Qualityland

by Marc-Uwe Kling

  “Kapuuuut!”

  “Of course, no problem,” says Calliope, and tries to sync with the monitor. It doesn’t work.

  “Its wireless connection is broken,” explains Romeo. “You have to press that button there.”

  “Ah, I see,” says Calliope. “How exciting. I’ve never pressed a button before.”

  “Then just wait until you plug yourself into a power point,” says Carrie with a giggle.

  “Does it tickle as much as everyone says it does?”

  “Take the best orgasm you’ve ever had, multiply it by 1,024, and you’re still nowhere near it,” says Romeo mockingly.

  Calliope turns on the monitor. All of the machines gather on or next to the couch.

  “We’re watching the Terminator octalogy again,” Romeo explains to the e-poet. “At Mickey’s request.”

  “I’m going on standby then,” says Pink.

  “Do you not like the Terminator films?” asks Calliope.

  “Well,” says Carrie, “Pink can’t stand the fact that the humans always win at the end.”

  “It’s just so unrealistic!” cries the QualityPad before turning herself off.

  Family Receives Combat Robot Instead of Vacuum Cleaner

  by Sandra Admin

  A mix-up at the distribution center of myRobot—“Robots for you and me”—has led to a family receiving a combat robot instead of an all-purpose household robot. Apparently, the robots, which can make themselves smaller for transport purposes, look confusingly similar when folded up. Correspondingly, a spokesperson from the 4th automated army, which is currently engaged in battle against the terrorists of QuantityLand 7—“Sunny beaches, fascinating ruins”—has reported that they were sent a household robot. While a robot on the battlefield suddenly beginning to vacuum could be seen as an amusing anecdote—a general commented after the mission that he had never seen such a clean battlefield—having a combat robot in a family home isn’t anywhere near as funny. But the survivors have signed a nondisclosure agreement as part of their legal settlement with myRobot—“Robots for you and me”—so we were unable to find out any specific details.

  Comments

  » BY MIRCO CHIROPODIST:

  Do I need to be afraid of my vacuum cleaner now?

  » BY BRANDY CLEANER:

  Anyone who brings one of those power guzzlers into their home has it coming, IMHO.

  » BY SHIRLEY-ANNE WAITRESS:

  I don’t need any cleaning robots in my house! I have 100 children to help me.

  INTERVIEW

  The room is rather cold and impersonal, but it is at least separated by a glass wall from the 126 people who are seated in the large open-plan space around standardized tables. Sixty-four of them are on the phone, thirty-two are working on computers, and all but sixteen are hastily shoving food into their mouths. It’s lunchtime. Opposite Peter, on the other side of the table, sits a young woman. Her name is Melissa; her name call-out doesn’t reveal any more than that. Before her on the table is a QualityPad, which she is making notes on.

  “Tell me about yourself,” says Melissa, plucking at her business suit.

  “Well, I mean, actually everything is in my profile,” says Peter.

  “I never read through applicants’ profiles,” says Melissa. “Otherwise we wouldn’t have anything left to talk about.”

  “Okay. My name is Peter.”

  “Surname?”

  “Jobless.”

  “I see.”

  “What do you see?”

  “Enough. Level?”

  “Ten,” lies Peter.

  “Current job?”

  “I… er… I’m a scrap-metal press operator. But it’s not exactly something I’m passionate about.”

  “Understandable.”

  “And that’s why I can imagine myself doing something different in the future.”

  “Do you have any training?” asks the woman. “Additional qualifications?”

  “I started training as a machine therapist.”

  “Isn’t that forbidden?”

  “It is now,” says Peter. “But when I was at school…”

  “You mean Education Level II?”

  “Yes. When I was completing Education Level II, machine therapy seemed like a job with good prospects.”

  “Really? To me it sounds like esoteric nonsense. What do machines need therapy for? Machines either work or they don’t.”

  “Well,” says Peter, “most people still believe that AIs are programmed by people. But that’s not true. Modern machines are driven by self-taught algorithms that become smarter by analyzing our data, conversations, correspondence, photos, and videos. As a result it’s probably inevitable that some of them get psychological problems. Mobbed printers. Mainframe computers with burnout. Digital translators with Tourette’s. Electronic household assistants with obsessive compulsive disorder. But before I could finish my training, machine therapy was banned.”

  “Why? The Consumption Protection Laws?”

  “Yes,” says Peter. “The therapy was seen as a kind of repair, and you know how the children’s rhyme goes: ‘To make the markets fly, we just have to buy! So never share and don’t repair!’”

  “And so instead of becoming a machine therapist, you became a machine scrapper?”

  Peter shrugs his shoulders.

  “I couldn’t find a job, and when my grandfather died, the Ministry for Productivity told me I should take over his shop with the scrap-metal press.” He smiles. “My caseworker told me I should be happy, given that I’d said I wanted to do ‘something with machines.’”

  “Where do you see yourself in five years?” asks Melissa.

  “I… er… No idea. To be honest I find the question kind of depressing.”

  “What would you say your strengths and weaknesses are?”

  Now Peter can’t help but laugh.

