But what kind of free expression is that? Free
expression so long as you're sitting at home with your PC plugged into
the wall?"
"Well, it's not like we're talking about displacing all the other kinds
of expression," Alan said. "This is in addition to all the ways you've
had to talk --"
"Right, like this thing," the kid said. He reached into his pocket and
took out a small phone. "This was free -- not twenty dollars, not even
two thousand dollars -- just free, from the phone company, in exchange
for a one-year contract. Everyone's got one of these. I went trekking in
India, you see people using these out in the bush. And you know what
they use them for? Speech! Not speech-in-quotes meaning some kind of
abstract expression, but actual *talking.*"
The kid leaned forward and planted his hands on his knees and suddenly
he was a lot harder to dismiss as some subculture-addled intern. He had
that fiery intensity that Alan recognized from himself, from Kurt, from
the people who believe.
Alan thought he was getting an inkling into why this particular intern
had responded to his press release: Not because he was too ignorant to
see through the bullshit, but just the opposite.
"But that's communication through the *phone company*," Kurt said,
wonderment in his voice that his fellow bohemian couldn't see how
sucktastic that proposition was.
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