I am not using a pre-developed prompt today. I saw a note I made years ago about the concept of Digital Organisms and thought about the idea in a school-centric way. So, here is my prompt: What if you had to take home a digital organism and care for it the way you take home the school pet?
“We should call it Freddy!” That was Jelisa’s voice, loud and plaintive. I’d liked her in the second grade but never since. My fourth grade class was gathered around a clear silicon orb. We watched the light inside it pulse and move like one of the Lava Lamps on the old time Youtube shows my mother liked to watch.
“No, Sam!” Henry said. He wasn’t a bully, not exactly, but he was big and bossy, and expected that people would listen to him. Instead more of my classmates chimed in, shouting out a dozen names ranging from simple boy or girl names to the kinds of thing you’d name a pet pig or a gerbil. Finally Ms. Macklin raised a hand to her mouth and blew air into her cheeks until it they puffed out like a bubble. All of my classmates quietly did the same. I did it too.
“Jai, what do you think we should name it?” She said, once the class was silent.
It took me long enough to answer that a few people in the class started to giggle. She never called on me, so I really didn’t know what to say when she did. Finally I said, “I don’t think we can name it yet, Ms. Macklin.”
“Why not?
I studied the shape moving inside the clear dome. It was just zeros and ones, an empty construct that hadn’t even been plugged into the internet yet. I said, “It hasn’t decided what it wants to be.”
Ms. Macklin smiled. She said, “Very good, Jai. It hasn’t chosen a host or even a form. We cannot decide those things for it. That wouldn’t be fair.”
The class groaned, and I swear a heard a few kids mutter bad things at me under their breath. Ms. Macklin continued, “That doesn’t change our responsibilities here, children. We still have to take care of it. Someone is going to have to take it home tonight.”