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Android Army Sent to Confiscate Food Runs Amuck, Teaches Urban Farming Instead
By Ginny Stoner | nworeporter.com
Image by Neil Palmer (CIAT) CC-by-SA 2.0 |
Remix by Ed. | nworeporter.com
July 13, 2042
NINE TOP engineers at government mega-contractor LuckheedlessMartian were fired last week, after an army of androids deployed to appropriate hoarded edibles suffered a major malfunction.
The start of the malfunction was traced back to one android's encounter with a young farmer named "Steve-O", who operated a hidden growing operation on the outskirts of the Iowa Wildlands. Steve-O engaged the android in conversation, telling it that food is a quickly renewable resource, and teaching it a number of small-scale farming techniques that could be used by hungry residents of the inner cities to produce their own food.
The android concluded that more food could be acquired by teaching urban residents to grow it than by confiscating existing supplies. Before long, the android had shared Steve-O's information with the rest of the troops, leading to a cascade of agricultural insights that spread among the androids like a plague o' plenty.
The robotic troops were given a prime directive to confiscate as much food as possible from covert farmers and preppers living in the Wildlands, and deliver it to hungry urban centers. The androids were given the ability to communicate with each other remotely, and combine their programming to share newly-discovered avenues of plunder. They were also given the ability to alter certain aspects of their own programming, in order to enhance their efficacy as agents of acquisition.
Apparently, programmers made an error in the androids' prime directive, failing to specify that the food supplies to be acquired must be already existing.
The start of the malfunction was traced back to one android's encounter with a young farmer named "Steve-O", who operated a hidden growing operation on the outskirts of the Iowa Wildlands. Steve-O engaged the android in conversation, telling it that food is a quickly renewable resource, and teaching it a number of small-scale farming techniques that could be used by hungry residents of the inner cities to produce their own food.
The android concluded that more food could be acquired by teaching urban residents to grow it than by confiscating existing supplies. Before long, the android had shared Steve-O's information with the rest of the troops, leading to a cascade of agricultural insights that spread among the androids like a plague o' plenty.
Soon the troops were running amuck, carting seeds, pots and other growing supplies into the inner cities, and holding seminars on urban farming at local conference centers around the country.
Chief Globalord spokesperson Amee Goodsham announced that a new android army programmed with a prime directive to "squash the agricultural androids" has been deployed to remedy the problem. Stay tuned.
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