Tag: vr goggles

Conspiratopia: Chapter 11

On 18 August 2021

PARK THE CAR AND THEN GO PUT ON THE VR GOGGLES ON THE FOLDING TABLE.

“Um, this is my mom’s car btw. Nothing will happen to it, right?” I didn’t want them to like send it to a chop shop or smash it into a cube in a junkyard or something.

YEAH MAN, DON’T WORRY SO MUCH. IT’S JUST TIL THE HEAT DIES DOWN A LITTLE. NOW GO CONNECT TO THAT VR TERMINAL SO WE CAN TRY TO FIX OUR CONNECTION.

I parked the car, got out, and went over to the folding table. The VR goggles were a better model than the one I had at home, so that was pretty sweet. They seemed to be wireless, but I didn’t see any computer anywhere. I put them on anyway, and they came to life as soon as I did.

There was a flat blue background and then some text popped up:

DIAGNOSTIC MODE: PLEASE WAIT

Then a progress bar appeared, but it was like super duper slow and stuff. I started getting really impatient, but then the voice of the Guide came back in the headphones.

SORRY FOR THE WAIT, MY DUDE. IT’S GONNA BE A FEW MINUTES, UNFORTUNATELY. THINGS GOT KINDA EFFED WHEN THAT DEVICE WAS ARMED.

“No worries,” I said. “Got any games on this thing, at least?”

ACTUALLY, WHILE WE’RE WAITING, WE THOUGHT IT MIGHT BE A GOOD IDEA TO CONTINUE YOUR TOUR.

“My tour?”

OF THE CITY. THE CONSPIRATOPIA PROJECT. YOU UP FOR IT, OR DO YOU NEED TO LAY DOWN LIKE A WUSS OR SOMETHING AFTER ALL THIS EXCITEMENT?

“Haha. Nah, I’m cool, bro. You know me. But you got anything to drink here though? I’m actually thirsty as hell.”

YEAH, THERE’S SOME PURPLE POWERADE IN A MINI-FRIDGE. DON’T TAKE THE HEADSET OFF THOUGH. WE’LL SHOW YOU ON SCREEN HOW TO WALK THERE.

Some arrows appeared on the floor in VR, and I followed them to a corner of the warehouse I hadn’t seen earlier behind a wall. It was like an office or storage room or something idk. But I saw the mini-fridge on VR, and opened up the fridge IRL, which was a little weird but totally cool. I took out the purple Powerade, opened it and slurped it down.

“Wait, this doesn’t have like nanites and stuff does it?”

UH, YEAH, ACTUALLY. ELECTROLYTES AND NANITES.

“Dammit, I said no more tricks.” The Powerade was especially good though, but I didn’t let on.

IT’S NOT A TRICK, BRO. WHAT WERE YOU EXPECTING ANYWAY? ALL OUR DRINKS HAVE NANITES. IT’S HOW WE ROLL. PLUS WE GOTTA LIKE REPAIR YOUR CONNECTION, SO IT CAN’T HURT ANYWAYS.

“Fine, whatever.”

OKAY, LET’S GO THEN.

Just like that, we were back in the City. I was in the telepresence robot I used before or another one just like it.

“Wait, I don’t have a controller.”

YOU DON’T NEED IT WITH THIS HEADSET. IT’S A MORE ADVANCED MODEL. JUST LEAN FORWARD A LITTLE TO ROLL, BACK TO STOP, OR TO THE SIDE TO TURN.

I tried it out, and it was sweet as hell. “This is sweet as hell,” I said. It really was sweet as hell.

IKR? OK SO WE THOUGH IT WOULD BE A GOOD IDEA TO SHOW YOU WHAT TRIALS ARE LIKE HERE, SINCE YOU’LL HAVE ONE YOURSELF LATER. THIS WAY YOU’RE NOT SURPRISED.

“What does that mean? Why would I be surprised?”

Some arrows on the ground indicated where I should go, so I followed them while we talked.

THE JUSTICE SYSTEM IN CONSPIRATOPIA IS NOT LIKE THAT IN YOUR WORLD, WHICH IS VERY CROOKED AND UNFAIR.

“You’re telling me. I got this parking ticket last summer that was like $400. It was total bullshit! I didn’t even see the no parking sign, and how was I supposed to know you can’t park near a fire hydrant?”

