Zeno's Bar & Grill
Wednesday, November 02, 2005
The Joke’s on the Jokester
Gadzooks! Chris Elliot was so taken in by the website for the fictional Victorian-era robot called Boilerplate that he included the robot as a character in his first novel, a spoof of historical mysteries, The Shroud of the Thwacker. As reported in the NY Times, Mr. Elliot was unpleasantly surprised when a 21st century webmaster turned out to be the inventor of this supposedly 19th century robot. Apparently the two were able to come to an amicable agreement about proper credit in future editions. That’s certainly a rarity in today’s litigious world.
--Melanie & Kelly
