Dave Gross
1126 Fell St.
San Francisco, CA 94117

• How did I get into this hobby? "I am interested in a new science called memetics, or meme theory. Meme theorists are trying to apply the principle of natural selection to the realm of ideas, culture, and instances of folklore like urban legends. The 'blue star' urban legend is a wonderful example of a 'meme,' and because we have many examples of it 'caught in the wild,' so to speak, we can learn about how it evolves over time." For more information, see my page entitled The Blue Star Meme: Applying Natural Selection Thinking to Urban Legends.

• Who spreads this urban legend? "This legend isn't a 'hoax,' really, because this isn't a case of people deliberately spreading lies and trying to mislead people. This legend is typically spread by well-meaning people who believe that they're doing a good deed."

• Why do so many people get fooled? "Most people don't even imagine that the information could be bogus. They assume that if they have been given false information, someone must have deliberately tried to fool them, and they can't think of why anyone would try to deceive them in this way. Also, the legend has taken on such frightening details - the fatal trip, the strychnine, the many victims - that many people feel that it's better to risk spreading an unfounded rumor than to fail to notify people of a terrible danger. The legend also plays on a number of stereotypes about drugs and drug users that people seem to enjoy spreading for their own sake. It's also worth saying that there are always people willing to speak up about things they know nothing about."

• This thing really has a life of its own, doesn't it? "If you think of the warning flyers as an information virus things become clearer. Just like the common cold virus breaks into a cell and uses that cell's reproductive mechanism to make more copies of the virus, the 'blue star' warning hijacks a person's capacity to reproduce information in order to spread. Instead of spreading useful information, the host instead spreads more copies of the information virus."

• Now that you've got the word out, will the legend die? "The legend is stronger than ever. New, virulent strains appear and spread with astounding speed now that they've infected the internet. In just a few hours, monitoring my computer at work, I saw one strain jump from hundreds of military computers to machines at InterGraph and then to Microsoft."