Six game designer friends make an NPC that accidentally becomes the first superintelligence. "Munroe's book is deadly serious about how we play with our world, and what will happen when the world plays back." -Cory Doctorow "If the thought of one more Skynet waking up and throwing off its chains makes you roll your eyes, give this refreshingly original, contemporary take on emergent AI a try. You won't be disappointed." -Peter Watts, Hugo Award winner By 2031, they're trying to forget their playful collaboration soft launched the Singularity. Marco is in New York illegally documenting human habitats before they are sold off and sealed up. Chae-yeong is in Phnom Penh, killing rapists because her phone tells her it's OK. Claire has relocated to a township better designed for human happiness. Like everyone else on the planet, they're struggling with the only important choice that's left: Would you rather be a pet, or go feral? Starting in the contemporary global videogame art scene and leaping forth to the decades to come, it explores our adaptation to the ultimate technological change. "A new Jim Munroe book is cause for raucous celebration, ecstatic dancing and the lighting of signal fires. Nobody writes about flawed human beings caught in the middle of bizarre, terrifying systems as well as Jim Munroe does. His work has expanded my sense of what's possible in speculative fiction, and he never stops blowing my mind." -Charlie Jane Anders, Nebula Award winner
10 parts