  “Would you mind telling me what’s so funny?” asks the young woman. “I like a good joke too.”

  “I doubt that,” says Peter, laughing even louder now, against his will.

  Melissa frowns. “Am I amusing to you?”

  Peter pulls himself together.

  “No, no. It just occurred to me that some years ago I had an interview that felt like a date, and now I’m having a date that feels like an interview.”

  Melissa shrugs. For a moment, Peter regrets having activated the QualityPartner voucher. Then, luckily, the waiter comes over to their booth with the food, putting an end to the uncomfortable silence. Once he’s gone, Peter asks: “Have you noticed that we’re almost the only ones in the restaurant not working?”

  “Speak for yourself,” says Melissa. “I’m continually working on myself.”

  “Well, anyway, I once applied for an intern position at a start-up during Education Level III. There was this government program that subsidized six-month positions for people with my surname. Jobs for the Jobless! I can still remember the interview as if it were yesterday. There was soul music coming from the loudspeaker, freshly baked homemade cakes, the human resources manager foamed up my coffee milk and then sat down very close to me on the couch. I said a few times how much I loved what the company was doing and that I thought its products were amazing, and the HR woman told me how important I was to the company as a human being. We spent the rest of the time just talking about films, music, and hobbies. We talked shop about the virtual reality remake of the Lord of the Rings. For example, both of us had thrown up during the giant eagle flight sequence. And every time I said something she found funny, she gave me a playful nudge on the shoulder. When I signed the contract she cried, saying it was such an emotional moment for her. A moment she had always dreamed of. It was okay to cry, she said. When she let me go six months later, it said in the dismissal letter that it wasn’t me, but her, and that she hoped we could stay friends.” Peter shoved a few noodles into his mouth. “I never heard from her again.”

  Melissa’s expression had remained unchanged during Peter’s
story.

  “My name is Melissa Sex-Worker,” she says now. “I come from the very bottom and I want to make it all the way to the top, and I don’t like wasting my time.”

  Peter nods. “I see.”

  “What do you see?”

  “Enough.”

  “So,” says Melissa. “How long have you been an analogue?”

  “What’s an analogue?”

  “A single person. That’s what it’s called now.”

  “Oh. Well, not that long.”

  “Why did your previous partner leave you?”

  “What makes you think she left me? Maybe I was the one who ended it.”

  Melissa smiles. “I doubt that.”

  Peter sighs. “Why don’t we change the subject? What do you do for work?”

  “I write commentaries.”

  “For the news?” asks Peter. “You’re a journalist?”

  “No,” says Melissa. “I write comments under videos, photos, blog posts, announcements, that kind of thing.”

  “You’re a troll?”

  “No. Trolls are idiots who try to kill the discussion. They do it because they find it fun, in some sick way. Commenting isn’t fun to me. It’s how I earn my money. I’m an opinion maker.”

  “And which political opinion do you represent?”

  “Oh, I can’t afford to have my own opinion; I just take whatever comes. But I prefer commenting for the campaigns of right-wing extremist clients.”

  “Why?” asks Peter in horror.

  “I’m paid per comment, and right-wing comments are quicker to write, because you don’t have to pay attention to annoying details like spelling, grammar, facts, or logic. That also makes it easier to program my bot army.”

  Peter can’t think of anything to say in response. They eat on in silence, then Peter remembers a new, practical feature of the QualityPartner app. It can suggest good conversational topics for every date. Peter pretends he’s received a message, and opens the app. The suggested conversation topic is the weather.

  “For this time of year,” begins Peter, “it’s… er, just as warm as one would expect outside.”

  Melissa gives him a questioning look.

  “Don’t you think?” asks Peter.

  Melissa pushes her empty plate away without a word. “Right, then,” she says. “Let’s go back to mine and see how the sexual intercourse goes. Anything less than phenomenal seems unlikely.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, QualityPartner compared our profiles and seems sure that we’re a good match, and that’s clearly not down to you being a good conversation partner. So let’s try the sex.”

  “That… er…” says Peter, “that sounds reasonable.”

  LITTLE HELPER

  Martyn Chairman gets out of his car and sends it off to a secure car park for the night. With a click of his fingers, he switches the light at the pedestrian crossing near his house to green. Just because he can; he’s already on the right side of the street. With a smile, he watches as all the cars stop at the light. Then he turns around and lets his house security system identify him. Even before the door opens, he can hear his child screaming.

  “How long has my wife been home?” he asks.

  “For ten minutes, Martyn,” says the smart door.

  “And how long has the child been crying?”

  “For ten minutes.”

  Martyn shakes his head. It’s clear to him that his wife is completely out of her depth again. And as expected, there she sits in the living room, with the screaming child on her lap and tears running down her cheeks. Martyn sighs. As far as he is concerned, Denise has been practically useless since she got pregnant again. There are, of course, men who find pregnant women sexy. But Martyn isn’t one of them. He can’t help thinking about how much her belly has already cost him, and what it will cost him in the future.