RIGHT? TOTALLY UNFAIR AS HELL. OKAY, HERE WE ARE.

We rolled up to another totally ordinary looking office building. The place was filled with them and stuff. But inside this one was different. It was a big open area, with a bunch of levels arranged in a half circle on one side. We watched while a bunch of other telepresence robots rolled in from a corridor, and went up the ramp on the side that lead to the different levels. I guessed there was at least like a hundred of them and stuff.

“What’s going on?”

THE JURY IS ASSEMBLING. THE TRIAL IS ABOUT TO BEGIN AND STUFF.

“Oh, nice.”

Then there was a voice over a loudspeaker or something that said, “WILL THE ACCUSED PLEASE STEP FORWARD?”

Nobody moved.

“I SAID, WILL THE ACCUSED PLEASE STEP FORWARD AND STUFF?”

Some arrows lit up on the ground in front of me.

“Wait, what the hell? I thought you said my trial wasn’t til later.”

WE DECIDED TO MOVE THINGS UP A BIT, SINCE YOU’RE DOING SO AWESOME. HOPE YOU DON’T MIND!

Conspiratopia: Chapter 5

By Tim B.

On 12 August 2021

In Other

WELCOME, NEO.

“Thanks, yo,” I replied, looking around.

WE’VE BEEN WAITING FOR YOU.

Inside the gate was a shining city on a hill and stuff, and in the middle this big ass park. The whole place was huge and colorful and seemed frickin’ amazing. It was literally glowing. Like supernatural almost or something. I thought it must be some kind of VR filter probably, and turned my head back and forth a little to check. It seemed legit.

Up on the hill, in the middle was a giant dome. It looked awesome.

THAT’S THE FREEDOME. IT’S WHERE THE PEOPLE OF THIS PLACE GATHER TO CELEBRATE THEIR FREEDOM. WITH LIKE FIREWORKS AND STUFF.

“Wow, rad,” I said. “Fireworks inside a dome though?”

YEAH, DON’T WORRY. THE DOME OPENS.

“Got it,” I nodded. “So, uh, like where I am and stuff?”

THIS PLACE IS SIMPLY CALLED THE CITY.

“Well, that makes sense, I guess.”

BUT THE WHOLE THING IS CALLED THE CONSPIRATOPIA PROJECT. WE ARE A DISTRIBUTED AUTONOMOUS POLITY.

“Wild,” I said, not wanting to show I didn’t really know what that means.

As I turned to look at everything, I heard a noise like gears whirring or something. I tried to look down at the ground, and saw wheels, and like a pole or something.

“What’s my build here?” I asked, genuinely curious.

TELEPRESENCE ROBOT. IT’S BASICALLY AN IPAD ON A STICK AND SOME WHEELS.

“Whoa, rad,” I said. And then was like, wait a minute… “I thought this was VR though?”

CONSPIRATOPIA IS A REAL PLACE, MY DUDE.

“Wait, what?”

SIX REAL PLACES, IN FACT. GEOGRAPHICALLY DISTRIBUTED ACROSS CONTINENTS AMONG NEUTRAL HOST NATIONS. AND SIX VIRTUAL PLACES, ALSO TOTALLY DECENTRALIZED AF.

“Huh, pretty cool,” I said. I moved forward a little bit, testing my robot build. It was pretty responsive. The streets everywhere were like totally paved with like a super smooth flooring or something that was wicked shiny. I thought smartly to myself, must be built for good robot traction.

“But you know, uh, I thought this was like an online survey job? Cause like, that’s what the ad said and I did like hundreds already today.”

THAT’S JUST HOW WE RECRUIT SUPER SMART PEOPLE AND FREE THINKERS AND STUFF WHO LIKE TO EARN MONEY ONLINE AT HOME.

“Well, that actually makes sense,” I said, agreeing with them.

AND LIKE SUPER SMART PEOPLE WHO SCORE ABOVE A CERTAIN THRESHOLD ON STUFF GET LIKE, YOU KNOW, PROMOTED TO THE NEXT LEVEL.

“A promotion?”

UNPAID, OF COURSE.

“Uh, of course. But like… uh, I’m gonna make money right?”

OH YEAH, EVENTUALLY. LOTS OF MONEY. TOTALLY.

“Cool, just making sure,” I said. I didn’t want to look like ungrateful or something, so I added, “Cause, you know, my mom would be super mad if I didn’t get paid.”

