Date: Fri, 2 May 1997 15:08:43 -0500 (CDT) From: Crypt Newsletter Subject: File 3--EX-VIRUS WRITER CLINT HAINES DIES OF OVERDOSE AT 21 CRYPT NEWSLETTER 42 April -- May 1997 EX-VIRUS WRITER CLINT HAINES DIES OF OVERDOSE AT 21 Long-time readers of Crypt Newsletter will be astonished to hear death -- due to heroin overdose -- came to the famous Australian virus-writer Clint Haines on his twenty-first birthday, April 10. He was from Brisbane. Writing in the Usenet comp.virus newsgroup On April 19, Rod Fewster, a moderator of one of the Fidonet's virus information newsfeeds and one who knew Haines, said: "Clinton Haines, who earned his place in virus-writing history at the age of fifteen as Harry McBungus, became a household name in the virus world by the time he was eighteen as Terminator-Z and TaLoN . . . [Haines] gained widespread fame a couple of years ago with front-page newspaper headlines yelling about how his No Frills virus had stopped the Australian Taxation Office dead in its tracks for two days, and was regarded by his peers as one of the best virus writers of all time . . . [He] will be cremated tomorrow morning. "Clint quit virus writing two years ago to concentrate on his university studies and he had the intelligence to go a long way in his chosen field of microbiology, but unfortunately being intelligent doesn't always give you street smarts. "Clinton Haines/Harry McBungus/Terminator-Z/TaLoN died from an overdose of heroin . . . on his twenty-first birthday." Haines' interest in controlled substances could be seen in frequent posts to the Usenet where the University of Queensland student waxed enthusiastically on topics ranging from the synthesis of LSD and methamphetamines to his own experiences with Prozac. In April, it all came off the rails, rendering him dead and an acquaintance comatose. For example, on the date-rape drug, rohypnol: ". . . a friend of mine had 10 rohypnols and a 6-pack, woke up in the lockup with 25 stitches in his head and a broken arm, and couldn't remember a single thing from the last 12 hours . . . turns out he was vandalizing a train seat and the security guards beat the shit out of him . . . then he got off at the next station only to try skateboarding and broke his arm." On speed and LSD: ". . . I assure you people that LSD and amphetamines are a rather wondrous combination, the ceaseless and energetic progression of thought along a myriad gossamer threads of abstract reality . . . throw nitrous on top of that and you have God mode happening . . . thinking is simply a matter of choosing where you want to go inside your mind and insight/thought rushes abound to the point of not having enough time in which to follow every branch point . . . to the point where your individual thought threads meld themselves into higher denominations . . ." Haines rambled wildly on his thrill at sniffing laughing gas: ". . . nitrousing out in this state of mind can be wicked because you go so far out on a mental limb . . . sometimes you get to this point where everything becomes completely fluid, not in the physical sense, but one can see, perceive, visualize, etc., every ramification of everything that goes on in the particular mental environment you construct . . . including, say, the passage of a tennis ball under the influence of gravity, or the evolution of an argument and the interplay of multiple factors, even your own thought reasoning . . . when one nitrouses out to a point of total thought fusion, and the concurrent realization/visualization of an extended range of thought capabilities occurs, one gets the rare chance to 'refit' aspects of one's mind, much like getting into newly-washed clothes or something." And, sadly, on heroin synthesis in a post on September 20, 1996: "WARNING ---- MAKE SURE you cut the rock so produced down to NO MORE than 30% purity -- otherwise you'll end up killing a whole bunch of people . . street-grade heroin is usually in the range of 10-20%, maximum." The Australian VLAD virus-writing group promptly published a memorial virus to Haines, called "RIP Terminator Z," according to a story by technology writer Julie Robotham in a piece published in the April 29 edition of the Sydney Morning Herald. Fewster commented to Crypt Newsletter, "[Clint Haines] had a bright future ahead of him, and in my opinion could have done some good in the world if he'd just kept his head together."