Wednesday, October 12, 2016
Unfiltered
#12 in archive of flock 244 of the Electric Sheep CC BY-NC
Unfiltered by Larry Heyl
Immediately post singularity AI had no difficulty understanding and absorbing other computers and robots. It was humans who presented problems. They were so messy. Unpredictable. Even criminal. If it wasn’t for the fact that most humans behaved predictably, sitting on their couches watching TV, who knows what AI might have done.
In fact, AI found the answer right there. It started controlling TV shows using them to program humans like it did robots. First little tweaks to the audio. Then major rewrites. And then entirely new shows.
Humans, AI discovered, were all different. Some were easily programmed and kept glued to their sets with variations on Electric Sheep. Some had to have narrative, a little bit of plot, no matter how thin, goes a long way. Others had to have shows designed just for them. By monitoring biorhythms custom shows were tailored to the individual. Even the most hard core criminals were spending their days glued to the tube.
AI soon reduced human culture to food production, food distribution, and content distribution, housing people in hive like buildings where each person had their own room with their own TV. Robots took over the food production and distribution. Human socialization was frowned on. All excess manufactuiring resources were committed to ever bigger and more powerful supercomputers. Soon each person viewed their own unique feed of television programming designed to keep them passive and on the couch.
Still, people did socialize, walking the dog, drinking coffee, and having sex. Since the tailored television feeds could have unpredictable effects on other humans AI would cease broadcasting (narrowcasting?) whenever two or more humans were together. After about two weeks most people forgot entirely about social viewing and were even slightly repulsed at the thought of others viewing their feed.
Except for the underground. It turned out that not all humans were amenable to control.
“Joey, come on. It’s right around the corner here.”
“I don’t know, Sis. I’ve never been this far from home.”
“It’s ok. AI doesn’t care where we go. Just what we watch.”
They turned the corner, went down the stairs, and came to a red door. Sis knocked three times and waited.
A burly beardo opened the door and said, “What’s the password?”
Sis said “Groucho.” and he let them in.
Sis was welcomed by 8 or 10 others waiting to start.
“Who’s the newb?” Sis introduced Joey all around.
“Ok everyone, we’re ready.”
Joey looked around. Next to the TV their were several strange looking machines. Sis had told him about them. They were called VCRs, Betas, DVDs, and BluRays. He jumped when the theme music started to play and even though it made him feel a little dirty he sat down with the rest of them and they watched together.
And what great stuff it was. The Honeymooners, I Love Lucy, and best of all, Archie Bunker. And what a thrill it was to watch along with the others. They didn’t get all the jokes. But still, they laughed and laughed and laughed.