Sycamore (Near-Future Dystopia) Read Online Free PDF Page A

to see as well underwater as they could on land. If the Lenses could do that then everyone would buy them, he reasoned. Amos asked how Kevin proposed this be achieved, to which he replied: “I’m not clear on that yet.”
    The audience applauded politely at the end of Kevin’s pitch and he sat down at the far end of the row. Kurt was pleasantly amazed that the next few pitches saw no increase in quality and that his rivals’ ideas were either tiny modifications of existing services or utterly impossible pipe dreams. The first reasonable suggestion was that Sycamore develop commercial lie-detection software. 100% accuracy wasn’t beyond modern facial-recognition services, the contestant claimed, but he failed to capture the board’s imagination.
    Before long the seventh entrant was introduced and Kurt felt his nerves building. He had been using the time during the previous pitches to finalise his own and knew that it was as polished as it was going to get.
    The seventh pitch was by far the strongest so far. It was the first specific and plausible idea, and Amos seemed interested. The concept was for a home and workplace security system. A user would set a six-digit combination as normal, but the twist was that the pressure-sensitive keypad fitted on their door would have no visible numbers. Only the appointed user’s UltraLenses would reveal the numbered zones (0-9), which would shuffle their position every few minutes. In the contestant’s words, “it doesn’t matter if someone learns your passcode; to get in, they need your eyes.”
    It wasn’t the kind of Hollywood idea that would excite the viewers but Amos appreciated its simplicity. “I like that,” he said. “It would sell.” His fellow board members nodded their agreement and the man seemed sure to reach the final three.
    Him, me and Kate .
    “And now for the wildcard entrant... Kurt Jacobs.”
    There was more cheering than there had been for any of the previous contestants because many of the audience were students and faculty who knew Kurt, or at least knew that he was a former student. When he had graduated on that very stage only two weeks earlier, Randy had been there. Kurt searched the room for a friendly face and eventually found Professor Walker near the middle. The professor mouthed “it’s yours” and Kurt’s nerves evaporated.
    Because Professor Walker was right: it was his. Kurt had been working on this idea for years and it was galactically superior to the best anyone else had offered. His pitch would be the most polished, too. Confidence bordering on arrogance convinced Kurt that only the SycaPhone could stand in his way, so all he had to do was make it impossible for Amos to justify choosing Kate over him.
    One deep breath and away he went.
     
    ~
     
    “I’m here to tell you that the UltraLenses are capable of far more than we use them for. These Lenses have the ability to change the way we interact with the world, and each other, on every level. The question we should be asking, therefore, is not, “ What kind of device can make the most of the Lenses? ” but rather, “ What kind of system can the Lenses make possible? ” The answer? Let’s find out.”
    Amos looked at Kurt with an intensity that was simultaneously frightening and encouraging. Whatever he was thinking, he was interested.
    “When you look at something like a QR barcode for a few seconds and end up seeing a movie trailer in your Lenses, what’s really happening there? Basically, the Lenses are capturing the image and sending it to the server, where it’s recognised as a link. Whatever content is hosted at that link is then displayed. As soon as I got my hands on the UltraLenses, I went to work on passing the images they were taking in over to a computer. Obviously that required intercepting the communication between my Lenses and the server, but that wasn—
    Less than a minute into the pitch, Amos interrupted Kurt. “Do you mean to say that you illegally