| Feed by M.T. Anderson | |
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Cover to Feed |
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| Author(s) | Matthew Tobin Anderson |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Science fiction |
| Publisher | Candlewick Press |
| Publication date | 2002 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 320 |
| ISBN | ISBN 0763622591 ISBN 978-0763622596 |
| OCLC Number | 54586791 |
Feed (2002), a dystopian novel of the cyberpunk genre by M. T. (Matthew Tobin) Anderson, is a dark satire about corporate power, consumerism, information technology, and data mining in society. The novel depicts how every human's life completely revolves around advertising, as well as the knowledge and will that the Feed not only provides them with information on demand, but manipulates their decision-making.
The story depicts a future in which the Internet has evolved into the "Feednet": a computer network to which the brains of American citizens are directly connected by means of an implanted computer chip called a "Feed", which about 73 percent of Americans have set in their brain, usually at birth as it minimizes complications. Privacy has become a thing of the past; corporations are free to monitor and manipulate citizens' thoughts. Feeds frequently interrupt normal thought processes in order to direct the user's attention to messaged advertising. The government may even subpoena one's memories for legal purposes. The corporations and conglomerates responsible for the feed participate in data mining by monitoring the purchases and interests of those with the feed in order to use this information to fit individuals into consumer profiles. Their human value and worth within the system is determined by the consistencies (or lack thereof) in their consumer habits. Those connected to the Feednet can "M-Chat" one another (a form of evolved Instant Messaging) on closed channels, effectively creating a form of telepathy. In addition, the Feed chip is implanted at such an early age that it actually takes over the running of many brain functions as the child matures. As a result, certain sites on the Feednet have psychological effects on users, causing them to go "in Mal"; in other words, they can deliberately cause their feed chips to malfunction, causing physical and mental sensations similar to the effects of some intoxicating drugs.
The natural environment has also undergone extensive damage; atmospheric conditions no longer allow the natural formation of clouds, the trademarked "Clouds™" implying artificial replications. Most bodies of water have long since become inhospitable; the oceans have become so acidic that whales are sheathed in plastic coverings (and hunted for sport). Sexual reproduction is no longer possible. As a result, all women undergo in-vitro fertilization and have their children custom tailored to their liking.
The corporations responsible for the Feed have an immense power in the future America. They run the school system, which is now known as School™. Throughout the book, they appear to hold the true power in America, leaving the president virtually helpless as the Global Alliance, a coalition of other countries, threatens to go to war with them.
Contents |
While spending Spring Break on the moon, Titus and his friends meet Violet Durn, a strange young woman whom they invite to party with them. While at a club called the Rumble Spot, a man from an anti-feed organization hacks their feeds, causing them to shout anti-feed slogans uncontrollably before going unconscious. They wake up in a hospital, unable to use their feeds. Since they have nothing else to do, Violet and Titus begin to talk. They begin a relationship. After several days, their feeds are brought back online and they go back to Earth.
One day, Violet reveals her plan of resisting the feed to Titus. She plans to show interest in such a wide and random assortment of products that her feed will not be able to properly predict her interests or develop her personal consumer profile, an integral component of mass marketing strategy in a vast cyberspace of consumer products. Afterwards, Titus has nightmares of riots, pollution, and oppression before being woken up by Violet, who shared a similar dream. Though Titus does not know it, Violet realizes that someone, most likely the Coalition of Pity, has been accessing her personal information. She calls FeedTech customer service, but is presented with an artificial intelligence named Nina that is of no help.
Soon after, the Coca-Cola Company holds a promotion in which free Coke is awarded to people who positively integrate it into every day conversation. Titus, Violet and their friends get together, planning to rip off the company by talking about how Coke is good for several hours. Because of an insightful comment Violet makes about Coke's carbonation, the other girls make fun of her. Angry at the remarks of the others, Violet tells Titus to take her away. Titus does so, grudgingly. On the way home, they fight in the car. Violet tells Titus that her feed is severely malfunctioning, and she may well die. They reconcile, and go to Titus' house. Because Violet expresses interest in experiencing many things before she dies, Titus and Violet go to the ocean. Various parts of Violet's body are shutting down periodically at this point.
