haircut.” He also mentions that he’s hard at work on a new sf novel. His new story is a fine work of speculative fiction. * * * * I. The fabrikator was ugly, noisy, a fire hazard, and it smelled. Borislav got it for the kids in the neighborhood. One snowy morning, in his work gloves, long coat, and fur hat, he loudly power-sawed through the wall of his kiosk. He duct-taped and stapled the fabrikator into place. The neighborhood kids caught on instantly. His new venture was a big hit. The fabrikator made little plastic toys from 3-D computer models. After a week, the fab’s dirt-cheap toys literally turned into dirt. The fabbed toys just crumbled away, into a waxy, non-toxic substance that the smaller kids tended to chew. Borislav had naturally figured that the brief lifetime of these toys might discourage the kids from buying them. This just wasn’t so. This wasn’t a bug: this was a feature. Every day after school, an eager gang of kids clustered around Borislav’s green kiosk. They slapped down their tinny pocket change with mittened hands. Then they exulted, quarreled, and sometimes even punched each other over the shining fab-cards. The happy kid would stick the fab-card (adorned with some glossily fraudulent pic of the toy) into the fabrikator’s slot. After a hot, deeply exciting moment of hissing, spraying, and stinking, the fab would burp up a freshly minted