Qualityland

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Quality land is a book project of the German author , songwriter , small artist and comedian Marc-Uwe Kling . It was published on September 22, 2017 by Ullstein Verlag in two versions: light and dark. These differ in the texts between the chapters, which contain, among other things, fictitious advertising. It was read in as an audio book by the author and published at the same time as the book.

content

The book is a satirical dystopia that spins on some of the digitization trends that are already recognizable today. Topics include surveillance capitalism , the question of the difference between human and artificial intelligence ( Turing test, etc.), the implications of the emergence of an artificial superintelligence and moral-philosophical questions in connection with Asimov's robot laws , the trolley problem and the Treated right to repair .

There are three types of content: In addition to the actual narrative, a “travel guide” explains the life and characteristics of QualityLand. In addition, "Advertising" or "News" reworked for advertising is interspersed between the chapters.

The setting is a transformed country. All cities have been renamed, and the surnames of residents denote the occupation of the same-sex parent at the time of conception. Adjectives that refer to Qualityland may only be used in superlatives.

The world in Qualityland is controlled by the algorithms of a few dominant platforms. "TheShop" delivers products without an order, therefore even before the customer even knows that he needs them, and the partner search engine "QualityPartner" suggests better partners even to married people and also ensures that the existing relationship is dissolved. “Intelligent” machines are ubiquitous. They are so well developed that they themselves are conscious and sometimes have defects, for example a drone with a fear of flying or an android author, a so-called e-poet, with writer's block.

Each person has a “level” (1–100) that indicates their importance to society. The level can change, both up and down. With a single-digit level you are considered to be "useless". Higher level people have a number of advantages. For example, they are called first at the doctor's or can control traffic lights.

The story essentially follows three characters: Peter Unemployed, John of Us and Martyn Board.

Peter unemployed is a scrap machine. He has a personal digital assistant whom he calls "Nobody". One day, Peter receives an unwanted product from TheShop (the world's most popular mail order company): a pink dolphin vibrator . In the further course of the story, Peter tries to give it back, which turns out to be more difficult than expected.

John of Us is an android and a candidate for the upcoming presidential election in which he will run against a human. His theories about society and the fact that he is a machine create many problems.

Martyn board is in the same party as John of Us. He is a minor member and is unhappily married.

characters

Peter unemployed

Peter is a nice but critical resident of Qualityland. Little is learned about his private life, among other things that he is an only child and runs a small scrap press. In this he uses an elevator to his basement to save many machines that would have to be scrapped, since the repair of machines is prohibited by the consumer protection laws, from being scrapped. They spend their time in Peter's basement watching TV. Among them are the Qualitypad Pink, the combat robot Mickey and later also Kalliope 7.3.

John of Us

John of Us is an android . He belongs to the Progress Party and is its presidential candidate. Visually he looks like the actor Bill Pullman .

Martyn Board of Directors

Martyn is a relatively insignificant MP. His father is very disappointed in him. This is also because Martyn (even before the story) accidentally impregnated a young woman, so that their daughter is now called a schoolgirl with a surname. His father is the big business owner Bob Board of Directors, who finds John of Us' views detrimental to his company.

Calliope 7.3

Kalliope 7.3 is a so-called e-poet, i.e. an android that was developed for writing books. Because of writer's block, it is said to be scrapped by Peter unemployed. She is (within the book) the author of the book "Qualityland".

Kiki Unknown

Kiki is a confident, strong woman who meets Peter in a self-driving car and tells him to get in touch with "the old man". She tries to act as unpredictably as possible in order to remain undetected.

Conrad Koch

Conrad Koch is John's rival in the election campaign and thus the human rival candidate. He belongs to the quality alliance. Koch can be seen as a stereotypical populist and possibly a caricature of the President of the United States, Donald Trump .

The old

The old man is a "wise" man who has locked himself in a glass ball in his house for security reasons and gives Peter various tips. It is indicated several times in the book that he is the author Marc-Uwe Kling himself.