At School™, Titus is somewhat disturbed to learn that Calista got a large artificial lesion on her neck. Link finds it sexy, but Titus and Violet both are disgusted by it. Titus invites Violet to a party.
At the party, Quendy shows up with small artificial lesions over most of her body, in an attempt to do better than Calista. Opinion is divided on it, but Violet finds it extremely disturbing. Titus takes her away to the attic, and talks about how he and his friends used to play games here as kids. He describes the feeling of walking through an empty house, knowing everyone is aware of your every move, without knowing where they are. Violet interprets this is an analogy for the fall of America, and feels better, though Titus is unaware of the significance of what he has said. They join in a game of Spin the Bottle. Marty gets Violet, but before he can kiss her, Violet bursts out a tirade, possibly initiated by her deteriorating feed, and collapses when she is finished, forcing her to be taken to the hospital.
At the hospital, Titus is shown a place where he can monitor Violet's feed efficiency, which would be at 98% for a normal person. Hers is at 52.9%, but goes up to 87.3% after she is treated. When Titus is allowed to see her, they have an awkward conversation, before Titus leaves. In the aftermath of the malfunction, Violet loses memories of the year before she got the feed installed. To avoid losing more memories, she makes large records of things she can remember, and sends them to Titus. Overwhelmed, Titus does not watch them, and deletes them at the end of the day. Violet's body parts shut down more and more often. Because they cannot afford to pay themselves, she and her father petition FeedTech for free repairs.
Violet sends Titus a list of things she wants to do. The first few items represent things she would like to do with Titus, including dancing, going to the mountains, and visiting Fort Wayne. After that, her list becomes more fantastical, describing an ideal life in which she does not have the feed and is actually from Fort Wayne. She wants to grow old and have grandchildren with Titus, retire by a lake, and have a dog named Paine. The second to last item may be an attack on Titus. In it, Violet says that she wants to not remember what will actually happen, which includes Titus standing by her bed, waiting until he has been there long enough to be a good person. Titus does listen to the whole thing, but not at once.
While she is recovering, Violet calls Titus while he is in mal with his friends and becomes angry with Titus because he is unaware of the environmental disaster that happened that morning in Mexico. Though the details are never given, some sort of toxic waste seems to have engulfed a number of villages there, and the Global Alliance is prepared to go to war with the United States. Titus, still intoxicated, decides to drive to her house. He falls asleep shortly after arriving due to the after effects of the mal. While he sleeps, Violet gives him further bad news in the form of a memory of that morning.
Violet's leg froze up as she was going downstairs, and she fell. At this time, Nina, the artificial intelligence from FeedTech responded to the request for free repairs Violet and her father made earlier. FeedTech decided not to help Violet because of her strange customer profile — something brought about by resisting the feed. Nina offered to go shopping with Violet to help her form a viable consumer profile, but Violet refuses.
That weekend, Violet comes to Titus' house to ask him to go to the mountains. He is reluctant at first, but ultimately agrees. Violet's father does not want her to see Titus anymore, so she is avoiding him. They stay at a cheap hotel. That evening, Violet tries to have sex with Titus, but Titus refuses, telling her that he keeps imagining her already dead. They criticize each other's lifestyles, and break up. On the way home, Violet's arm stops working and Titus considers apologizing, but does not. As Violet gets out of the car back home, her leg fails, and she falls. Titus drives away, leaving her father to take care of her.
The next day, Violet apologizes to Titus via feed, but Titus does not answer. The summer without Violet goes badly for Titus. He and Quendy start dating, and he goes on a trip to Io with Link and Marty. However, the new fashionable lesions people wear start spreading to the point of making people nearly skinless. Marty gets a "speech tattoo" that forces him to say "Nike" in every sentence. For unknown reasons, the bees across America become extremely aggressive and attack people. Finally, a glitch in the feed then causes people to freeze in place, somewhat like Violet. Titus thinks of her for the first time in a while.
Near summer's end, Titus' father returns from a corporate getaway. He shows memories of the whaling expedition to his family, but cuts them short when he begins staring at a female co-worker's chest and feels aroused. As Titus' parents fight, Titus receives a message from Violet's father saying that Violet wanted Titus to know when it was "all over," and that this time has come.
