Meta
It was a strange and peaceful thing to be the last guy outside. I can’t say I ever expected this, but I can surely say I brought it onto myself, but, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. The whole thing started with Mark’s announcement. ‘Meta’, they called it. I even remember when it was Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. You were probably given that info via those new subatomic transfers. It seemed that everyone was becoming a genius or a prodigy once that whole transfer thing started happening. Well, you know what they say: “If everyone is a genius, that just means no one is”. I’m not sure if that’s what Mark intended to do, but it surely took a turn for the worse. Since I’m writing this letter just in case anyone is still out there, I’ll explain the events the best I can. I just need to inform you of a few things before we start. I don’t know how to get in, I don’t have any cryptos to buy my access, and the prepared survival food is all gone. Don’t even bother to go look for it.
It was at the end of October 2021, that Mark made his plans public and the world went absolutely nuts. I even remember what I was doing when I read the news online. I was waiting for a cup of coffee I bought in a Dunkin Donuts in the middle of nowhere. I was on my way to visit my parents in Indianapolis when a policeman asked me, quite randomly, what I was looking on my iPhone. I got scared for a second, me being an African-American in 2021, but I now see he was just being snoopy. I answered him that I was reading some news about the people at Facebook changing their company name to ‘Meta’. The police officer frowned his face and said something I can’t recall anymore. I think he just said that the whole social media world confused him. He had no idea what was to come. It was about to get a whole lot stranger. The policeman scratched his belly, raised his eyebrows, and gave me a good pat on the back before taking his coffee cup and heading for the door. Before leaving he turned back and told me to have a good trip. I just threw him a good simple wave and returned my attention to my phone.
The next three years were kind of dull. I mean, Meta started developing new ways to interact in their virtual environment, but nothing was out of this world. Everyone created their avatars and there were lots of mixed opinions about it. The world’s purists were trashing the new apps, saying they took all the human interaction out of the meetings and talks. I guess they were right, but Meta’s goals were not to spread hugs and kisses. The majority of the population got accustomed to that way of working, interacting, and even living. Some people started to be very dependent on their ‘metavatar’, which is what they ended up calling them after a while. Their social media posts turned very quickly from their actual face, family, and friends, to their environment and avatar in the ‘meta-verse’. I’ve read some blog posts about people talking about this transition and many were kind of awkward about it but it happened effortlessly. When you take a person that is uncomfortable with their looks and allow them to create their perfect self, the outcome could be seen as pretty obvious, don’t you think?
It was until the fourth year that Meta announced their tests for the ‘MM’. The ‘Meta-mind’ was a concept that Mark was very excited about and it was pretty straightforward. Due to the advancements in technology and investigation in the neuroscience department at the University of Massachusetts, Meta started playing around with the idea of doing transplants, but I don’t mean physical transplants. The whole idea was to send your mind, your awareness, and the possibility to feel, touch, hear, etc., to your metavatar. This news sounded insane to everyone, even a little impossible. A few weeks went by and nobody heard anything from Meta and everyone thought the project was unsuccessful. Out of nowhere, Meta announced their successful trials and even published a talk between a guy inside his metavatar and Mark, horsing around as two very friendly buddies. After that video, it didn’t take two seconds before the U.S. Government got involved and tried to shut their entire project down. Right then and there, the moral dilemmas surfaced. There was no way to bring back the poor little lonely guy inside his metavatar. He had signed a contract and he knew the consequences. The guy was the first person in history to translate his mind from a brain to a server located in Dallas, Texas.
There was no way to stop the ‘MM’ operation because Meta had their legal department work extremely carefully to ensure that the process did not break any U.S. laws. From all over the world people were flying into California, Texas, and Washington to be the next person to be “signed up”. According to the records, it took 6 years for everyone to give in and join the meta-verse. Of course, the first people in were the wealthiest 1%, but after a lot of protests, Meta opened up the servers for everyone to come and join. It became incredibly impossible to argue against it. Life inside the meta-verse was free. You had to give up all your money, all your possessions, and most importantly, all your debt, to enter the meta-verse. Inside, there were no physical barriers. One day you could be drinking a beer on a beach somewhere, and the next day you could be skiing in the tallest mountain you have ever seen. The feelings were all real. You could feel cold in the snow, hot on the beach, and wet in the rivers. You did not need to sleep, although you could. You would just set a timer for how long you wanted to be out and that’s it.
Furthermore, ‘MM’ was the best thing humanity could have ever done to the environment. Very protected solar panels, wind turbines, and other sustainable energy sources kept the meta-verse running smoothly. The population inside grew exponentially and that was okay. Having kids was free and instant. Sex became the most popular hobby because you could control your pleasure levels. Everyone was living in Nirvana, apparently. I don’t know what else you could do inside there but if everything from your mind was translated to your metavatar, then that means that greed, jealousy, and envy were also present. I’m unaware of it is all going down these days. I stopped monitoring them a long time ago.
When I started going back home from my fifteen-year stay at the Amazon Rainforest, I have to say I was scared to death. “Where was everyone?” was my first and completely obvious question. Completely abandoned cities, animals running around everywhere. I even got attacked by a lion in the middle of Mexico City. What was a fucking lion doing there? Anyway, When I arrived in the United States, pants completely shat, I saw the wall. A solid 13 feet metal wall was guarding the entire U.S. Border. After walking a couple of miles I finally gave up and realized that I was never going to find an entry. I had to go back and find some climbing supplies to casually hop on over it.
On my way to Indianapolis, I arrived at Dallas. There, I found the first of the three Meta Headquarters I eventually ended up visiting and memorizing. The same stainless steel walls protected the five million square feet area. With my climbing supplies, I entered and got inside the headquarters. In there I found a whole new reality. I found it funny that the Meta-verse was not running on Microsoft or Apple’s OS. Ubuntu was the chosen system. Can you believe some idiot left the password in a post-it note inside the second drawer of a desk? From then on I started monitoring the system and learning how it all worked. The first thing I did was look up my parents. Sadly, they were not there. A week later I did the trip to Indianapolis and eventually found their graves. That was my lowest point, I believe.
Anyway, I went back to the Dallas Headquarters and started looking for a way inside the Meta-verse. I didn’t want to be left alone outside. I found out that the only way to get inside was with a bitcoin payment, but that system shut down two weeks after “the last guy” entered. If you are reading this letter you can wait for me here. I come back every six months. Sometimes I lose track so it might be a bit less or more. I left the password somewhere in there in case you want to take a look at every one. Don’t pull the plug on the whole thing. Or do. To be honest, I don’t care anymore.
With love,
Mathew
