Month: July 2021

Panel One - A multistory mall with an open atrium and escalators prominent. People are shopping and over their heads are luminescent numbers in either red or green. Two characters look over the crowd. Narrator: In Daniel Suarez’s Freedom™, a scene plays out in a shopping mall where two characters use augmented reality and easily accessed financial data to see the net worth of shoppers walking past. “...glowing numbers hovering over the heads of all the shoppers moving past them. Dollar amounts. Green for positive, red for negative. Most of the numbers floating over peoples' heads were negative. There was no anticipating who had money and who didn't. Some of the most successful looking people seemed to be worst off.” (Suarez) Panel Two - A woman with a green number above her head, looking up at it. Woman (narrator): What does the number floating above your own head say about your relationship with displaying wealth versus having it? Panel Three - The narrator is looking up at a wealthy looking woman who is riding an escalator up, and has a red number above her head. Shops are in the background. Woman (narrator): Do you see purchases as investments in how people perceive you? Panel Four - The narrator sits in the background of a cafe. A barista is serving coffee with a green number above her head. Woman (narrator): Do you think your wealth is something to hide from others in order to avoid the attention it will bring? Panel Five - A smiling clerk is completing a transaction with a man who is mostly off panel except for his hand. His hand holds a cell phone which he's using to buy something in a mall shopping bag that the clerk is holding. Narrator (off panel): It’s not far-fetched that in Freedom™, the well-to-do people are often the most in debt. Panel Six - Two women passing each other in a mall corridor. One walking toward us is wealthy and carrying several shopping bags, a red number hovers above her. To her right a woman is carrying shopping and weari
Posted on July 31, 2021