The Buying of Lot 37 by Joseph Fink

Author:Joseph Fink
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2019-04-01T16:00:00+00:00

You know me, listeners. I’m a pretty straight-and-narrow radio professional. I’m all about objectivity and impartiality. But it’s time for a Cecil Palmer editorial.

Given the growing prevalence of the internet—not just on computers, but also phones and watches and owls and certain trees—our private information is just out there, waiting to be taken and exploited by the wrong kinds of people.

Of course, it’s vitally important that vague yet menacing government agencies have access to our personal data, like income, dream journals, phone logs, embarrassing thoughts, and slash-fiction archives. Also the police and the World Government. And the mayor. And the faceless old woman who secretly lives in all of our homes.

Yes, those people should all have access to our private data.

But now there are things called scripts and algorithms that can just scan our e-mails and our purchase history and all those photos of cats wearing baseball mitts we like to share with each other. And these scripts and algorithms are sometimes called bots. And these bots are large cyborgs that break into our homes and look through our stuff and then feed these secrets to corporations and then these corporations make more bots and soon we will have to fight bot armies. But with what? Knives and guns are completely internet-based now. They will turn against us in that war.

We are not safe from the impending Bot Wars. So stop having personal data is what I’m trying to say. No more e-mails. No more job histories, Night Vale. No more cat pictures or erotic fan fic or text messages.

I know this is difficult. On the one hand, we enjoy having personal information like careers and friends and hobbies. On the other hand, we’re talking about war. And on the third, eleven-fingered hand, nothing is to say bots wouldn’t be benevolent leaders. But I do not wish to find this out.

I’m sure the naysayers will tell me that I’m overreacting, which I am. But it’s my opinion, okay. You don’t get to tell me who’s overreacting. You’re underreacting, I’ll say. I’ll totally say that. I’ll say that to their face.

What—? What’s that?

Oh. Okay.

Listeners, Intern Maureen just handed me a note explaining that the City Council has just declared all information totally public, and that since no information is private anymore, the giant corporations and their bots cannot harm us by mining private data. The City will keep all of our information safely out in the open and available to anyone wearing sunglasses and a sidearm.

Thanks, Maureen.

Moments ago, the Sheriff’s Secret Police held a secret press conference reminding us all that murder is illegal. Also attempted murder. “Like, let’s say you try to kill a person but you don’t actually succeed,” a Secret Police spokesperson whispered from behind a concrete pillar in the underground garage of the disused East Night Vale Mall, “then that’s still illegal. Even if you didn’t kill that person.”

“But what if you just think about killing a person but don’t actually do it?” came one question from the batch of reporters who were also whispering and hiding.

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