FlamingText

There goes the last human voice

Robots are stalking me.

Every day for two weeks now I've gotten home and the same robot has left a message on my voice mail telling me to call an 800 number for some important information. The robot has a Brooklyn accent. I looked the number up and it's the number of a marketing survey company. I can't tell the robot I'm not interested, I can't opt out, I can't even talk back. The robot does all the talking. It doesn't care if I hang up. It doesn't care what I do. It just keeps calling and calling.

   Robots are also faxing my office with offers for discount vacations and mortgage refinancing. Of course they never stop filling my email box with offers to enlarge my manhood and help me meet Seattle area singles. The e-robots seem very concerned with my sex life in general, although they also want to sell me pharmaceuticals and offer me stock tips. Recently one of them disguised itself as one of my friends, and wrote me an email directing my attention to a hot new website where I can both sell and purchase a wide variety of items. Afterwards my friend wrote to say that her mailbox had been invaded by an obnoxious robot who proceeded to spam everybody in her address book. She wrote:

"Ignore that last message. This is the real me and I'm sorry for the inconvenience."

I asked her how I knew this was really her and not just another clever robot. She replied "Trust me. By the way, I would like to tell you about a remarkable new patch that will enlarge your penis!"

I asked her if she knew some means by which I could reduce it, because quite frankly enough is enough.

   See, I can joke around like that with my friends, but not with robots. If you talk back to the robots then they know somebody's home and they'll never leave you alone. Your phone will keep ringing off the hook, they'll camp out in the yard waiting for you to come outside, and they'll move into the apartment upstairs from you where they'll keep you up till all hours with the racket they make while they're clomping around on their huge ungainly metal feet. You'll never get a decent night's sleep again. No, the only thing to do with robots is to lie low and pretend you don't hear them.

It's not like any of them has a sense of humor anyway. Fucking robots.

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"Why are you investing in this company?" he asks me. "I've never heard of them, they seem to be based in the Cayman Islands, and I'm not sure that they actually produce anything. As your broker I cannot recommend this."

"Hot tip from a robot." I tell him. "Robots can't lie to humans. I'm pretty sure it's one of Asimov's Laws or something."

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   I must confess to having a soft spot for Tom Petty. The first record I remember buying with my own money was a Tom Petty record (yes, record.) Tom Petty is not particularly radical or groundbreaking -- quite the opposite. Even when he broke in the late seventies his music was considered kind of a throwback to bands from the previous decade, most notably the Byrds -- but he understands how to write a simple, straightforward pop song and I appreciate that. He's also not the first person you'd think of when you think of radical politics. Hell, it doesn't get much more mainstream than classic-rock stalwart Petty.

   But every once in a while a guy like this will surprise you by hitting the nail right on the head. There was a song he released back in 2002 called "the Last DJ" that got a little bit of radio airplay and then faded away never to be heard again. What's kind of amazing is that a song that is so critical of radio and media ownership in general would ever get played in the first place.* There's one stanza that gets stuck in my head because it sums up how I feel about so much of what's going on in today's business, political and media landscape. Plus, it rhymes:

As we celebrate mediocrity
All the boys upstairs want to see
How much you'll pay for
What you used to get for free

   That pretty much sums it up. I've been thinking about it today as I watch with great interest the debate unfolding in Congress over whether to actually have an open discussion about completely dismantling the principle of Network Neutrality, or whether to just hand the big telecoms what they want by slipping the rewrite of existing laws into a rider on the "Government Puppies for Sad Orphans Appropriations Bill" in the middle of the night after all the reporters have gone home for the day. (Don't worry, the Senate version of the bill will eliminate funding for the puppies, so your tax dollars are safe.)

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   You know who won't suffer if some kind of tiered-access, pay-to-play standard for internet access is established? Robots, that's who. Robots have deep, deep pockets. Deeper than yours. There's a lot of money to be had in swindling retirees out of their pension checks and selling sugar pills to insecure men. Well, more money than there is in telling people about your band's next gig anyway. Yep, the robots will pay to play, and they'll keep calling and they'll keep writing, so you'll never have to feel lonely, because the robots are never going away!

The machines have your number, and they're here to stay.

Posted by flamingbanjo at April 21, 2006 08:00 PM