O l i v e r B e n j a m i n
“Serial killers are cool!” Leonard insisted.
“Right. And I say, VTV should show more serial killer shows. In
fact, I think there should be a cartoon every Saturday morning about
serial killers. What do you think?”
“Good idea, bro,” said Wade.
“Hey, how about a sitcom about a family of serial killers?”
suggested Leonard.
“Excellent!” cheered Bob. He started to type furiously, or as
furious as one could type with one finger and constantly forgetting
where the “v” key was. “You see,” he went on, “it’s our duty to make
sure that VTV doesn’t lose its edge. Like when that jerk decided to
take the cocaine out of Coca-Cola. If only we’d been working for Coke
then, that would have never happened.” He continued typing. “That’s
the problem with America today!” Bob insisted, and his friends
eagerly agreed, although none of them had any idea what he was
talking about, especially Bob. He was too busy trying to find the “c”
so that he could spell “serial.”
Bob stopped typing and reviewed his handiwork. The memo had
now been transformed from an eloquent bit of programming strategy
from a trained professional into a poorly written, plodding, whining
order to make exactly the opposite changes than had originally been
proposed. The three of them all reviewed it. It was perfect, thanks to
his computer’s built-in spell-check, grammar-check, punctuation-
check, plausibility-check, and reality-check.
They set to work fine-tuning the media engine that was Violence
Television, making subtle policy changes here and there, pruning
inflated budgets and redirecting certain funds to more suitable
locations. They were careful not to overdo it, and for a while at least,
they succeeded in attracting no unwanted suspicion. This was
because despite their difficulty functioning in the real world, the
three were really quite comfortable and dexterous in the realm of the
computer. Also, Bob’s department was not listed on any rosters, nor
known about by anyone at VTV besides the only-marginally-more-
important Sanitation Department, and Gareth, who had already
forgotten that Bob even existed. Plus, with Gareth’s new mystery
project piled on top of all other priorities, there was an abundance of
confusion and mania circulating about and mistakes increasingly
passed through the bureaucratic turnstiles without heed.
The scope of Bob’s endeavor was growing and extending it’s
tentacles into all of VTV’s business, even the parts that he didn’t
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