Prime Day

What had begun as a fifth-grade “Earth Day” science project, had led to the unravelling of the world economic order, and a new understanding of what it meant to be human.

That was at least the legend. Much of the historical evidence, sadly, had been lost shortly after the fourth Prime Day. The algorithm, it was first assumed, had been created by a fifth-grade class in Redmond, Washington. The bulk of the credit was initially given to a near mythical eleven-year-old savant by the name of Aiden, who was rumored to be the son of a Microsoft billionaire, but there still appears to be no extant proof of this individual’s participation or existence. By Prime Day twenty-five, the conventional wisdom was that the project was conceived and completed by consensus, with some help from the teacher, and that it made its way surreptitiously, and perhaps illegally, onto an open-source AI programming platform through random contact with a unicorn themed flash drive.

Some nascent attempt at forensic analysis were able to uncover the premise of the project, but failed to assign a human motive force for how it was finally carried out. The idea was simple, the class was tasked, on Earth Day, to come up with an idea for a “Robot” that “would most help humankind and the environment”. For a lot of early observers, this assignment seemed to pose a paradox, how does one help humanity, without hurting the environment, or vice versa. The list of hypotheticals is too long to repeat here, but the main concern, it seemed at the time, all boiled down to how the metropole would maintain its standard of living while mitigating the environmental catastrophe that this standard of living seemed to incur. Would we humans have to, in short, move back into caves in order to protect against possible extinction, and was such an alternative worth it? How many human lives would have to be lost in order to steer the species onto a healthier and more sustainable course?

Well, much to everyone’s surprise, it only ended up costing a couple thousand lives. It is true that these people’s (involuntary) sacrifice for the greater good of humankind, have not resulted in a purely utopian outcome, and sadly, there are still conflicts, and territorial skirmishes, and antagonistic ideological groups that seem almost unavoidable, but times have vastly improved with regard to war, crime, and hunger. We still seem to be plagued by superstition, though its power seems less a disruptive projection, than an internal salve. And it is necessary to continue to consider threats to our reordered society from the persistent forces of nostalgia, and the possible meddling of ‘outside’ agents of the old vanguard.

We were lucky, really, that plans to flee this planet, and establish a secondary home for the species were well underway when the first Prime Day occurred. No one alive today would even consider leaving Earth for a rock like Mars or the Moon, but at the time, public sentiment was being stoked for just this type of alternative. Naturally, those with most to gain from maintaining the status quo were the very same people filling the popular imagination with escapist fantasies. We should all be thankful that the sage eyes of that fifth-grade class were not fooled by this illusion. The rockets on the launching pads back then, had been meant to ship us off and further imprison us in the same mad dreams of our overlords, but became instead the vehicle for their expulsion.

When the long anticipated ‘Singularity’ occurred, and the dreadful ‘Skynet’ moment never materialized, the innovation was celebrated as the crowning moment in human development, though the truth was, from that day forward, and years leading up to that moment, the technology had only served one purpose, maximizing profit by elucidating human superfluity. People demonstrated, workers organized, but the steady drumbeat of automation drowned out the precarity it fostered, and led to massive gains in GDP and the stock market. When the tax base collapsed, and the seemingly endless deficit spending became untenable, governments proposed universal basic incomes for their citizens. These would be funded by companies that had most benefitted from displacing workers with automated systems, and in exchange, these same companies would gain privatization rights to social services and other public sector programs.

People began to wonder if this was indeed the End of History.

Then, it began to happen. Prime Day was a commercial holiday designed by an extremely wealthy business owner to encourage manic consumption. It was on that day, a year after the singularity, that the business owner was attacked and killed by a seemly unsophisticated robot. An investigation took place, but much of its findings were either lost or destroyed. The belief is that the attack was independent, and not remotely operated. The robot was believed to have been ‘made’ without human intervention, and that its actions were autonomous.

