Why MrEntropy?

I’m most often asked, “Why MrEntropy?”  Most people assume it’s about chemical reactions, but it isn’t.  If I abbreviate it to “MrE” then people assume it’s about the drug, Ecstasy.  It’s not.

The nickname, or handle, “MrEntropy” was conceived many years ago.  Before the Internet became a big thing (even before it was known outside of academic circles).  It came about during the time of the Bulletin Board System (BBS).

At the time I was heavily influenced by a writer named Michael Moorcock.  One of my favorite series of books by him was The Dancers at the End of Time series, which detailed the lives of a few people who lived at the end of Time, when the universe was dying.

Also, around that time, I had read a magazine article about the death of the universe.  I don’t remember if it was in Omni or Discover.  Basically it said that the universe would die from “heat death,” where everything would become colder and slower until, finally, there was no movement left.

I thought, then, that if life arose in a “Garden of Eden,” where everything was green and lush and new, then life might end in a place called “The Garden of Entropy.”  Being influenced by the End of Time series, I thought if the Earth were finally cold, dead, covered in snow then there should be a final outpost for humanity.  A domed, green, living garden in the middle of the snow desert.  The caretaker should have a simple name, so the obvious choice was Mr. Entropy.

A side effect of this name, which didn’t occur to me at all and was pointed out by someone several years after I was using it, was when it was abbreviated to MrE it sounds like “mystery.” I liked that.

I first used “Garden of Entropy” as the name of a BBS I was running.  I can’t remember which software it was, or even which computer.  It may have been the Atari Mega 2 ST running RATSoft, or the 386 running whatever it was I was running at the time.

After that, the Internet hit big so I dropped the BBS (a sad day for me) and began using it as my major “nickname” for every place that I went.

So, there you go.  The origins of MrEntropy.  Feel free to ask questions.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 8th, 2008 at 10:26 am and is filed under Life in general. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

4 Responses to “Why MrEntropy?”

  1. sandra Says:
    April 10, 2008 at 7:39 am

    Very original and unique. I.ve just started reading your site, or whatever it’s called (i’m new to this internet stuff) and you have interesting stories and are well worded. Actually is keeping my interest, so far.

  2. mrentropy Says:
    April 10, 2008 at 7:49 am

    Hi Sandra,

    Thank you for dropping by and reading. Hopefully I can keep on writing and keep your interest level high :)

    And a special thank you for posting a comment. I love comments.

  3. Andro Says:
    June 21, 2008 at 5:52 pm

    I’m trying to track down any information still remaining about RatSoft. Please contact me if you still have any of your old stuff around.

    Thanks!

  4. mrentropy Says:
    June 21, 2008 at 9:45 pm

    Hi Andro,

    You didn’t leave an email address so I hope you’ll see this and not spend your life wondering about it.

    It’s remotely possible that somewhere, buried in my parents garage alongside my Mega 2 ST, I still have the RATSoft floppies. I doubt it, though. I couldn’t even be sure that they’d still be readable after all this time spent in a garage. I also have the manual printed out.

    The big problem here is that my parents live a thousand or so miles away, so I won’t be able to pop in there one weekend and collect them (if they’re still there).

    I’ve searched the internet high and low, but can’t seem to find anything about the software or the company anymore. That’s a shame, because I remember the guy being pretty good about questions and support. I know I was never wanting.

    It would be almost worth it for me to set up one of the Atari ST emulators and run a BBS over a telnet session.

    On the other hand, you may be in some kind of luck. I can’t find anything about the company, but I found this link to recent messages about someone wanting info on RATSoft: http://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?f=14&p=121977, and there’s a link for the software in there, too.

    The name of the guy that wrote it was named Steve Hughey. On a whim, I sent an email to a Steve Hughey on FaceBook who’s around Silicon Valley. If you want to email me at mrentropy@gardenofentropy.com I’ll let you know if I get an answer from him.

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