IX  X    

---

IV:21.  [Finally,] the potential media represented by networked computing systems offer novel metaphors and models for some of the crucial subjects of poetic writing. To take just one simple example, in the world of networks, multi-user systems — the sharing of information processing resources by several terminals — is a commonplace. The popularization of this new metaphoric vehicle may make it easier to conceive of multiplicity or decentralization in relation to, say, the brain(s) or body(ies) of the mind(s) or person(s) seen as multi-user system(s), but without the usual associations of such multiplicity with personality disorder, (mental) illness or (harmful, anti-social) disjunctions. For, in networked computing, plurality, multiple/parallel processing, and decentralization, are signs of robustness and efficiency in our attempts to represent, manipulate and create meaning from complex inputs and interactions.

---

    IX  X