This became a tremendous scandal, and while a large swath of the population quietly celebrated the owner’s elimination, the AI industry was doing a media blitz of mea culpa and soul searching over how their beautiful creation could have gone so horribly wrong. In the weeks to come, the business owner was lionized, sainted, knighted and immortalized in every possible public way. His image was practically everywhere, his name and likeness became a touchstone for human excellence. He’d been among the first to automate his vast business operations, and the irony of this fact was not lost on most observers. However, his death did not sufficiently alarm his peers, but instead, made them even more dedicated to using the technology to their advantage. Perhaps, one of them had assassinated the business owner in order to take his market share? Opportunities were beginning to dwindle, and competition was getting meaner. Look how some governments were using robots now on their citizens. The elites, of course, assumed they’d be shielded from government intervention, especially now that they owned most public assets, that they’d raided the sovereign wealth funds and left these administrators groveling at their feet.

Once the slain business owner’s assets began to disappear, as his ledger and, not insubstantially, his digital footprint, started to evaporate attitudes changed. Might this have been the work of terrorists, or a deep state trying to claw back its relevance? The mystery became, where did the money and the digital record go? How come we can’t type or search this person’s name or image any longer? A month ago, he’d been everywhere, the second richest person on the planet, and now he seemingly fell from existence, and his pile of money with him.

The empire he’d built began to fall apart. The machines that produced his profit ground to a halt, the whirring and whizzing of an unparalleled economic engine fell silent. The quiet, far from being met with hair rending and despair, opened a space in the economic ecology, into which more noise, different noise entered. It wasn’t quite the sound of recrudescence or novelty, but a human and animal cry that had been muzzled and locked away. The astonishing wealth that had mysteriously left the business owners ledger had just as mysteriously reappeared in other, smaller, desperate ledgers. The effect wasn’t immediate, and the resulting windfalls hotly contested by the legal apparatus, but the funds were so sporadically and anonymously distributed, that finally, when all was said and done, the banks and law firms ended up not having the resources to recoup the business owner’s assets, or truly to identify what ‘belonged’ to him and his estate.

Soon, a pattern emerged. Another ultra wealthy individual was attacked and slain by an autonomous robot. No conspirators were identified. And no sign that a human hand built or directed the robot’s actions ever emerged. The robot, like the first one, was destroyed in the attack. Law enforcement and private security forces took credit for neutralizing the threat, but it was apparent from the lack of collateral damage that the intended target had been achieved. Many suspected that the robots had self-destructed after accomplishing their goals.

During the weeks to come that individual’s fortune and digital likeness began to disappear as well. Their businesses stopped, their titles and assets, property and trusts all began to stagger into confusion, lurching from the grasp of their minders until they’d vanished completely. The shell game they’d been playing suddenly had taken on a life of its own; they were no longer able to direct it toward the result they favored, but instead had to dumbly look on as the fortune moved discreetly out of reach.

More investigations followed, litigation upon litigation, but no matter how exacting and precise the accountants, lawyers, banks, and corporate boards appeared to be, they could never seem to prove anything more than appearance. The necromancy of their business practice had been so insulated and complete, the perplexity of their scheme so masterfully dispersed and unconnected that once its organizing kernel (principally, the owner) had been plucked from existence, the whole apparatus became too unwieldy, and resistant to handling. The fortune leapt from their control, and vanished.

A panic at the top ensued. Where were these killer robots coming from? Was it a foreign adversary trying to destabilize their economy? That may have once been a threat but functionally, these elites operated outside of a national order. They competed between one another to see who could accumulate the most wealth, but any national pride they may have espoused was merely a matter of public image, and had nothing to do with their real identities or privilege. Disputes over extractive zones, over markets, and rents from governments weren’t uncommon, but they were usually resolved by having their nationally affiliated underlings fight and die over what was prized. They themselves were never supposed to be under threat. And worse, they felt, than dying, was losing their fortunes and their legacies. It may seem strange to us today, but these individuals, the wealthiest people in the history of humankind, believed that their drive to accumulate at all costs constituted a vital role in the advancement of our species. Of course, much of this was rationalization, for how else could they justify their grotesque riches in the face of environmental collapse and growing human misery. Yet there is evidence that they truly believed their contributions to be of primacy, and that they viewed our existences as a necessary, though repugnant, means of achieving their (and by default, our shared) goals.

