>> and the story of the time Zoner inadvertently brought
>>down the governments of twelve independent systems with one erroneous
>>post to a Usenet newsgroup.
>
>Does this have any basis in reality? If so I've gotta hear this one.

I'm reminded of the infocom game for the HitchHikers Guide to the Galaxy...
I don't remember the exact quote, but if you enetered something the parser couldn't handle, it would occasionally respond with something to the effect of
"your words travel through a freak wormhole, to a peace conference in another galaxy, where they are a mortal insult, causing both sides to exterminate eachother...try to be more careful about what you say, ok?"

if anybody remembers/can find the original quote, that would be nifty :)