Proximal BirdFlip: The Teleconference of Doctor Faustus is a satire and parody - existing somewhere on a continuum that allegedly includes Dante, Cervantes, Jonathan Swift and Terry Pratchett1, with maybe a dash of Evelyn Waugh2 - concerning the biopharmaceutical industry and politics of the recent BirdFlippandemic of which you have doubtless heard3. And so that the keywords come up in the search, please not that it contains Dumb and Idiotic Humour as well as Humor, is Humorous as well as Humourous and has Humous and Hummus in it as well, just in case someone looking for Humour mistypes it as Hummus. 1 fairly fictional; but what it does share with Terry Pratchett is the habit of displaying ridiculousfootnotes and using the names of peculiar birds such as the Fluffy-backed Tit-babbler, for noapparent logical reason. I don't know about you, but I hate footnotes, I really loathe and detestthem, so I don't know why I've put so many in this book.2 The dash after "Waugh" is undoubtedly the dash this clause is talking about.3 If you haven't then read the book!