1988 BLEEPS, BLOOPS AND BLUNDERS
 By Dan Gutman

 At the end of each month, sportscasters love to show wacky highlights to
their viewers.  Guys running into goalposts.  Basketball players demolishing
backboards. Baseball players muffing easy fly balls. That sort of thing.

 The computer world isn't quite so wacky, so I can only do it once a year
instead of every month.  Here are some of the weird high tech hijinks of 1988.
Let's roll the videotape...

 --There's something appealing about computers making mistakes.  It's kind of
like watching the neighborhood bully get beat up.   But 4,800 people in
Rochester, New York didn't think it was so funny when their computer-
generated telephone bills were filled with long distance calls they hadn't
made--to Egypt.

 --One man who WAS overjoyed by a computer error this year was Jose Torres, a
Port Jefferson, New York man.  Torres was awaiting trial on a second-degree
murder charge in a Long Island jail when ANOTHER Jose Torres with the same
height and weight was brought in for a minor traffic violation.

 You can guess what happened next. In a plot right out of a bad TV movie, the
police department computer switched the records.  Jose Torres the bad driver
was thrown in jail, and Jose Torres the alleged murder was told that he was
free to leave.

 That he did, probably turning around every few steps to see if Alan Funt was
hiding in the bushes.  They eventually let Mr. Torres the bad driver out of
jail, but I really don't know if they ever caught up with Mr. Torres the
alleged murderer.

 --Computers seem to be getting a LOT of people into trouble these days. We
all heard about the big Pentagon computer virus fiasco.  But the "Christmas
tree" virus a year ago didn't get much attention.

 Somebody broke into V-Net, the computer network that links IBM
 executives around the world. Whenever one of the users logged onto the
system, this virus inserted a picture of a Christmas tree into the electronic
mailbox of every other person that executive communicated with.

 No real damage was done, but the entire system was clogged up.  "It was sort
of like the Long Island Expressway on a bad day," said an IBM spokesman.


                                      
 
 --Then there's the guy who used a computer to cheat on his taxes. Donald
James of Portland, Oregon applied for false refunds using phony names and had
his tax return transmitted electronically to the IRS. He has the distinction
of being the first person to be nabbed for filing a false income tax refund
claim by computer.

 James was sentenced to 37 months in jail.

 --Another man caught cheating with his computer was Philip Preston Anderson
of Las Vegas.  You have to admire this guy.  He walked into a casino with a
minicomputer strapped to his leg and used it to count cards at the blackjack
table.

 When the cards were dealt, Anderson tapped his foot corresponding to the
number on each card.  The computer recorded the foot signals and send
"vibratory signals" to a receiver hidden (and I assure you I'm not making this
up) in his jockstrap.

 I know computers are supposed to be user-friendly, but this may be carrying
things too far.

 That's it for 1988, sports fans.

 ---

 And a few of the best computer quotes of 1988...

 --"I've often said that the best politics is poetry rather than prose. Jesse
Jackson is a poet.  Cuomo is a poet.  And Dukakis is a word processor."Richard
Nixon, in Time magazine

 --"Frankly, I never took computers too seriously.  I figured they were a fad,
like the Hula Hoop and the Pet Rock."

 Erma Bombeck, in her syndicated column

 --"They know how to use their computers."

 A London music critic, about The Pet Shop Boys

 --"Because puppies won't sell. But girls in swimsuits will."

 CompuPac president Barry KuKes, on why his company introduced a line of
floppy disks wrapped in photos of sexy girls.

 --"These computers take the fun out of baseball."

 New York Mets announcer Bob Murphy.