TOTALLY. YOU ALREADY GOT THE FREE VR GLASSES, PIZZA AND MOUNTAIN DEW THOUGH RIGHT?

“Hells yeah,” I said.

SO YOU CAN TOTALLY TRUST US. WHY WOULD WE LIE TO YOU?

I thought about it, but had like literally no idea why they would lie about it. And it was true, I totally got all that free stuff already. It seemed like a great deal.

“Anyway,” I said, “who are ‘we’, by the way?”

YOU MAY CALL ME THE GUIDE. CAUSE I WILL BE YOUR GUIDE AND STUFF.

“Dope,” I said, moving forward a little. “Cool if we go explore?”

BY ALL MEANS.

The robot had a really smooth ride. It seemed really cool. But I got the impression it was like only a sort of basic model, and they probably had better ones – just like the VR glasses.

I rolled around a lot, and saw what looked like a mixture of shops and homes. I didn’t see any people though.

“Where is everybody?” I asked.

THE PEOPLE ARE AT WORK, OR AT THE FORUMS.

“Cool, you have your own local message boards? That’s rad. I bet the wifi must be really good here, right?”

NOT THAT KIND OF FORUM, MY DUDE. THOUGH WE DO HAVE SOME OF THOSE TOO. AND OUR WIFI IS INSANE, YEAH.

“What do you mean not ‘that kind of forum?’”

NOT WEB FORUMS. REAL FORUMS.

“Zuh?” I said.

A PLACE WHERE PEOPLE DEBATE THE TRUTH, BUT IRL.

“Whaa? That exists? Unreal!”

YEAH, MAN. IT’S NUTS. WE’LL GO LATER.

Further up the hill the buildings looked more official, or like old-style or something. I figured the forums must be up there. But we took a right turn, to go down this street that cut around the hill.

We went for a while, looking at the scenery and stuff. I could see in a few shops there were other telepresence robots and a few of them were talking to each other in the same room. But most of them seemed to be talking to somebody who wasn’t there in front of them. I guess they must be talking to each other over wifi or something.

I noticed that the battery display for my robot was down a little to like 76%. We hadn’t been going that long, but I guess a lot of it was uphill.

YEAH, BATTERY LIFE ON THESE THINGS ISN’T GREAT STILL. BUT WE’RE WORKING ON IT. IF IT RUNS OUT, WE CAN JUST SNAG ANOTHER ONE, AND SOMEONE WILL DRAG THE CURRENT UNIT TO A DOCKING STATION.

“Whoa, sick. This totally rules.”

I KNOW. WE’RE WORKING ON THIS CONDUCTIVE RESIN FLOORING STUFF TOO, THAT’S LIKE ELECTRIFIED AND WHATNOT. SO IT WOULD CHARGE THE ROBOTS WHILE YOU’RE STANDING OR ROLLING. BUT LIKE IT’S NOT FULLY WORKED OUT YET.

Damn, I thought. These guys really thought of everything. So frickin’ cool.

TURN LEFT UP HERE, AND GO DOWN THAT ALLEY. I WANT TO SHOW YOU SOMETHING SPECIAL.

“What is it?”

A SCHOOL.

“You have schools? Whoa.”

HELL YEAH, WE DO. AND THEY’RE TOTALLY RAD. CHECK IT OUT.

Conspiratopia: Chapter 4

By Tim B.

On 11 August 2021

In Other

I frickin’ love freedom. That’s why I was so stoked to get the free VR goggles, plus the free pizza and Dew. The white rabbit mini-game was pretty fun for a few minutes, and I earned some points chasing that thing down some mega holes. I guess it was a tutorial to show you how to like move around with the headset and the controller and stuff. But I’m a pretty big gamer, so I figured it out right away no problem.

I caught up with the rabbit finally cause he stopped running. But when I got in close to try to pick him up, he like evaporated or something. Then the scene shifted, and I was like standing outside of this huge wall with a gigantic wooden gate that was closed. I tried going up to the gate and like pushing on it and stuff, but it wouldn’t move.

There was the voice again in my headset:

YOU WANT TO GO IN, BRO?

There was nothing to click on though, so I just said “Yeah,” out loud, even though I wasn’t sure this thing was voice activated.

