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the longer (2019) version
Zsolt Kerekes - now Writer at
GoblinSearch - which as you can
plainly see is writing unburdened by a business plan - was once best
known for his fast typing and many editorial cut and pastes
performed in the worshipful service of the
dot
in dotcom and
memoryfication
of computer storage...
- which content - having been
mostly FTPeed like ticker tape in tappety clusters of frantic finger clicks
splurged out in internet time - displays the typical DNA of a writing
methodology not overmuch burdened by pausing for spell checks or
reflecting on fancy literary niceties...
- such as whether the liberal
use of dashes expunges the need for commas and colons - dashes being
sufficient in themselves --- to subtly indicate a stylistic awareness of
punctuation concepts in general while signalling that the author doesn't
fret about the world wide standard distribution of punctuation marks in the
English Language - so the next time he taps a reader-viewable character on
his qwerty - which isn't a letter or numeral - he's not anxious about the
need arising in later editing ("editing" being a
procrastinational habit of offline writing which is best done after
publishing - when it comes to web pages - if it is indeed ever needed at all)
to defend the case for those exact (in-sentence contextual) X-Y spatial
coordinates.
The existential question - have I got the commas in the
right place? - being an espoused philosophy for writers other than he.
In
December 2018 he retired from the web ad funded life with the
sale
of his
mouse
site (StorageSearch.com) which gives him the freedom to continue typing
fast but with the novel luxury of being decoupled from any pressing need to
aggrandize and monetize readers.
Where did these writing ideas come
from? Where are they going? And is he secretly hoping to be paid one day
according to the average length of the sentences he writes?
Or -
and this is conjecture based on the evidence of what has been observed so far in
these pages - paid according to a rarely applied formula which sum is in
inverse proportion to the number of people reading them... Which as the
readership approaches zero - would indeed make such a self publishing venture
worthwhile.
If that were the case sadly it didn't work.
(Note the use of "were" above - indicating a polite
awareness of the existence of grammar - which is another delaying tactic for
writers - like safely crossing the street would take longer if you paused to
appreciate the brand names of all the passing cars... Honestly, sic... what
more can I say - but if you're still studying the preceeding sentence to
triangulate the cracks in its structure then DIY guides of
sentence-ological mastic are
available.)
Returning to this author who - having sold his computing
publishing potboiler and being of a certain age - had demonstrably cleared
all self imposed hurdles to his retirement. So you might imagine that
would wind down the voltage of the tippy tappy ticker tape. But he hasn't taken
the hint and unplugged. Yet.
Maybe writing - in his case - is a due
to a health problem. Being a fast typer may be an unfortunate addiction. Would
he notice if the keyboard wasn't connected to anything?
Are you
starting to feel you know enough already?
Those who had begun
suspecting they had the measure of the author and his wretched "bio"
long before they ever got this far - having seen enough warning signs in the
title they would not be at all surprised by whatever drivel came next - most of
which they will happily never see - as they are no longer with us - having
much earlier than this point treble-clicked away.
What kind of bio is
this anyway?
At least linkedin has limits on the word counts.
Or
does it? - Have you seen his?
Don't bother.
And depending
what year it is when you read this (and even if time travel has enabled you
rejoin this type of conversation in a different sequence to that which I
envisaged) you may not even know or care
what
linkedin was (or will be) anyway.
You could look it up on
wikipedia but that might have gone too.
As I said in an article in
2001 -
remember,
the web has no memory! Or I think that's what I said. If it didn't before -
it does now. (Fake history was established long before fake news.)
The
stories we tell about ourselves depend on who we're telling them to and what we
hope may happen afterwards...
- the interview,
- the relative you haven't met before,
- the dating site,
- the new neighbor,
- the border guard.
Border guards... that reminds me.
Have
you ever crossed a border while being shot at - by border guards in the country
you were leaving?
Perhaps the shooters were annoyed you didn't go
via the designated channels.
Your argument is that you side-stepped
the official exits because they were closed nets for people like you to
get scooped up tidily and shot later. You didn't have the papers which told a
more convincing story. And the authorities had temporarily suspended tourism.
So - weighing up all the odds - better to risk being shot at from a distance
while running than while tied up in a cellar at close range.
But I'm
getting ahead of myself here. Or closer to the start in chronological time. If
this were the complete baby to dotage life story that's where it would have
been better to begin. More interesting from a grab the reader point of view.
