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"The SF approach: an awareness that things could have been different, that this is one of many possible worlds, that if you came to this world from some other planet, this would be a science fiction world."
- Neal Stephenson
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| Timebroker | ||
| A person who traded in the commodity of other people's time. |
In the near future Earth of this short story, Cedric Swann is a timebroker. His job is a byproduct of the a-soms, anti-somnolence drugs that eliminated the need for sleep. Finally, humanity had broken free of the time standard created by their planet's rotation. There were no longer hours that were especially more desirable for work, or for leisure, or entertainment.
| A timebroker mediated between individuals and institutions, citizens and the government. Individuals registered their shifting schedules hour by hour with a timebroker of their choice. During such and such hours, they would be willing to work; during other hours, they were interested in attending a concert, a ball game, a university class, a gym. Contrarily, institutions registered their needs. The symphony wants a thousand listeners at four a.m. on Sunday. Can you provide them?
Institutions paid the timebrokers large fees for delivering guaranteed numbers of people - customers or workers or jury pools. Citiziens received discounts on the face value of ickets or tuition, or bonuses from employers, or tax breaks from the state and federal governments, for being willing to commit blocks of time via their timebrokers. |
| Technovelgy from Shuteye for the Timebroker,
by Paul Di Filippo. Published by Penguin in 2006 Additional resources -
|
Very cool meditation on the fungibility of time in a 24/7 society.
From the excellent anthology of original stories Futureshocks, edited by Lou Anders.
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'He was in a high-ceilinged windowless cell with walls of glittering white porcelain.'
'I don't have to tell you about the seven two-mile-diameter orbital mirrors...'
'The robant and the tiny old woman entered the control room slowly...'
'Guy named Otto Octavius winds up with eight limbs... What are the odds?'
'It is as you thought when you constructed the time crystal, my master Vaylan.'
'This was their world, their planet — this swift-traveling, yet seemingly moveless vessel.'
