“I believe the answer is simple….. Let’s ask them to play a game…”

James continued, “Earth has been going through a phase of rapid technical advancement. They are already working hard to develop elementary Artificial Intelligence (A.I.’s) and nanotechnology, sure they’re many years from anything worthwhile, but they believe they’re close to making this leap. Some of them believe that if they can develop a working A.I. it will help them develop a cascade of new technology, introducing a period of rapid technological advancement. As we know from history, such events can happen, but of course, a poorly programmed A.I. can be equally devastating, this is why we have laws and controls governing A.I.’s.”

“Recent advances in computing have led many young people to spend a lot of time playing games on their data-net. Many of these games are based on roleplaying, like a crude version of the virtual world’s games our people play.”

“My proposal would take advantage of two things, one the belief that their world is on the cusp of even greater technological advancement then they’re currently experiencing, the second is this trend of young people playing online games.”

***

Kevin was sorting through the last week's auto-discarded e-mail when he found the message. He set strict rules for his e-mail program, automatically discarding over 90% of the messages. So once a week he scanned the discarded messages, for items he might have missed.

What caught Kevin’s eye was the message address. The message was from Intelecom, a company in the news recently. The company claimed that they were six months from releasing a Fully Immersive Virtual Reality Massive Multi-Player Online Roleplaying Game (FIVR-MMORPG) game. Kevin was excited at first on hearing the news, until it was revealed that the first game pods to be release would cost as much as a small car, not including the monthly subscription.

Kevin just didn’t have that kind of money. He was nearing a year out of college, after spending 5 years to get his engineering degree. After Dozens of interviews, he was still working a job asking customers “do you want fries with that?” So again, the rich get and the rest of us serve milkshakes…

With the recent news, this e-mail caught his attention, so let see… “Mr. Asharic we would like to invite you to alpha test our new game, Omnia Online. We’re extending this to you as a top player on Arcania Online. In return for your help with testing our new system, you will receive a free Immersion Pod and a year’s Gold Subscription when the game goes public. Of course, as an alpha tester, you would also be included in the beta test group, if you wish.”

“Hell yeah…!” shouted Kevin.

The e-mail ended with a please reply by date of the twelfth.

“Shit… what’s the date…” said Kevin… he sighed. It’s still the twelfth. He sent off his acceptance.

Then he started to think, ‘why didn’t I hear from Gordon?’ Gordon was another of the top ten players on Arcania, and a close friend who he often teamed up with. In fact, they were in the same guild.

He called his friend Gordon to find out why no one called him… then he remembered… his prepaid phone service had been out for 3 days, and only reactivated when he was paid yesterday. Grr, he hated always being short on money. Many of his friends were having the same problem; Out of school and no real jobs. Can’t call flipping burgers a real job, it just doesn’t pay the bills.

Gordon answered the phone, “Hello?”

“Hey Gordo,” said Kevin, Gordon hated being called that. But Kevin was both excited and irritated so, he thought ‘the hell with it’.

“Dude, you know I hate that name, why are you calling… oh, by the way, did you get an e-mail from Intelecom? Isn’t that the shit?”

“Yeah, that’s why I’m calling. Just spotted the message and sent in my reply. What have you heard about the new game?”

Gordon replied, “Wow, you almost missed the deadline. I tried calling you days ago and couldn’t get through.”

Kevin sighed, “OK, phone problems but, it’s good to hear you’re in on this.”

“If you just sent in your reply, you probably haven’t got the confirmation letter yet. According to that, the Alpha Testing is supposed to start in 9 days, I’m keeping a countdown, can’t wait dude! They also e-mailed me a manual to read up on the pod. The pod itself is amazing… did you know, it’s designed so that someone can stay immersed in the pod for days on end, it can feed you, handle waste and keep your body in shape. Can you believe that???”

“How does that work?” asked Kevin, “Where does the food come from, and the waste go?”

“I’ll send you a copy of the manual.” said Gordon “According to it, there are containers hooked up in the base of the pod, one contains a food slurry mix, another for water and a third for waste removal. And the gold subscription level includes replacing those containers once a week.”

“How does that even work?” asked Kevin. “Does the pod shove a tube up your ass? You might actually enjoy that, but I would give it a pass.” ‘Hmm’, thought Kevin ‘tubes going in and out of my body? That would suck, how fun could a game be if the first step to playing it is to shove a tube up your ass.’

“Ha, no way dude, that would suck,” said Gordon. “No, according to the manual, there is a body wash system built in. It removes the, uh, waste and keeps your body clean at the same time. The only connection is a mask that fits over your face, to supply air and food. When you eat in the game, it feeds you. Cool Huh?”

“Wow, that’s pretty high tech.” While Kevin hadn’t worked as an engineer yet, he could still appreciate how complex a system it would take to do everything Gordon was talking about. “That level of complexity helps explain the price they’re asking for the pods. Yeah, go ahead and send me the manual. It feels kind of funny, having to study up on how the game works. I thought I was done with school… hahaha.”

***

It turned out that reading the manual was not really like going to school again. It was only about thirty pages and just focused on basic use and maintenance. Anything beyond required a service call. It’s good the pod came with a five-year warranty. Not only did it cost as much as a car, it had a warranty to match.

Kevin arranged for the pod installers to come next Monday. He had to spend a few days clearing enough space in his studio apartment to fit the pod in. The game pod needed at least eight by four feet of space with one long side accessible for climbing into, kind of like a tanning bed. So Kevin pushed his couch forward, and got rid of the coffee table, it made the sitting area of his apartment much smaller, but Kevin rarely entertained guests. The space behind the couch would be just about right now for the new game immersion pod.