Satisan

How society gradually became Seranova’s opium den

[This is my first post in a 30 day challenge where I will publish a blog post every day. I was inspired to do this by the great Scott Alexander, who inspired and directly recommended (people like) me to simply write more. I advise everyone reading to check out his blog, astral codex ten, if you hadn’t yet. And thank you Mon0 for introducing me to this guy in your great post “Scott Alexander's Top 10 Articles from 2014”. This is my first time writing fiction, so please forgive me if it’s rough around the edges. Day 1/30]

The year is 2045, Heroin is a thing of the past. We’ve invented something way better. Satisan is the new drug in town.

Initially discovered by researchers at the biotech firm Seranova in 2032 as a treatment for depression, Initial studies looked incredibly promising. Depression patients reported an opiate like bliss but with zero risk of overdose, heart attacks or choking on your own puke. In fact, no negative physical effects were found at all!

This bliss like state, was quickly dubbed satispace by its users. Users describe satispace as a dream-like mental state in which their thoughts seemed to self-select for maximum satisfaction.

Interestingly, the researchers of Seranova had accidentally discovered telepathy as well. More specifically, people in satispace had the ability to telepathically communicate with other people in satispace, satisfying their need for socialization.

Subjective effects of Satisan are varied but most users report: euphoria, occasional bouts of genuine laughter, reduced boredom and compulsive redosing.

Better yet, because Satisan was active at the picogram scale, Seranova found a unique way to monetize it. Instead of simply monetizing a pill, they invented a dispensing device that had virtually unlimited doses of Satisan inside.

Because by the year 2032, even pharma companies had hopped on the tech-bro naming trend, the dispensing device didn’t have a medical sounding name at all anymore, it was simply called “the loop“

After Seranova released the loop to the public in 2035, adoption happened slowly, and then all at once.

After scientists tried to study what made satispace so desirable, it was discovered to make the user think about whatever thoughts would cause the person to remain in satispace the longest.

Users started reporting finding out about new things they were very much interested in, but had never thought about before, via satispace. Quotes like “satispace seems to know me better than I do sometimes!” were common amongst users.

Gradually, peer pressure started to build up. Increasingly, events and information were restricted entirely to satispace. And non-users were caught “out of the loop” increasingly often.

By 2042, It was considered completely normal, expected even, to have a loop during your break, before bed and have it be the first thing you do in the morning. Much like smoking in the 1980s and vaping in the 20s, the drug of the century consumed the 15 minute break of employees all around the world.

People tried to quit of course, but found themselves returning very fast. FOMO was cited as a major reason for not quitting. A user who wished to remain anonymous reported: “Without my loop, what am I supposed to do in my work break? What will I talk about with my friends? I’ll miss out on so much!“.

And after all… why quit? Satisan had zero reported overdoses. The only negative effects were reported to be a slight increase in anxiety, a shorter concentration span, a reduction in coherent, independent thought and a more sedentary lifestyle. The latter could easily be fixed by going on a run more often, most people didn’t do this of course, but the peace of mind knowing they could was enough.

As white collar work was almost fully automated throughout the 30s, and blue collar work was currently going through its own automation revolution, a universal basic income was gradually rolled out. This was lower than wages, to encourage people to pursue working but it functionally made working entirely optional. People could, if they wanted, simply live off the UBI entirely.

This economic reality made the worst side-effects of Satisan way less relevant. People didn’t need to lock in anymore, the main driver of progress wasn’t human deep thought anymore, that had long been offloaded to the machines somewhere in the 30s.

Users who felt addicted to satisan start a satispace channel called “Mindful Loop Use”. It’s very popular. It’s members think about healthy boundaries for hours. None of them actually quit.

Businesses ran polls on their customers. “I discovered it during a Satisan binge“ quickly became the most common form where people heard about your business.

Naturally, businesses wanted to start advertising in satispace. Recent biotech advances made it possible to inject thoughts into satispace and they immediately issued a software update to the loop to make this possible.

Overnight, The Seranova corporation started to earn a shit ton of money using these “thought-ads”. They quickly used this to fund studies proving satisan’s safety and to lobby the government against regulating satisan.

Parents and old people rang the alarm bells first. It started with banning loops in schools. But kids figured ways to sneak them in anyway, after all, a loop fit in your pocket. Eventually, parents and seniors gave in too. it was basically too pleasant to not indulge.

The worldwide average time spent in satispace reached 16.3 hours per day in 2045. Society gradually became Seranova’s opium den.

Thank you for reading all the way to the end, keep in mind that this is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is of course not a coincidence, because in case you somehow hadn’t noticed, this post is about recommendation algorithms.