By Nate Anderson
May 22, 2008 - 08:38PM CT

When AOL released "anonymized" search results from more than 500,000 users back in 2006, the resulting firestorm even blew into the mainstream media, which managed to track down and identify some of the "anonymous" users simply from their search queries.

Now, two years later, a seedling emerges from those ashes as a Philadelphia theater company launches USER 927, a new play based on one user's rather unorthodox set of queries. Ars spoke to writer Katharine Clark Gray about the piece and what led her to create it.

A play about search queries might sound as enjoyable as listening to Winnie Ille Pu read entirely in Latin (I speak from experience), but AOL user 927 was no ordinary searcher. The Consumerist picked 927's queries from the complete archive and published them online in 2006, which inspired director Michael Alltop to pitch Gray on the idea of doing "a play about it."

The queries start harmlessly enough. Sure, user 927 has some medical problems ("heal time for broken legs," "human mold," "mold on humans," "skin mold") but who has the time these days to keep themselves entirely fungi-free? But things quickly take a turn for the worse with the sudden appearance of "dog sex" at 9:28 PM one evening.