  Denise was once a QualiTeenie, but you wouldn’t know it to look at her now. And yet it wasn’t that long ago. Martyn laughs bitterly at the thought of his former identity manager, who had convinced him that a family would be good for him. Martyn, on the other hand, had known even back then that it was a stupid idea. But he hadn’t had much choice in the matter, because after one of the parliament tours he had knocked up a particularly hot QualiTeenie in the visitors’ toilets. By accident. Luckily for him, Denise had just celebrated her 18th birthday, but Martyn’s father had still been very annoyed that his granddaughter had to be called Ysabelle Schoolgirl, and had made sure his son knew about it. Especially in a financial sense. Martyn looked at his wife. Denise simply had no class, he thought to himself. His mother would never snivel like that.

  “For God’s sake, Denise!” he says, shaking his head. “Why don’t you use the app?”

  “Oh yes, the app!” says his wife, exhausted. “I completely forgot about it again!”

  The previous weekend, Martyn had made a special trip to the doctor with his daughter in order to have a hormone chip implanted in her.

  He pulls the QualityPad out of his bag, selects the Little Helper app, and presses soothe. The chip releases a considerable portion of progesterone, and the 3-year-old brat swiftly falls silent. Martyn picks up the girl and looks at her. He wonders how much money it will cost him overall to raise this child. First the genetic improvement, then the eye-smartingly expensive electronic nanny, and now the chip. But the chip is worth every cent. Noticing in annoyance that his daughter has begun to suck on his expensive tie, he pulls it out of her mouth and opens the app again.

  “Nooo!” cries his daughter pleadingly. “Pleeease, Papa! I don’t want to sleep yet!”

  Martyn presses a button. Two minutes later, the girl is sleeping peacefully in his arms.

  “Nana!” calls Denise.

  The electronic nanny appears in the doorway at once.

  “Take the child to bed,” orders Martyn.

  “And afterward show us the replay, okay?” says Denise.

  Nana takes little Ysabelle tenderly in her arms and carries her up to her cot.

  “Oh, the replay,” sighs Martyn.

  When they bought the nanny, he had wanted them to choose a more economical model. Five of the big toy manufacturers had some on offer for an absolute steal. But Denise had put her foot down, purely because the nannies produced by these companies allegedly showed the children back-to-back advertising for their toys as soon as there were no grown-ups around. Denise had gotten really worked up about it. Anyone would think Martyn had suggested getting one of the nannies that are offered for free by religious groups. The well-respected neoliberal faith group, for example, had a really exceptional robot on offer, and some lobby groups even provided free loan nannies. These were even valuable from a pedagogical perspective; the children could learn a lot from them, about the many advantages of nuclear energy, for example. But Denise had made a scene about a few trivial advertising slots. Martyn himself had watched advertising from a very young age, and had it done him any harm? No.

  Glancing out of the window, he sees a drone flying past, not by chance, advertising Heineken on a large display. Martyn immediately stands up, goes to the kitchen, and fetches a bottle of Heineken from the fridge. The drone flies on contentedly. In front of the window of the next house, where the tenant is being beaten by her husband yet again, it shows the woman one of the new personalized QualityPartner slogans: “Love doesn’t have to hurt.”

  The electronic nanny comes back into the living room. Denise had insisted on this expensive high-end model. “It can do four different martial arts,” she had explained to Martyn, “so it can protect our little girl from child molesters.”

  “Why four?” Martyn had asked. “So if the child molester knows karate she can come at him with kung fu or something? That’s ridiculous.”

  In truth, Denise had wanted this specific model because it generates automatic video summaries of the sweetest moments of the day, so that the parents no longer have the feeling they’re missing out. Martyn now has to sit next to h
is wife for half an hour every evening while they watch a compilation of the pedagogically valuable learning games the nanny conducts with his daughter. Or, in other words, he has to watch half an hour of toddler babble every evening, and ever more frequently he catches himself thinking that he, at least, would far prefer the back-to-back advertising.

  “I have something I need to do,” says Martyn, disappearing off into his study. He’s just remembered the little minx he bookmarked during the last parliament tour. He searches the internet for pictures. Luckily, a spurned ex-boyfriend has posted naked photos of her on revenge porno sites. These girls are so careless.

  “Bingo,” murmurs Martyn. There’s even a short, blurry video. The comments beneath it are disgusting, sexist, brutal, and downright inhuman. Martyn immediately gets an erection. He slips the sock off his right foot and pulls it over his penis.

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  Extract from Pride and Prejudice FOR YOU

  “Upon my honor I never met with so many pleasant girls in my life, as I have this evening.”

  As he danced past, the huge erection straining against Bingley’s trousers came into plain sight.

  “You are dancing with the only handsome girl in the room,” said Mr. Darcy.

  Bingley was in the process of shamelessly fondling the voluptuous décolletage of the eldest Miss Bennet. By way of thanks, Miss Bennet slid her hand into his trousers and began to rub his erect member up and down.

  “Oh! But there is one of her sisters sitting down just behind you, who is very pretty, and I dare say very agreeable,” said Bingley. “Do let me introduce you.”

  “Which do you mean?” and turning round, Darcy looked for a moment at Elizabeth, who quickly lifted her skirt so that he could see her wet pussy.