Pink, the quality pad

Pink, the Qualitypad, is a tablet that has been assigned the identity of the kangaroo from the kangaroo chronicles by its owner . That is why it represents the same interests and political directions as the marsupial from Marc-Uwe Kling's other creations. Pink is held in the hand most of the time by the combat robot Mickey, who suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder.

Organizations

Everybody

Everybody is the largest social network in the world and is similar to Facebook . Everybody's motto is “Everybody is on everybody”, which is why the network has started to create user profiles for people who are not yet registered, which are then operated by chatbots .

QualityPartner

QualityPartner is a partner search program. It informs at any time about available better partners, regardless of the current relationship status.

TheShop

TheShop is the world's largest mail order company, which also sends packages that have not been ordered, but whose content nevertheless please customers according to an algorithm.

WIN

WIN (an acronym for What-I-Need ) is an Internet service originally started as a search engine , which has since developed into an algorithm-based digital assistance system. The management of the company is taken over by the artificial intelligence Zeppola. In the novel, the corresponding devices are referred to as WIN assistants or PDFs ( personal digital friend ).

criticism

Eva Thöne rated the book on Spiegel Online as less funny compared to Marc-Uwe Kling's previous works and described the structure of the story as "[...] conventional, but okay [...]". In the Süddeutsche Zeitung , Maximilian Sippenauer also criticized the structure of the plot, among other things in relation to the characters John of Us and his assistant, but praised the storyline about the fight against TheShop that takes place towards the end of the book .

Awards

Adaptation

On March 11, 2019, it was announced that Mike Judge wants to produce a series adaptation of the novel for the American television station HBO , co-produced by Lionsgate .

continuation

On Twitter, he announced a graphic novel for QualityLand due out in May 2020.

literature

  • Marc-Uwe Kling: QualityLand (dark edition) . Ullstein, Berlin 2017, ISBN 3550050151 .
  • Marc-Uwe Kling: QualityLand: Roman (light edition) . Ullstein, Berlin 2017, ISBN 3550050232 .
  • Marc-Uwe Kling: QualityLand (dark edition) . Audiobook edition. Audiobook Hamburg, 2017, ISBN 3957130948 .
  • Marc-Uwe Kling: QualityLand: Roman (light edition) . Audiobook edition. Audiobook Hamburg, 2017, ISBN 3957131014 .
  • Marc-Uwe Kling: QualityLand: Volume 1.1. Volant & Quist, 2020

Secondary literature

  • Elisabeth von Thadden : Welcome to Klings “Qualityland”, in: dies., The contactless society. Munich 2018. pp. 127–133.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Stefan Hauck: Marc-Uwe Klings new novel in two versions / absurd technology and a speaking tablet. In: boersenblatt.net. September 22, 2017. Retrieved June 5, 2018 .
  2. ^ A b Eva Thöne: Marc-Uwe Kling - "Qualityland": In the shadow of the kangaroo. In: Spiegel Online. September 22, 2017. Retrieved June 3, 2018 .
  3. ↑ Lennart Mühlenmeier: Review: "The system says I want it, but I don't want it." In: netzpolitik.org. October 9, 2017, accessed April 15, 2020 (German).
  4. ↑ Welcome to QualityLand. Retrieved August 7, 2018 .
  5. ↑ Maximilian Schönauer: Contemporary literature - On the threshold of blemish. In: Süddeutsche.de. November 13, 2017, accessed June 5, 2018 .
  6. ↑ “QualityLand” is the best SF novel. Börsenblatt , August 6, 2018, accessed on August 7, 2018 .
  7. ^ Lesley Goldberg: Mike Judge Solidifies HBO Future With Rich Overall Deal, Pair of Series Orders. In: hollywoodreporter.com. The Hollywood Reporter, March 11, 2019, accessed March 12, 2019 .
  8. ↑ Marc-Uwe Kling: @realMarcUwe. In: Twitter. May 7, 2020, accessed on May 7, 2020 : "Incidentally, the first volume of the QualityLand graphic novel will be out next week."
  9. ↑ QualityLand. In: voland-quist.de. May 2020, accessed on May 7, 2020 .