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"As opposed to illiteracy, where you can't read, aliteracy means that you can but you just can't be bothered. They say aliteracy is on the rise these days."
- Peter Watts
 |
| Claim Beacon | ||
| A electronic device that proclaims that a planet has been claimed by a given party. |
| "This is an outrage, you five-eyed bandit!" the assistant military
attache yelled, thrusting to the fore.
"This planet was discovered by a
Corps scouting vessel! It belongs to
us." "I shall overlook your tone, Major," the Groaci whispered acidly, "induced no doubt by envy at my race's superior optical endowments and simply inquire whether any Terran claim to the world was ever registered with the appropriate tribunals?" "Of course not," Pennyfool snapped. "We didn't want every claim-jumping Tom, Dick and Irving in this end of the Arm swarming in here to see what they could loot."
 (Shilth the Groaci from 'Retief, the Long-Awaited Master' by Keith Laumer) "An unfortunate oversight." "But the Survey boat planted a claim beacon. You must have seen it." "Dear me, now that you mention it I seem to recall my chaps vaporizing some sort of electronic noise-maker which was interfering with radio reception. Too bad that not a trace remains." |
| Technovelgy from Retief, the Long-Awaited Master,
by Keith Laumer. Published by Worlds of IF in 1969 Additional resources -
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'The object seemed melted together like wax — nothing was distinguishable.'
'Midges have many capabilities. To the untrained eye, they look like sparrows.'
'I made disks of my own voice to the number of five hundred very carefully chosen words.'
'His sensors out and working, and the whirring of the tape that sucked up sight and sound and shape and smell and form...'
'It sounds to me as though you had invented a kind of metal earthworm.'
'I don't have to tell you about the seven two-mile-diameter orbital mirrors that circulate around the satellite, making it habitable.'
'The steel tortoise gave MacKinnon a feeling of Crusoe- like independence.'
