| Apocalypse Averted | |
| The rise and fall of IDChip.com |
And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
— Revelation 13:16-18
Dateline: 09/01/99
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By David Emery
The Internet was abuzz two weeks ago with news that a multi-billion dollar company called Global Monetary had established a Web presence to promote its plan to implement a "proprietary global system of exchange, customer tracking and profiling."
Appearing out of nowhere on August 17, 1999, www.idchip.com offered volunteers US$250 apiece to accept subdermal microchip implants in their right hands as part of a "cardless ID system" enabling members to "purchase everything without the need of cash, check or even a credit card!" Qualified applicants were even promised low-cost health insurance and right of first refusal on shares in the company's planned IPO.
Reactions in Usenet discussion groups where news of Global Monetary's existence first broke ranged from amusement to hysteria.
"The fact that this ID is implanted in the right palm is particularly disturbing in light of the Biblical prophesy in Revelations," wrote one correspondent in a message cross-posted to half a dozen Christian newsgroups.
"The end times are closing in quickly," warned another.
A skeptic in alt.bible replied: "Relax. It's a joke. The Website is just too amateurish to belong to a $5 billion corporation."
Joke or not, by the close of its first 48 hours of existence, Global Monetary had racked up over 10,000 visitor sessions on its Website. A hundred people had filled out the ID chip application form and submitted it. And, according to self-styled general manager Bill Cross, hate mail was pouring in from "hysterical Christians and privacy enthusiasts who thought it was for real."
It wasn't.
Only Rothschilds Need Apply
Some people figured out the joke right away from surface implausibilities: the sudden appearance of a multi-billion dollar corporation no one had ever heard of; the simplicity of the site's design (not "amateurish," precisely, but certainly lacking the bells and whistles corporate sites normally display); the claim that implant technology has already been sufficiently perfected to begin inserting chips in humans on a grand scale (so far as anyone knows, there has only been one such experiment to date); and various arcane but recognizable references to known conspiracy theories and apocalyptic world views.
There were also several not-so-subtle tip-offs. For example, while Global Monetary claimed to have offices in major cities from Zurich to Singapore, the Website listed its headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas (pop. 11,257).
(Note: as some astute observers have pointed out, for all its obscurity, Bentonville is the headquarters of Wal-Mart, the massive chain of discount stores. The mystery — or rather, the joke — deepens.)
A page linked from the ID chip application form listed some very odd "demographic qualifications" for applicants:
To qualify you must be:-a resident of Montana
-male
-born before 1915
-be employed as an civil engineer
-work in the insurance industry
-earn $10,000 or less
-and have an indifferent attitude toward implantation.
-must be Asian
-must have the last name of Rothschild
On the Employment page, the qualifications for the Developer position included the following:
Must be gullible enough to think this company is for real but smart enough to follow this tiny little url. Plus 2 years system development experience...
The "tiny little url" (linked only from the letter "l" in "url") pointed to a special page erected soon after the site went live which gave the whole game away.
Or rather, it was supposed to give the game away, but by the end of Global Monetary's second day in existence, the site continued to generate so much apocalyptic hysteria that its owner replaced the entry page with a full disclaimer.
"Everyone remain calm," it began. "The antichrist is NOT among us."
Next page > Part 2: The perils of Net satire > Page 1, 2