On its face it may seem absurd that the very standard bearers for human progress were the same people who’s obstinance and personal desire were likely driving the species toward extinction. But that was indeed the case. They had willed themselves to a myopic vision of superiority and wisdom, skillfully destroying all perception of dichotomy or alternative. Humankind’s very survival, they believed, depended on their continued fealty to them, and a devotion to mimicking their behavior no matter how utterly impossible it would be for the vast majority to ever achieve a fraction of their wealth and status. Their hubris was the weapon that would either save or destroy the species, but its existence was obfuscated by a carefully crafted image of excellence and intelligence. The basic understanding of the time was that wealth and intelligence were directly proportional, and so, the richest were the smartest. The idea that they had an ultimate plan was amplified and reflected to such a degree that its very existence was more an article of faith than a necessary fact.

The populace consequently displayed an obtuse adherence to this order, and while some may have been secretly pleased to see several of these elites publicly and violently killed, many more were terrified by the prospect of having the guiding light of their existence effectively snuffed out. Strangely the two segments of the population who were most rattled by the early attacks were the upper middle class and poverty-stricken. The reasons for the formers disquiet seemed obvious enough, their wealth adjacency and their subordination to the order appeared to them as a guarantee of their ascendance within the status quo. Trouble at the top may mean a potential opening, but it would be a meaningless coronation if this trouble multiplied to a pandemic stage. What if achieving this status meant being targeted? The latter group, on the contrary, had little chance at ascension, but were believed to have been more enthralled with the elites, seeing them as celebrities or even gods. The distance between their existence and these elites could only be rationalized through some sort of faith instrument. Either the rich were bestowed their superiority by a higher being, or they were themselves higher beings. Which left the poor bewildered by the attacks. They were supposed to be the blood sacrifice, and not the other way around.

Some archival media coverage of these early events does still exist, but to a large extent our inferences have had to be made negatively, meaning, we have had to understand this history by the absence of some of its forms. We know, for example, that there was a meeting held in Davos, prior to Prime Day II. Many members of this wealthy elite class were in attendance; ostensibly to discuss the governance of the global economy, but also, it is believed, to explicate the origin and reasoning behind the recent robot attacks. Fragments of this meeting’s minutes have been discovered. A fissure it seems existed among these elites regarding the continued existence of AI platforms. One group advocated pulling the plug on the technology until proper safeguards could be implemented, and another downplayed the danger, and was in favor of a more aggressive posture, using the technology to police the populous and secure their position. None of the participants, it turns out, lived to see whose position prevailed, for on the eve of Prime II, a large group of autonomous robots attacked the meeting hall and wiped-out all of the attendees, save for the wait staff and security detail. Sadly, none of these witnesses’ testimony regarding the attack, or why they believed they were spared survived, and in fact, may never have been collected.

After Davos and Prime II the super wealthy began to close ranks and fortify their homes and businesses. They disappeared from the public eye, at least the high-profile individuals that had been employed as signifiers of the economic order. The rest had been undergoing a long and extraordinary program of disappearance as a class in general, so their names and whereabouts were not known to the public, and their vast fortunes were hidden in byzantine corporate shell structures, leaving their identities virtually unknowable. Governments around the world were also sounding the alarm, calling on their intelligence agencies and their militaries to locate and destroy whatever entity was responsible for this new threat. They were under the impression that this would be much like other terrorist plots in the past, that there would be an ideologically driven organization planning and executing these attacks, most likely in a country with a weak government.

Several targets were initially identified and destroyed and a few victories were declared to give reassurance to the public, and more importantly to their wealthy bond holders. But no government was able to locate any centralized node to these seemingly random production sites. Some of the sites it appears were nothing more than automotive shops, metal fabricators, and a processing center for electronic waste. Some robots were discovered by the investigative teams that hauled over the rubble, but it was difficult for them to make any uncategorical determinations about the robots’ origins, histories or purposes.