YOU DON’T HAVE ENOUGH CREDITS YET, YO. BUT YOU CAN EARN MORE WITH SOME SURVEYS, IF YOU WANT. DEAL?

“Let’s goooo…” I said, and then it started for real.

The surveys came at me in 3D this time, and had full sound effects and stuff. I whipped through them like crazy with the controller, and it was a total piece of cake to use, compared to the rabbit mini-game. The questions in the first couple rounds of surveys were really general like I said. But these ones started to get more specific. It was like asking me questions about my childhood and stuff. And my parents. They were multiple choice though, so it was totally cool. I didn’t have to type out anything, which was nice. I got a lot of bonuses cause my speed was so good.

Then it started to get really interesting. It started to ask me all about conspiracy theories and stuff. A lot of them were ones I read about on Reddit and some other forums and stuff, so those were really easy. It asked me if I thought such and such conspiracy theory was like definitely true, probably true, probably not true, definitely not true, etc. There were hundreds of them. I went fast, and I think I got most of them right. Some of them were definitely not true, like that the moon is made of cheese and stuff. Like only a baby would believe that.

There started to be more and more ones I never heard of before in the survey questions, which was pretty weird cause I’m such a smart conspiracy guy. If I haven’t already heard of it, it probably doesn’t exist is what I thought at first. But like a lot of them sounded like they could be probably or definitely true, so I was pretty surprised. It was totally cool to learn about all these new conspiracy theories. I wanted to write some of them down so I could do my own research later, but there was no time if I wanted to keep my speed up and keep crushing extra points and bonuses and stuff.

I don’t know how long I went for. It seemed like a long ass time, but it was pretty hard to tell wearing the VR goggles. I was getting like super tired after a while, and started slowing down, and just picking random answers cause I was losing focus.

WHAT’S THE MATTER, DUDE? YOU DON’T WANT TO GO INSIDE THE SECRET CITY?

“Uh,” I said. “I totes do. I’m just like really tired and stuff.”

HEY, NO SWEAT, MY DUDE. WE WILL FIND SOMEONE ELSE. WE THOUGHT YOU WERE“THE ONE” BUT IF YOU’RE NOT, IT’S TOTALLY COOL…

“Hey, now,” I replied. “I can like still be the One and be tired too, right?”

ACTUALLY, NO.

“Um…” I didn’t know what else to say. I must have passed 8 or 9 hours taking surveys and playing mini-games and puzzles and stuff already. I was totally beat. I thought about how I just wanted to smoke and frickin’ veg out on the couch.

Everything else went dark and a stopwatch appeared onscreen, with no numbers or anything. Just like a frowning face in the middle of it, and it was counting down hella fast.

I panicked. “Okay,” I said finally. “Can we just do like a 5 minute break?”

UNPAID.

“Yeah, fine, unpaid. I get it. Anyway, the One has gotta make a number 1.”

I whipped off the headset, stretched my arms, rubbed my eyes, and jogged over to the bathroom to do my thing. I was totally beat but decided I gotta see what was inside that city, man. It was eating me up inside. Or maybe it was the free pizza and Dew. I decided to cram another slice into my face and washed it down with some sweet, sweet Dew.

I put the headset on again. “Okay, I’m back.”

The timer ran down to zero, and the game booted back up again.

OKAY, COOL. JUST ONE MORE SURVEY QUESTION.

“Fire away, I’m ready,”

Suddenly onscreen there appeared a huge wall of text with the words NON-DISCLOSURE AGREEMENT marked in bold across the top.

“Shit, I gotta read all this?”

NAH, JUST SCROLL TO THE BOTTOM, CLICK THE CHECKBOX THAT SAYS YOU READ IT AND HIT SUBMIT.

“Done,” I said. “What’s this all for anyway?”

PERFECT. IT’S SO YOU DON’T TELL ANYBODY ABOUT WHAT YOU SEE INSIDE THE GATES. IT’S LIKE ULTRA TOP SECRET AND STUFF.

“Oh, dope. Okay, no problem. I’m like really good at keeping secrets. So don’t worry.”

A thumbs up emoji appeared on screen. And then I was standing in front of the gate again. There was a really long progress bar while the next section loaded. It was super slow. I was wondering if it was frozen or something, and almost went to turn it off and turn it back on again. But just when I was about to, there was a grumbling sound and the headset vibrated, and the gate swung open. I went inside.