Gibson’s world in Pattern Recognition seems to revolve around the Internet and web-based forms of communication. The plot of the story even stems from Casey’s obsession with the videos. One of the first things she does at the beginning of the novel is log on to Fetish:Footage:Forum. Stella, the sister of the creator, Nora, of those aforementioned videos, uses the internet to broadcast her sister’s brilliant works, attracting the minds and souls of millions of people worldwide, one of them Casey. How does Casey get sucked into tracking down the maker in the first place? Through the posts she added to F:F:F, which Bigend tracked and used to his advantage. Casey even finds a vital piece of information regarding the watermarked footage in an email from Parkaboy, her contact through F:F:F, who in turn received it from another email. Casey was able to obtain a map of codes from Taki, through a meeting setup via email. Furthermore, Hobbs-Baranov, a mathematician previously employed by the government, used the Echelon search engine to decipher the map and retrieve the email address of Stella and Nora. Finally, Casey contacted Stella and was able to meet Nora and watch her work, all through an impromptu email. However, Andrei Volkov and his accomplices first became aware of Casey because of her post on the footage forum. It was also because of the internet that Dorotea was able to keep track of Casey and terrorize her with stuffed Bibendums. The internet was how Boone could hack into Casey’s account and read all her emails, causing his relationship with her to disintegrate.
Obviously, the internet and its many applications played a major part in the story. First of all, Casey was able to communicate with people from all four corners of the earth and form connections with some of them that later was to her advantage. F:F:F was more than an online social networking site; it was where people of similar interests could expand their ideas and thoughts and create theories that would be tested due to difference of opinions. It was where she “met” Parkaboy, and her relationship with him lasted for the length of the story and even went to the next level. Casey’s list of contacts increased through F:F:F; she was able to encounter more people through it than she would have if she never had a computer. In fact, if she did not have Damien’s Cube or her Blue Ant issued iBook, her search for the maker would have been fruitless. She probably would have neither seen nor heard of the videos in the first place.
The internet does have its downsides. The break-in at Damien’s apartment, the nose-cracking escapade, the drug-induced dream and the anxiety that Cayce experiences throughout the novel could all have been avoided if she had not posted about Russian mafias on F:F:F. Also, Dorotea as Mama Anarchia was able to track Casey’s moves through what she posted on the forum or other illegal means. Every post gives insight to her nature. Another point is that total identities can be concealed. Casey never expected Dorotea and Mama Anarchia to be the same individual. The Internet could be appropriately compared to a coral reef in the ocean; sure there is a lot of free space and life but once in a while, a few predatory sharks can be lurking around the corner.