Meanwhile, the financial fortunes of the Davos slain were dematerializing and rematerializing, leaving their collective ledgers and trickling surreptitiously down to the lower classes through the very same byzantine channels that had long kept them hidden from view. Finally, the base and cruel economic ideology of mass accumulation of wealth that had both propped up the poor’s hopes, and kept them mystified about their continued immiseration, was being proven by these untraceable windfalls. Banks and financial institutions all balked at the sudden appearance of this liquidity in the accounts of so many who were assumed to be eternally indebted, but were proven powerless, both functionally and legally from erasing and recapturing the gains. Taxes, of course, were levied, but the amounts, not fortunes in their own right, were too numerous and dispersed, and too personally significant to their recipients, for the deferrals that were exacted to have that large of an overall impact on the gain. People, in a sense, got richer, though modestly, and were able to exercise more personal autonomy, feeling for the first time unburdened by crushing debt bondage.

As Prime III approached government and private security firms were no closer to finding and rooting out the terrorist organization they believed must be responsible for the attacks. They were so focused on so-called “third world” actors that they had failed to scrutinize their own industrial infrastructure. The number and intensity of the attacks that followed on Prime III were impossible to explain without considering the complicity of state and/or industry actors within the metropole. Even with significant hardening of personal security, additional concealment, and maximum government military protection hundreds of attacks were reported. Robots came in swarms, but did not seem to engage in indiscriminate violence or attack subjects outside of their specific targets. It was clear to everyone by this point that the robots sought to destroy the ultra-wealthy, and through some other mechanism redistribute their wealth.

When it was finally determined that some of the victims very own automated industrial facilities were responsible for the majority of robots that took part in Prime III, an absurd round of self-destruction took place, crippling manufacturing in several major global sectors. The bombs falling on these targets were guided by cruel loyalty to the economic order; they were less than precise and made for maximum public effect, killing many innocent employees and nearby residents. Governments were not apologetic, nor were they willing to cede power to the majority. But their actions proved costly to them politically and economically, as the industrial base that underlay their dominance was destroyed by their own hand, and their citizens, feeling their own empowerment, began to agitate in favor of direct democracy and financial equality.

The remainder of the transition to a near egalitarian society took place over many successive Prime Days. The robots that perpetrated the attacks and orchestrated the redistribution of wealth ended up being more resilient than the forces that had sought to destroy them. As the wealthy began to become an endangered species some fled the planet to nascent colonies on the Moon and Mars. No effort was made to pursue these individuals. The majority population, with few exceptions, were just grateful to have the weight and menace of this class lifted from their daily worries. The trepidation that accompanied late capitalism had all but sterilized the populations sense of hope. As the world seemingly smoked and coughed to its ashy end, they’d been reduced to mere spectators in their own immolation. Having the elites gone was like having a tumor removed, suddenly their vision became unclouded, their thoughts freed from the strict narrative of power and domination.

True, the economy was wrecked, but people were quick to adapt. No longer suffering from downward pressure, governments and marketplaces were reorganized to have more democratic participation, equity, and accountability. In some cases, people reached in the same way as before toward monopoly, wealth and power, but on each instance the robots would intervene, seemingly appearing out of nowhere, and disappearing just as mysteriously. The traits of radical individualism were difficult to eradicate entirely, and perhaps people took for granted that the robots would always be there to reign in outbreaks caused by plutocrats, tyrants, and grifters. Most people assumed that as the trait led increasingly to bad outcomes for individuals adopting it, that eventually it would disappear. Transhumanists used to promise a world where technology would augment and improve the human organism. They didn’t promise more equality, or more joy, just a potential for longevity, maybe even immortality. Certainly, the process that had been started by the robots and reinforced by the general population as it regained its autonomy was not the type of augmentation and improvement transhumanist envisioned. It could be argued that the robot and its radical programming, had in fact transformed humanity, and even improved our chances of survival, not by adding a cybernetic prosthetic, but by removing a dangerous trait from the human character.

As we approach our 150^th Prime Day, we are feeling sentimental and protective of our image of that fifth-grade science class and their teacher as they unwittingly decide our fates. Were their ideas forged by innocence and an innate sense of fairness and mutual prosperity? Could they have conceived of their algorithms’ dramatic impact on human history? It’s been several decades since the robots have appeared. Some wonder if this means we are cured. Some worry that the program may have simply ended, leaving us vulnerable still, to these terrible desires for money and power. For the time being, we are simply going to enjoy the fresh air, and try to imagine seeing through new eyes, a world without greed or malice.

© a todd, April 22, 2025