Caribdis Okay, just finished Once in a Liftime, working on Eternum now. And, just needed to point out a major flaw in the story that makes zero sense.
Nova's lack of a phone.
Now, I get it. Most people know fuck all about actual computers, how they work, and hacking, so I'm gonna assume you fall into that category too. Well, what makes zero goddamn sense, is the girl saying she doesn't have a phone "because they can be hacked" while she's sitting there using a freaking laptop!
Hackers have phones. They either add the same protections to their phones that they have on their computers, (Yeah, that's something you can do with smartphones, because they
are computers!) or if they're not that good a hacker/programmer/etc and don't know how to work with phone OSs, and/or are super paranoid, they just get a cheap ass flip phone that isn't a smart phone and can't do anything but make calls. The kind of phone that you can't hack to get anything, because there's nothing on the damn phone except a contacts list, and that's only
if you choose to put one on the thing!
Disposable phones are a thing. Prepaid phones, ones that have no contract. Simple shit, AKA "burner phones". I used to procure them when I was in the miltary for military ops. We'd go right to the normal stores on the street and buy them up before sending our guys out on spec ops missions. It's not difficult or expensive to acquire. Anyone can get them.
Long story short, Nova not having a phone because "hackers" makes her look like the worst "wannabe" hacker in the world. Someone who is
pretending to be this "great hacker" but really isn't shit. You know how there's always someone who wants to make themselves seem better at what they do than they are? That's what her not having a phone looks like. Especially with the reasons she gave. It's the kind of amateur thing someone who doesn't know hacking would say because it "sounds cool and mysterious" but instead just makes anyone who's into computing know "this person is
not who I want working on my shit" then they turn around and walk away.
She's worried about photos on the phone being taken? Just don't use the photo part of the phone! That laptop she has? Most laptops come with a camera instealled on them. Hack the laptop, and you can turn the camera on, without any sign that it is one, and you can
actively watch what is happening in the room the laptop is in. That's
far worse than a few photos. And she has eternum, which means she has a chip in her brain. If she's paranoid enough to not have a phone, no way should she have hooked up her brain to the network. That's... not something anyone who worries about that stuff would do. Because any connection like that is two way. If they can write to the brain to show you the virtual world, then they can hack your brain. Show you torture and pain. That's the easy simple shit, not even talking about the more malicious things they could do. So... it's weird for her to
only be paranoid about having a phone is the point. It's a bad excuse for the character. She needs a better reason to not have a phone.
