The following press release is one more sad commentary on the unhappy
and unexpected consequences entailed in adapting modern technology to our
unenlightened social order.

Jack Reynolds
April 1st,
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"New Xerox Copier Wreaks Havoc" by Pete Repeat

Xerox officials held an emergency press conference Thursday to
announce a total recall of the "Reprotron 5000", their recently
released three-dimensional copy machine.

Xerox stock has plummeted to a new low since the release of the
innovative device.  Xerox hailed the Reprotron 5000 as a "new
revolution in copying" when it introduced the machine just two
weeks ago.  Market insiders were certain that the copier would send
Xerox stock through the roof.

At a demonstration of the Reprotron in January, Xerox staffers made
full three-dimensional copies of an oriental vase, a bowl of fruit,
and a perfect red rose.  Reporters were invited to sample apples
and oranges created by the original fruit, though Xerox technicians
warned that the copied fruit might taste slightly of toner.  John
Thompson (inventor of the Reprotron) stepped forward to make a copy
of a Manhattan phone book, but accidentally copied his hand and
forearm.  He quickly disposed of the highly detailed, frantically
wriggling half-limb as it slid out of the copier's delivery slot.

But Xerox wasn't ready for what happened next.  "We assumed that
people would behave as responsible, thinking human beings with this
copier, obviously we were wrong," Thompson laments.  From all
across the USA, reports have been pouring in of the copier being
used in what Thompson calls "sick, greedy ways."

In Union City, Arizona, Treasury Department officials are
investigating reports of a secretary who allegedly copied a single
bar of gold bullion 150 times.  A task force investigator stated,
"Granted, it takes money to make money, but we're almost certain
that this action is in violation of some laws."

Xerox officials are also under fire from consumers, due to rumors
that the three dimensional copying technology is imperfect.  Harold
Butz of Peoria, Pennsyvania, made a copy of a common cement brick
spray painted gold.  Butz told Treasury Department officials that
he was "shocked and dismayed" when he discovered that the machine-
made copy was 22-karat solid gold.  "All I wanted was a really good
copy of a cement brick spray painted gold," Butz asserted.  "What
the hell am I going to do with this thing?"

At a copy center in Austin, Texas, a couple was arrested for making
15 copies of their three year old son, Jeremy, and then refusing to
pay for the copies, claiming that some of the new children were
"smudged".  Local authorities were uncertain as to which charges
should be pressed.

Xerox plans to scrap all the machines they are able to recall, but
Thompson expressed concern over the so-called "black market
Reprotrons."

"Apparently some enterprising scalawags discovered that if they had
two machines they could use one to make a working copy of the
other," Thompson revealed.  "To tell the truth, we only sold two
machines in all ....  These copy pirates should be aware that as
with anything else that is copied from a copy and so on, there are
bound to be defects in the copies produced.  We have no idea what
kind of stuff will pop out of the slot when a person copies
something on a fourth- or fifth-generation machine."  Thompson
declined to comment on reports that hundreds of the pirated
machines have a human thumb attached to the coin slot which
constantly wiggles -- the results of a person's thumb getting in
the way during one of the original copier to copier copies.

"Ultimately, we're not too worried," Thompson stated.  "People
owning the copiers will eventually run out of the fluid that makes
the machines work, and we've taken all the fluid off the market.
A machine can only go about two weeks without a fluid refill, and
there won't be any fluid refills."   Asked why people with copiers
couldn't make copies of the fluid canisters they already have,
Xerox officials hastily ended the press conference, stating that
they "need to reconsider a few things."