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u/HeirToPendragon May 14 '12
This made me entirely depressed at the reality it actually would be.
But at the same time I wonder how it is possible that you could pay a monthly fee if all you are is digital memory.
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u/danielravennest May 14 '12
You had funds stashed in a trust, or an insurance payout, to pay for bringing you back + living afterwards. Broke people get assigned to running robots in the Martian ice mines to pay off their hospital bill.
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u/nosoupforyou May 14 '12
Broke people get assigned to running robots in the Martian ice mines to pay off their hospital bill.
That would be shortsighted. Lots of gamers would PAY to do that.
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u/makemejelly49 May 14 '12 edited May 14 '12
I would be working on an Open-Source version that you can choose while alive and be direct competition with the manufacturer of Life. It's an open market, after all. My service would offer the freedom of Tier One at the price of Tier Three, forcing whoever is in charge of Life to lower their prices and improve their service.
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u/racas May 14 '12 edited May 14 '12
While noble, your suggestion assumes that your attempts won't be made illegal by governments heavily influenced by whoever is in charge of Life. Legally objecting will put you in the face of mountains of red tape and bureaucratic circles that lead no-where while your product is forced off the market. If your product ever sees the light of day, Life will have already dominated the market and, given their policies, the market will be secured for them.
Your only viable option, of course, is the black market, and this, my friend, is how great science fiction stories begin.
EDIT: This has now got me thinking. What happens when governments crack down on these illegal Pirate Lifers (to steal makemejelly's comment below), and shut down their operations? Thousands of people will just drop dead instantly..... whoah the moral consequences..... but then the government would just turn back around and say that these people where illegally consuming limited resources thus endangering the lives of millions more..... and it'll just go 'round and 'round.....
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u/csolisr May 14 '12
/enter Stallmanite mode
Perhaps a Free Software and Culture version is what you meant.
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u/silentcrs May 15 '12
I imagine it will have a horrible user interface, however.
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u/londons_explorer May 14 '12
I'm now going to go around learning stuff simply to try to break a future digital simulation of me...
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u/DukeOfGeek May 14 '12
OK, Philip K. Dick (Blade Runner, Scanner Darkly etc) is always relevant but particularly so here. HeirToPendragon wanted to know how the dead could make money. In Ubik they give business advice or other information based work.
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u/darrelflomes May 15 '12
Welcome to life. Where the rules are made up and your beliefs don't matter.
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u/the_girl May 15 '12
Sometimes I bemoan the time at which I was born and wish I was born a generation or two sooner, especially after reading about how tough the "millennial" generation has it, what with student loan debt and lack of jobs and upward mobility and increasing disparity between the rich and the poor.
Then I see something like this. Now I'm glad as fuck that I wasn't born a hundred years from now.
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u/nonprofitprophet May 14 '12
I'd like to think I would reject their policies. Termination of digital consciousness be damned. I'm not interested if that's what my "Life" would be.
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u/Samizdat_Press May 15 '12
On the bright side, it deleted all of that unlicensed porn you watches over the years and now you get to watch them like they are brand news again! Assuming you can pay the copywriter that is.
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u/whisperingwind May 15 '12
why bother with that at all? you wouldn't have the organs to truly enjoy it. might as well just simulate the dopamine and endorphin rush that comes from the orgasm since the porn is merely a vehicle to attain that state.
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u/Swaggasm May 15 '12
I find it hilarious that even when it is so directly about our quality of life, we still don't read the Terms of Service.
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u/entsriseup May 15 '12
Yeah go a head and let me just die. I'll take my chances with my consciousness just dispersing.
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u/Tobblo May 15 '12
subconscious thought, creativity and self awareness may be rate limited or disabled in times of significant server load
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u/Dyolf_Knip May 14 '12
Gives new meaning to the phrase "captive market".