But this isn't that version of the bio.
Before I get back to the
prosaic "author bio" - here's an alternative version of these
shooting incidents from the border guard point of view. (I merely insert it
here to show the importance of imagination when telling your life story.
Adding the prefix "re" being even better. Re-imagining the past is a
recognized tool for improving the autobiography writer / reader experience.
Especially when the subject of the autobiography has never read a word of it.
Hats off to ghostwriters. My budget didn't stretch that far in convertible
lucre but was elastic in other dimensions.)
The shooting border
guards (like
those who long ago were
shooting
at my family - but missed in the dark) only shot people like us who didn't
cross in the correct places because they wanted to hear how good their
targets' stories were.
Life on the border as a guard was dull
otherwise. And they felt like they were being cheated and missing something
important when unsuitably-storied border crossers inconsiderately and
provocatively went the wrong way.
If the border guards could only
hear enough good stories from those kinds of people who came within range of
their story nets they might be able to concoct a better kind of
autobiography for themselves with once upon a time beginnings and happy
endings.
But our business here - about the author? - isn't about
interesting stories.
I assume you clicked on whatever it was because
you wanted to know more - about this writer - Zsolt Kerekes - who is the
Zsolthimself
associated with GoblinSearch.com.
He most definitely isn't one
of the hundreds of other more illustrious Zsolt Kerekes's which he discovered
out there sadly after he thought it would be a clever idea to register the
vanity domain
ZsoltKerekes.com
in 2011 - before having considered the possibilities for utter confusion - and
deciding it would be better to let that domain registration lapse.
Having
explained that he's not one of the interesting Zsolt Kerekes 's then please
read on.
Are you? (Still reading).
Maybe you're addicted to
reading literary articles on the internet.
This web site could be
the cure.
writers revealed
The written work speaks
for itself.
So why would you want to know the life stories of who
wrote them?
Do I can detect a sharp intake of breath here from
teachers of English Literature?
Maybe this page is not for you.
Just click away.
Is
this another example of how low the barriers to self publishing books on
the internet have sunk?
Discuss...
FYI - as a young teen I
chose to drop studying English Literature in school as soon as it was
permissable to do so - this being a decision - on my part - not triggered by
any lack of love of books and writing but rather in my
teenage-egotistically stubborn way - because I loved books and writing so
much that I didn't want my future writing style to be intimidated, imprinted
or buried by the weight of other people's analysis of tome tombs which I
preferred to navigate or not (at some future time and pace of my own
choosing) driven by a hard to describe satisfaction of reading books rather
than a desire to forensically dissect them.
Although like all revealed
plans which you read in autobiographies - other elements - later forgotten or
which might pixelate the narrative momentum - may have been in the mix too but
are more conveniently handled by their absence in chapter one and may lie out
of sight and mind until they are rescraped to make an exciting appearnace in
a later part of the narrative.
writers revealed while no one was
looking and an apology in advance for "about the author(s)"
In
my own reading life - I've been mostly content to read without
knowing anything much about the lives of the people who wrote the books I
enjoyed - unless they were writing about the real world (in which case if they
were
Winston
Churchill or Admiral
Doenitz or FBI Director -
James
Comey - they were writing about a script in which they had been principal
actors).
However I can confidently state here - now from my
vantage point of having written some accidental witness based histories related
to the computer market (here's
one
and here's
another)
which overlapped my 40 years of working in that industry - that just because
the author / actor in a real life series of events wasn't aware of something
taking place - doesn't mean that it didn't happen.
The recording of
history is affectected by points of view. Just as is the
interpretation
of market research.
As to writers of fiction - I might weaken my
resolve of being blissfully ignorant of author life stories in general to
sometimes (if I liked the books I had just finished) wanting to know a little
bit more more - especially if I thought that visiting their "about
page" or jacket / wiki bio might contain a follow up list of
their other works to sample.
OK I don't know or care much about
writer bios. Is that odd? Well that's me. So don't expect to find much
here. I don't have much affinity with the genre.
I've been just as
consistent in not needing to know much fan stuff about the personal line ups
and appearances of musical bands and partnerships (not being able to name in a
quiz - regardless of the prize - the line ups of any bands apart from the
Beatles) no matter how much I liked their albums or operas. Sometimes knowing
an author's background can put you off their work - just as seeing what your
favorite musicians look like can act as a barrier to enjoying their published
works.
bio / memoryfications of a SPARC-storage-goblin-guy
As
my 8th birthday was approaching - it was obvious to me what I'd like as a
present... a typewriter.
The 7 year old version of me knew for
sure - I want to be a writer.
My parents had a
business
selling, recycling and repairing typrewriters - so my birthday present wish for
a noisy metal machine with occasionally sticky keys and finger messing ink
ribbon changes - was not so outlandish - and was granted without any fuss.
(Despite the expense.)
That was 1964 - in England - in a seaside
town called Brighton
- which was - by common agreement - in those days - located a mere
hour's drive south of London. (It's
further
away now by road and
rail.)
Having
got the typewriter and with easy access downstairs in the workshop to infinite
amounts of paper and typewriter ribbons and technical support - you might say
the writing career got off to a good start - and for years I was stuffing my
stories into a little plastic suitcase labelled - "in case of fire save
this."
But writing technology aside (despite the comparative ease
of replacing tyepwriters as they got worn out and acquiring a fondness for ink
based pens too - which the shop also sold) - did not transition so
deterministically into writing as a career.
You might say - my early
ambition to be a full time writer - was suspended for 58 years. (Several things
got in the way - or competed for my attention - as I got older. School, other
hobbies and girls.)
Instead I spent 44 years of my life engaged
creatively in the electronics and computing industry.
Like writing -
this began as a childhood hobby. Unlike writing - with cautionary tales of
writers who could only afford to buy cheaper typewriters - it was impressed
on me - that electronics had a less risky way of being repurposed into a way
of earning a living. "You can always do writing as a hobby" - must
be a phrase that many other writers can remember being a roadblock which they
were But in partial recovery of that primal writer idea - I might say in my
defence that I did spend the last 28 years of that career as a self publisher -
writing about the computer market. Now having sold my main computer publication
and retiring (as a Christmas present to myself in 2018) I'm beginning a new
phase.
Somehow in the past 28 years of self publishing in a reputable
way - writing about real things and changing ideas in the computer market - I
did manage to squirrel away enough hours to scribble some fictional stories -
much of which content I never got around to putting on my story site -
goblinsearch.com
Now I've
got no more excuses. I have the freedom to divide my time to recovering the old
and inventing some things new.
After all that past writing online -
I'd like to think the best or the worst is still to come.
PS - On
looking back at the above - and for the first time reading it - I asked myself
- is it overly presumptious to write an "about the author" bio
before he has written anything significant yet?
What's one more
partial (and mayhap partially fictional) author bio more or less?
Ours
is a profession in which whole worlds are daily invented. |
examples of my past written works |
the SPARC Product Directory
sample
captures in the internet archive - 1996 to 2018
My first money
earning book - was a self-published (in 1992) buyers guide about the
computer market called the SBus Product Directory.
The original print
version weighed 2 pounds and cost $79.
In 1996 it was renamed the
SPARC Product Directory and began its speedy transition to being a free to view
(web
ad funded) web portal.
In those days SPARC based servers and
the Unix derived operating systems Sunos (later Solaris) were popular
building blocks in the telecoms and ISP based infrastructures which built
the internet in the formative dotcom bubble years of the internet. My guide
covered the hardware market from chips to supercomputers.
My favorite
SPARC article (published in 1996 and updated till 2009) is -
SPARC
History - because I had close relationships with nearly all the companies
involved in that market during a 20 year span of my career.
Penelope's
Secrets
Everyone's got an unfinished novel right? This one of
mine has been unfinished longer than most.
I started writing
Penelope's Secrets in 1994 and circulated the first handful of chapters in paper
book form. Then in 2000 I put it on the web and it grew to 78,000 words long.
It's
set about 4,000 years in the future. (Maybe by then it will be finished.) The
link takes you to the 2007 archived version of the text.
Scythia, a
hill... "Only yesterday morning, and throughout the ages of history before,
this tussock had been of no interest to anyone. Yesterday morning a single cow
and a few sheep had picked over the choicest blades of fresh unchewed grass, and
their dung showed how long they had ruled this little domain. The rabbit
droppings sprinkled around the small mound of grass suggested that other
creatures too, sometimes came this way. When night fell, the screeching of the
fox was silenced for the first time by the clamping march of armoured men."
Penelope's
Secrets Foreword:- To whom it may concern...