Titus goes to Violet's house where Violet is comatose and bedridden. Her father tells Titus stories of her decline intended to make Titus feel bad. He blames Titus, but Titus denies responsibility. In response, her father shows him memories of parts of her body and brain shutting down, the pain she experienced, and the reality of her current state of incontinence. He then tells Titus to be with the eloi. Titus asks what that means, but Mr. Durn refuses to answer, telling him to look it up instead. They fight, and Titus goes home. In unbearable guilt and grief, he sits on his floor naked. When his feed serves him a banner ad for jeans, Titus orders pair after pair until he has no money left at all.
Sometime later, Titus goes to visit Violet again. He does not speak to her father, but instead tells her "stories" — little one-sentence bits of news and trivia that were all he was able to find in the vastness of the information available over his feed. Finally, he tells her the story of their relationship in the form of a movie trailer. The book ends on a despondent note with Violet dying and Titus obeying the commands of a commercial for the blue jean warehouse that ends with double-meaning phrase "Everything Must Go."
The narrator and protagonist. Titus is the teenage son of an upper middle class family. Though glimmers of curiosity and creativity can be seen from time to time throughout the story, Titus, for the most part, is content with his consumerist lifestyle. He is described as being unintelligent throughout the book.
Violet remains Titus' girlfriend for most of the book. She was raised by her eccentric father, and was homeschooled. She possesses views at odds with what Titus has known all his life. She is significantly less well off than Titus, which often leads her to criticize Titus and his friends.
One of Titus' friends. Marty is described as being good at any game. He is loud and obnoxious at times.
Another friend of Titus. Link, it is revealed, is actually a clone of Abraham Lincoln. He is depicted as being very tall and physically unsightly. He is also said to be much wealthier than Titus, and lives in a gated community. Calista and Quendy compete for his attention throughout the book.
Calista is outspoken and opinionated. She has an ability to manipulate others with a combination of looks and talk. She is often the one to start one of the fights she and the other characters have with Violet.
Before the time of the story, Loga and Titus had a romance going. Though they have since parted as a couple, they are still friends. Loga is the only one of Titus' circle of friends who is not hacked at the Rumble Spot.
Titus describes Quendy as a "broken little economy model of Calista." She spends much of the story in a bout of one-upmanship with Calista over Link. When Link chooses Calista over her, she begins to make advances on Titus, and they end up going out. In the final scene, when Titus visits Violet to tell her "stories," he says he was on his way to meet Quendy for a date.
A powerful banker. Steve and Titus seem to have a normal father-son relationship, with both ups and downs. Near the end of the story, it is suggested that Steve may be having an affair.
Titus mother works in the fashion industry. She often seems frazzled.
His real name is never given, and he is referred to exclusively as "Smell Factor" throughout the story. On page 77 it is alluded that he is six years old: "Smell Factor had one of those birds now...so I could tell they were meg yesterday. Stuff always starts with people who are cool and in college, then works down, until when the six-year-olds get it, it's like, who cares?" Though his age is never given, he appears very immature for most of the story. Because of his feed, he often has no idea of what is going on around him and will shout out random phrases with no relevance to the situation. This implies that the problems the feeds cause will get worse with every generation.
A professor in a world that has devalued learning. He teaches programming languages in a historical context. He speaks almost exclusively with an absurdly formal vocabulary, which is alien to Titus. Though he does not have a feed, he uses a "Feedpack," an early, primitive version of the Feed which seems to have similar properties, which is not implanted in his brain but rather a large box carried in a pack.
M.T. Anderson presents the novel in a first-person narrative through Titus. Titus's perspective plays a significant role in implicitly explaining the conditions of society—he speaks in the contemporary vernacular, and expresses apathy towards the political events occurring around him, and detests learning anything more in school than he has to. This is contrasted by Violet's apparent concern of current events and curiosity of history and other cultures. It also allows the reader to see how the Feed affects Titus's thoughts, in a parody of the modern media and commercial marketing to teens of today. Profanity is used freely, even by older characters like Steve or the President.
In addition, the story's narrative is often interrupted with the text of commercials for consumer products, Feedcasts, and news snippets. This, among other things in the narrative, eventually allude to America being fired upon with nuclear weapons by the Global Alliance for its industrial crimes. This element adds texture to the book, as well as being a reminder of the nature of Titus' commercial-riddled life.