đź‘“~10 minutes
Six hundred people were watching this online. He noticed how the numbers fluctuated. He imagined people logging off for lunch or going to the toilet, or perhaps they just had a flaky internet connection. It was fascinating to think of all those people, a small village; sitting behind their screens in their messy living rooms, in their loungewear, or maybe all dolled up wearing stilettos, who knew, and they would all be watching him, soon. He would stand there, in front of the camera’s. Stumbling through his sentences and with lots of uh’s, well, and silences. Until he would stop and act. But it wasn’t his time yet. He would patiently wait and watch the online people exist in numbers, watch as the offline people roamed in and out of this room.
Something happened on stage. The slides were stuck or something like that. She was in the middle of a sentence about retaining new editors. He knew that was all she wanted; new editors who would stay. It was something he never worried about, he didn’t have to, and he certainly didn’t want to. He had no interest in new users and their doings, it would all be completely redundant after he would have his moment on stage anyway.
He fidgeted with the string of his hoodie and noticed how the host nodded at him reassuringly. Were his nerves that obvious? He felt his muscles tighten.
The online visitors count was high, Six hundred sixty-six people were interested in her story. He had never seen anything like this. Would they stay and watch him? Watch him stumble? He knew he would falter, and he didn’t care; the words that would come out of his mouth weren’t the most important thing about his time on stage. He knew he had shortcomings, things he wasn’t good at. He wished others knew theirs too, he thought as he reached for his backpack; unnoticeable to the room that gradually filled up. He felt the lump, it was still there, all safe and sound.
Maybe they weren’t there to listen to her, he fantasised, perhaps they were there so they wouldn’t miss a word of his presentation. He thought about all the preparation that went into his moment on stage. The content of his backpack was the least of his problems. He had to think of a good story to simply be allowed on that stage. He had fed ChatGPT his thoughts, something on working hard, writing numerous bios and connecting them through Wikidata or the other way around, he didn’t know and ChatGPT didn’t care. It spat out a nice enough text that convinced the organisers to give him his ten minutes on stage. Ten minutes with all those eyes focussed on him, all those minds who thought they were the greatest, but he knew for sure, would not have seen this coming.
He couldn’t wait to see the chaos he would cause. He knew it had to be chaos. Structured chaos. Orchestrated chaos. Orchestrated by him.
The last slide was shown. Her story was coming to an end. People applauded her, her ideas and her courage. But the only thing he heard was the voice of the host. “Our next talk is from someone who doesn’t need an introduction. We’ve all seen his messages on our talk pages or met him virtually at the Village Pump. Now we’re finally meeting him in the flesh!”
He saw how the counter rose to 700. 700 people online were silently watching him as he walked to his point on stage. The sound of a full conference-room with exhausted but enthusiastic people rang in his ears.
They only knew him from his online work, only knew the keys he stroked, only saw his emoticons if he wanted to lighten up his text. Now they would also see his face, and he knew they would never forget him.
And that would be just the beginning. Newspapers would pay attention to him, and not just the local rag. People would know who he was, where he came from, and all that he had to go through to get to this point.
He tapped on the mic. ‘Is this thing on?’ A gulf of positivity washed over him. The microphone was on, but there was something wrong. He forgot his backpack. It was still sitting next to his laptop. ‘I forgot something, back in a sec.’ He rushed back to his table to get his rucksack. Carefully, he held it in his hands, cautious not to bump into anything or anyone. He wouldn’t want to set it off early, now that he had come this far.
“Still on?” He tapped the microphone again. It was an easy crowd. They all loved him. The mic was still on, the people were still enthusiastic. He could feel his heart pounding in his temples.
He glanced at their clueless faces. They thought he would tell them things, that they would get inspired and then applaud, pat him on the back, buy him a drink. Only he knew he would change their world forever, change the whole world of open knowledge with just the push of a button.
He had practised it, as far as you can practise this sort of thing, of course. With just a push of the button, the wires would get connected. He had contemplated letting it make a sound too, but he knew that the people in the audience would provide enough noise, there was no need to add anything artificial to it. The community looked at him in anticipation. The words ChatGPT gave him tumbled in his head.
First he would make a few general statements, then he would slowly explain what was going to happen. And when he sensed that the tension had increased, when he heard people whispering ‘he wouldn’t’ and ‘is he serious?’, when people started looking frantically at the nearest door, he would act.
His voice wavered. He cleared his throat. ChatGPT’s words came out in fits and starts. People were getting restless. He saw someone looking at the door. This was his moment. He unzipped his bag. Wires jumped out of their wrapping. The battery was hot. Everything was on track; everything he could have ever imagined now had a stage, and not just a stage, it had an audience. An audience that held its breath as his hand moved to the button. For a moment, he enjoyed the ignorance on their faces, and for one final time he looked straight into the camera. Then he pressed the button.
A whirring noise began that grew louder by the second, as if an older Windows computer was booting up in a dusty attic, though he knew the cooling fans would soon kick in. The screen flickered, and a console popped up. The screen looked serene as the queries began to run in a satisfying rhythm. It worked.
The ignorance on their faces went from confusion to surprise. He knew he had to say something. He had practised the appropriate sentences all night long, and the time he had to explain was ticking away. Words were racing through his head, but he couldn’t find the right ones. Where was ChatGPT when you needed it?
He was unable to find his footing; his fingers knotted the strings of his hoodie, finally slowing down his thoughts. He was glad when he realised that he had anticipated this as well; after everything had unravelled, the explanation of what just happened would appear on-screen, words were simply redundant.
Q numbers paired with labels; red links turned blue; it was beautiful.
A world of statements and items was added, and his well-trained AI already started to write the biographies.
With a single press of a button, all systems collaborated to launch a multitude of biographies onto the internet, linked them, unified them. Years of invisible work now flashed across the screen in a matter of moments. Nobody cheered. Nobody took photos. All they did was stare at the screen. He imagined how his online audience had doubled. How journalists would await him, congratulate him on sharing so much knowledge, openly available for everyone. Free. Liberated. And as his cheeks turned red at the thought of all the positive attention, he felt the ground beneath his feet shift. Slowly, he collapsed. The last thing he heard was the beginning of an applause that swelled. When he came to, he didn’t immediately know what had happened. There were worried faces all around. “Did it work?” his voice cracked once again. A Wikipedian he had seen before but whose name he couldn’t recall nodded. “Yeah, man, it worked.” He sighed with relief and closed his eyes.