StorageSearch.com
sample captures from
1998 to 2018 in the internet archive
In the 20 years from 1998 to
2018 I published an online guide to the storage and memoryfication markets
called StorageSearch.com. In that period I wrote thousands of articles about
this market ranging from predictions and unique market insights to plain old
simple news coverage, comments and interviews with company founders and
technology inventors. I sold the site in December 2018.
Indicative
samples of my storage writing can be seen in
goblinsearch.com
In
2000 I wrote the story Alexander
White and the Goblins as a surprise for the 4 year old son - Alexander -
of a dear old friend who is also in the story.
That had consequences.
My
sister Anna - whose life was being cut short by cancer - asked me to promise to
write similar stories for her young children - Laura and Jamie.
That
led to the writing of Princess
Laura and the Unsuitable Dragon Suitors (which Anna heard in draft form) and
Jamie and
the Tree Troll (which I delayed writing until Jamie was a little older.
I
have other similar stories published, written, unwritten and promised still to
follow.
Chiltington Lane
In
2016 I started an infrequently updated blog called Chiltington Lane to describe
some of the little things which left an impression on me or which I had noticed
in the quiet rural lane in East Sussex where I lived.
See also:-
Where
inexactly is Chiltington Lane? | | |
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Zsolt's scribbles
1992 to 2025 |
....... |
The 1990s were the "listicles"
decade of my 3 decades self publishing career - as I said in a
linkedin
chat with Roz Morris - in
October 2023 - having first encountered that word myself in an article -
5 Ways
Writing Has Infiltrated My Life - which
Roz
had posted an alert to on linkedin. |
1992 |
 |
SPARC
Product Directory
In 1992 I self published an
independent guide of hardware compatible with the hot processor tech SPARC(r) (Scalable Processor ARChitecture)
invented by
Sun
Microsystems which was the most popular choice for companies building the
internet infrastructure for email, and later web servers, ecommerce and
search-engines.
see also:- my article -
SPARC
history - from 1987 to 2010
Initially I thought I might do 2 editions. To avoid infringing
trademarks I called it the SBus Product Directory (SBus being the
interconnection bus in SPARC systems.)

3 years (and about 20 print editions) later Sun and its branding agent SPARC
International suggested I should change the name of my book to the SPARC Product
Directory as they liked what I was doing.
I said - I can't afford the 6 digit $ annual licensing fee which was
the going rate in those days to license the
SPARC
brand.
They said - we'll give you a special deal. So I renamed my guide, and
my company
ACSL
got the full legal protection from pirates for my book.
In 1996 I transitioned it to a web site and an ad funded business
model.
In 1998 I widened my reach of list based guides with StorageSearch.com
which was the first publication to defragment the enterprise storage market with
guides for every storage technology and product type from chips to tape
libraries.

In
the 20 years from 1998 to 2018 I wrote thousands of articles about this market
ranging from predictions and unique market insights to plain old simple
news coverage, comments and interviews with company founders and technology
inventors.
Indicative samples of my storage writing can be seen in
When I sold
StorageSearch.com in December 2018 I retired from the computer writing life and
turned my writing efforts to writing fiction unburdened by a business plan. |
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my books published in 2023 |
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Alexander Woyte and the Pirates
(and Goblins)
A much afeared Portsmouth pirate ship frozen in
an arctic storm 300 years ago has melted free due to global warming and is now
running amok.
What's the connection to the disappearance of the young
Alexander and the goblins from the Old Book Shop in Petersfield who were
supposed to be watching over him?
see also:-
Books
set in Portsmouth | |
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Princess Laura and the Unsuitable
Dragon Suitors
When the young Princess Laura secretly rescues a
baby dragon from her father's hunt the dragon predicts that - one day in the
future she will be the cause of his death.
When Laura is 18 her
father presents her with a choice of suitors - one from each of the surrounding
kingdoms. Laura's chosen suitor must kill a dragon to prove his worthiness to
the King.
What can she do to make sure that doesn't happen? | |
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my books published in 2025 |
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the Goblins are
Coming!
Great deeds done for love of family do not list in
scrolls of wars.
Yet how best stop the tides of war return and live at ease together?
Memories fade. Can be remade.
Victors write true histories
whose meanings time wipes slippery.
For those who can read them - words of Olden cast new warnings.
The goblins are coming, 1, 2, 3.
Hide in the cellar. Hide in
the tree.
A novel of books past and future by Zsolt Kerekes - Spring 2025 | | |