Scaling Issues - 17/Jul/2012
It was getting a bit much. Arthur and Janet were effectively the manufacturing arm of a multi-million dollar industry. Plus two human secretaries. Kevin Wright and, he guessed, Nurse Blake. Five people who did packing and shipping. Eleven people.
He'd modified the original Body Builder so it could be directly controlled by Janet's AI core, then built two duplicate copies. Same friendly quirks as the original, so, no problems. Eventually they'd understood Kelly's crab-bot well enough to add a remote control interface, and it was now Janet's second remote, confined to the workshop. It helped.
"Quantity has a quality all it own", a quote attributed to Stalin. That was one good reason to mistrust it, but when you started to multiply things a thousand-fold life certainly started getting more interesting. The "Wright Frame" was now so popular he'd backed-up orders for over two hundred; he'd only sold about a hundred, so far. Projected sales of over two thousand for the year.
Interesting, it didn't seem to be something Fenspace had picked-up on. Here in Mundania (one of his science fiction friends called it), it was going really well. It was only months later that he found 'not licensed for off-planet use' in the terms and conditions. Kevin Wright claimed that made it 'more sexy', would increase sales on Earth, and, anyhow, people who wanted one would just ignore it.
He'd reasonably complete plans for a fully automated factory when Miss Lidzt ('Dana'), his secretary, came to him. She still used a gym to hang-on to as much of her good looks, as The Machine had given her, as possible. While there she got to know another recently joined member, and things were going quite well. Then she noticed the way discussions always drifted to her work, and began to wonder about industrial espionage. The suggestion that her exercise partner knew where to get loans at really good rates also troubled her.
Arthur sat her down, and talked to Dana about her finances. Then wrote her a large personal cheque that'd take a lot of immediate pressure off. A call to Kevin Wright and they had contact numbers for a reputable investigations agency, that dealt with industrial problems. They agreed to take the case, and strongly recommended getting the police involved.
"If I had an Angel to spare, she'd be going undercover at the gym, about now", thought Arthur.
What worried Arthur was that either he'd need a new AI to run an automated factory, Jenny certainly wouldn't do it (and he wouldn't let her). Or, he'd need a lot of humans on a workforce, and any industrial secrets he had would disappear. It wasn't that he distrusted people, in general, but with the wages he could pay and the bribery levels likely someone would sooner or later crack. Also, if he went for the AI factory, the 'taking jobs from humans' people would be all over him.
Then there was Alice. She'd arrived last week. Her waved appearance wasn't quite as slick as the Hollywood Machine managed, but it was quite good enough to pass as human. Unfortunately, the first thing she did was raise the back of her shirt to show him her serial number. And, it was one of his.
He'd paid to have her stay in a local hotel, and a small stipend to keep her going. Janet had gone out clothes shopping with her. The only other thing she needed was a Nokia phone charger - better than relying on bare wires and guesswork.
Her story was she'd been waved up into consciousness, and effectively told she was an exotic sex slave. Somewhere in Australia. They seemed to think she'd be barely sentient, but she'd been smart enough to escape, stealing the other two, as yet unwaved, robots. So, $150k worth? How on Earth, or off it, had they planned to make their money back?
She made her way with a friendly group of Aussie students, who were returning to Dublin. The unwaved robots were cached in Australia, and she could tell him their serial numbers. Yes, they were his.
It'd taken him a while, but Arthur'd worked-out how to contact Sarah. A proposed contract for collaborative work, with some carefully placed misspellings scattered through the text. A covert message soon appeared, and he memorised it's content before it self-erased, as he thought it might.
Let's see how they could upset the slavers...
--
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind
It was getting a bit much. Arthur and Janet were effectively the manufacturing arm of a multi-million dollar industry. Plus two human secretaries. Kevin Wright and, he guessed, Nurse Blake. Five people who did packing and shipping. Eleven people.
He'd modified the original Body Builder so it could be directly controlled by Janet's AI core, then built two duplicate copies. Same friendly quirks as the original, so, no problems. Eventually they'd understood Kelly's crab-bot well enough to add a remote control interface, and it was now Janet's second remote, confined to the workshop. It helped.
"Quantity has a quality all it own", a quote attributed to Stalin. That was one good reason to mistrust it, but when you started to multiply things a thousand-fold life certainly started getting more interesting. The "Wright Frame" was now so popular he'd backed-up orders for over two hundred; he'd only sold about a hundred, so far. Projected sales of over two thousand for the year.
Interesting, it didn't seem to be something Fenspace had picked-up on. Here in Mundania (one of his science fiction friends called it), it was going really well. It was only months later that he found 'not licensed for off-planet use' in the terms and conditions. Kevin Wright claimed that made it 'more sexy', would increase sales on Earth, and, anyhow, people who wanted one would just ignore it.
He'd reasonably complete plans for a fully automated factory when Miss Lidzt ('Dana'), his secretary, came to him. She still used a gym to hang-on to as much of her good looks, as The Machine had given her, as possible. While there she got to know another recently joined member, and things were going quite well. Then she noticed the way discussions always drifted to her work, and began to wonder about industrial espionage. The suggestion that her exercise partner knew where to get loans at really good rates also troubled her.
Arthur sat her down, and talked to Dana about her finances. Then wrote her a large personal cheque that'd take a lot of immediate pressure off. A call to Kevin Wright and they had contact numbers for a reputable investigations agency, that dealt with industrial problems. They agreed to take the case, and strongly recommended getting the police involved.
"If I had an Angel to spare, she'd be going undercover at the gym, about now", thought Arthur.
What worried Arthur was that either he'd need a new AI to run an automated factory, Jenny certainly wouldn't do it (and he wouldn't let her). Or, he'd need a lot of humans on a workforce, and any industrial secrets he had would disappear. It wasn't that he distrusted people, in general, but with the wages he could pay and the bribery levels likely someone would sooner or later crack. Also, if he went for the AI factory, the 'taking jobs from humans' people would be all over him.
Then there was Alice. She'd arrived last week. Her waved appearance wasn't quite as slick as the Hollywood Machine managed, but it was quite good enough to pass as human. Unfortunately, the first thing she did was raise the back of her shirt to show him her serial number. And, it was one of his.
He'd paid to have her stay in a local hotel, and a small stipend to keep her going. Janet had gone out clothes shopping with her. The only other thing she needed was a Nokia phone charger - better than relying on bare wires and guesswork.
Her story was she'd been waved up into consciousness, and effectively told she was an exotic sex slave. Somewhere in Australia. They seemed to think she'd be barely sentient, but she'd been smart enough to escape, stealing the other two, as yet unwaved, robots. So, $150k worth? How on Earth, or off it, had they planned to make their money back?
She made her way with a friendly group of Aussie students, who were returning to Dublin. The unwaved robots were cached in Australia, and she could tell him their serial numbers. Yes, they were his.
It'd taken him a while, but Arthur'd worked-out how to contact Sarah. A proposed contract for collaborative work, with some carefully placed misspellings scattered through the text. A covert message soon appeared, and he memorised it's content before it self-erased, as he thought it might.
Let's see how they could upset the slavers...
--
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind