Fishbowl

by Matthew Glass

  Andrei’s phone rang. It was Sandy, who was on a field trip with her anthropology class. He went into his bedroom to answer it.

  Sandy had just heard about Fishbowl’s involvement and asked what Andrei was going to do. He told her about the discussion that was taking place at the house. She asked him if he wanted her to come home. He didn’t see the need.

  ‘It’s a tough choice,’ said Sandy.

  ‘What would you do?’ he asked.

  ‘I’d …. I’d probably go with James and Chris,’ said Sandy. ‘But I haven’t heard all the arguments. You know I’ll support you if you go the other way.’

  He came back.

  ‘James was just saying,’ said Ben, ‘that in the case of the example I gave, we say we were doing what was required by law. It’s the same as cops not going into a place without a search warrant, even if that means they don’t find out about a terrorist plan that gets carried out the next day.’

  ‘Even if another three hundred people die?’ said Andrei.

  James shifted uncomfortably. ‘That’s the price we pay for our constitutional freedoms.’

  ‘Go tell that to the dead.’

  ‘They’re not dead, Andrei. Ben posed a hypothetical case. Hard cases make bad law.’

  Andrei didn’t find that persuasive. James didn’t back down. Where would it end if they committed to give the government anything they asked for? At how many degrees of separation would they agree to stop? Andrei said they could impose their own limits on that when they spoke to the FBI agents. Chris argued they would be branded as obstructionist if they did that, and they may as well stick with the letter of the law.

  The argument kept going, and they didn’t find any way to bridge the difference. At around midnight James called it to a stop.

  ‘We’ve said everything there is to say. Andrei, where are you now?’

  ‘I’m where I was.’

  ‘OK, sleep on it.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s going to change anything.’

  ‘We’re not doing anything until the morning. We told the FBI guys we’d be ready for them at eleven. We’re meant to be at the lawyer’s office at ten. Whatever happens, Andrei, we don’t do anything until we talk to him. No statement from anyone, right?’ He looked meaningfully around the room. ‘And I mean anything.’

  Andrei glanced at his watch.

  ‘OK,’ said James. ‘I’ll see you in the morning.’

  James left. Ben went shortly afterwards. Kevin and Andrei still lived at the house, and Chris often stayed there when he was in Palo Alto. They talked for another half-hour or so and then went to bed.

  Andrei had never felt more powerfully the burden of being the leader of this company. It was in the global spotlight now, he knew, at the very centre of the biggest thing that was happening in the world. The decision on how the company should act was his. Others could advise but he had to decide.

  At around two, unable to sleep, he called Ben. Ben answered the phone quickly. He didn’t sound as if he had been asleep, either. It had been a long time since they had had one of their talks. Andrei went through his thinking, explained why he felt he had to act in the way he was proposing, even though everyone was telling him otherwise. Ben listened patiently, even though he had heard it all already.

  ‘I’m not disagreeing with you,’ said Ben. ‘Andrei, what is it that’s making you so strong on this? I would have thought, actually, that your instinctive reaction would be the same as James’s. That’s the unemotional view.’

  ‘I’m not being emotional,’ said Andrei. ‘This is the best thing for the business, Ben. I really believe that. We’re a big presence in the world. We’re not three guys in a dorm any more. If Deep Connectedness is going to mean anything, if it’s going to be something that stays and makes a difference in the world – I mean a difference for the better – then we have to take that responsibility seriously. Something terrible has happened. If we’ve done anything to facilitate it, anything at all, then we need to admit it.’

  ‘And the privacy argument?’

  ‘If people value their privacy above this, then Fishbowl isn’t the place of them. I don’t care about the user numbers. I don’t care about how many advertisers we can attract. If people want Deep Connectedness without responsibility, then they need to go somewhere else where someone will give it to them.’

  ‘And where’s the limit? How small does the crime get before you don’t let the government see whatever they want?’

  ‘I don’t know, OK? This is a stand-alone case. Let them use the legal process for everything else. But for this, this is an exceptional case. I just … Look, it would be really easy for me to say what James is saying. I think that’s the easy way out. But I feel this sense of responsibility, Ben.’ He paused. ‘It’s like I brought this thing into the world. I’m not trying to take anything away from you and Kevin, but …’

  ‘I understand what you’re saying.’

  ‘So I feel, you know, I’ve got this special responsibility … If someone’s used this thing that I created, that I put into the world, for something like what happened in Denver, then I think I’ve got to honour that responsibility. I’ve got to do more than just say, “I’ll do what the law demands.” Anyone can do that, but that’s not the responsibility I have.’

  Ben was silent.

  ‘And I know there’s a disconnect, saying I’ll do it for this crime, but not for some lesser crime, and if you ask me where the boundary is, I can’t tell you. But I feel that now, with this thing, I’ve just got this responsibility and I can’t ignore it.’

  It must have been hard, thought Ben, for Andrei to find himself thinking like this, that there wasn’t some universal principle he could apply to everything, but that there was an exception that stood out instinctively for reasons that weren’t copper-bottomed with logic. No wonder he was agonizing over it.

  ‘Ben? What do you think?’

  ‘You can argue it both ways, Andrei. In the end, this is your business. Like you said, you built this thing. I’m not going to argue with what you think you need to do.’

  ‘But do you agree with it? I want you to tell me.’

  ‘It’s a justifiable position.’

  ‘But so is the opposite, right? But then what about what you said? If something happens that could be prevented because we go slow on this, what happens then?’

  ‘Sticking with the law is a defence, Andrei. James is right. It’s a good defence. We sometimes pay a price for constitutionality. Look, I think you’ve made up your mind. I’m not saying it’s a bad decision. I’m just saying that the other one wouldn’t be, either.’

  There was silence again. ‘I just think I need to do this,’ said Andrei eventually.

  ‘And that’s fine. Don’t torment yourself, Andrei, if that’s what you think, then that’s what you should do. I’ll stand behind you. The Grotto’s not going to be happy.’ Ben paused. ‘Just get ready for what’s going to hit you.’

  The statement Andrei proceeded to write wasn’t that long, but it took him hours. He drafted and redrafted it, balancing every word, trying to make sure it hit exactly the note he wanted and couldn’t be misinterpreted. The statement started solemnly:

  ‘Fellow Fish,’ Andrei wrote, ‘Fishbowl may have unwittingly become a medium through which one of the most heinous terrorist acts ever seen on American shores was incubated. We are not sure of this, but it is a possibility. I am as committed as I have ever been to Deep Connectedness. But Deep Connectedness is not without responsibility.’ He went on to explain what he was planning to do and why. He ended by saying that he knew some people would be unhappy, even outraged, but that he hoped in time they would understand. ‘Exceptional circumstances call for exceptional responses,’ he concluded. ‘If these days, after the tragedy in Denver, do not call for an exceptional response from all of us, I can’t imagine what would. Like all of us, Fishbowl must honour its obligation.’

  At around 6 a.m. he read it over for the last tim
e. Then he posted it in the Grotto, logged out, and went to sleep.

  22

  THE PHONE WOKE him. James Langan’s voice was apoplectic with rage.

  ‘I just felt it was important for me to say something,’ said Andrei – or tried to, a number of times, but he couldn’t break into the COO’s tirade.

  ‘Do you know what this does? It admits liability! Not just for us, for the entire internet! For all of social networking! It’s so … stupid! So unnecessary! We said no one was going to do anything until this morning! We agreed! You cannot do things like this! This is a business, Andrei! It’s not a high-school hobby. Sometimes I don’t think you get that. Look at the way you live. I am not coming to your house again! It’s disgusting. I cannot think in that environment. If we need to meet outside the office, we meet somewhere else. And you need to get control of Kevin. It absolutely is not OK that he talks to the press whenever he wants. And it’s not OK that he diverts engineers onto projects that we’ve already agreed we’re going to stop. He only does that because you let him. We’re working in chaos …’ It went on. Frustrations that had been buried in James since joining the company burst out of him. Finally he pulled himself up. ‘Where are you, anyway?’ he demanded.

  ‘I’m in bed. I was up all night.’

  ‘Well, get over here. We need to get to the lawyer. We need to talk before the FBI guys arrive.’

  When Andrei got to the office, James was still so angry he could barely speak to him. Andrei had thrown on the nearest clothes to hand, which were the same T-shirt and jeans he had worn the previous day. They got a cab and sat wordlessly side by side on the way to the lawyer’s office.

  The lawyer, a small woman in her forties called Angela Dustin, succinctly laid out the minimum level of cooperation that was required of Fishbowl by law. Andrei told her that he anticipated going beyond that.

  ‘That’s a matter for you, Mr Koss.’

  ‘Would that prejudice us in the future?’ asked James, not so much as exchanging a glance with Andrei.

  ‘In what respect?’ asked Dustin.

  ‘In that we might be required to do the same again in similar circumstances.’

  ‘From a purely legal perspective, no. That you have cooperated to a degree in excess of that required by law does not automatically and of itself create a new threshold that you could be required to meet in another instance, even if it were identical to this. However, I would normally not advise a client to take that path, because from a practical point of view it would considerably increase the pressure you would experience from law enforcement authorities in the future, and although this is not a strict question of law, these forms of pressure can be extremely difficult to resist. On the other hand, if you establish in the first instance that your policy is to comply with the requirements of the law and only those requirements, you create an expectation in the future that helps shield you from—’

  Andrei got up. Dustin looked at him in surprise. ‘When they get here,’ said Andrei, ‘I want you to tell them we’ll give them anything they can reasonably expect to relate to the bombing, but nothing else. If we decide they’re asking for something irrelevant, and they can’t convince us otherwise, then they can get a court order and do it the usual way. And if they find anything in what we give them related to any other crime, they can’t use it. That needs to be explicit. There needs to be some kind of agreement in writing or something. Can you say that to them?’

  ‘I can say anything you like, Mr Koss. Whether they’ll agree is another question.’

  ‘Tell them that’s the condition. If they want content, it’s Denver. Nothing else.’ Andrei turned to James. ‘I’m going, I’ll see you back in the office.’

  At Ramona Street, Andrei sat on the edge of Kevin’s desk as surreptitious glances were thrown his way from all over the office.

  ‘Dude, nice work.’ Kevin grinned. ‘Loved the statement. I assume James is happy.’

  Andrei ignored that. ‘The FBI is going to ask us for data. The deal is we don’t give them anything if we think they’re just fishing for stuff, and they can’t use anything they find to prosecute any crime but Denver. I want you and me to be the ones to deal with this personally.’

  Kevin grimaced. ‘You want me to work with the Feds?’

  ‘I’m going to ask them to feed their data requests to you. If you think it’s fine to give something, do it. If not, or if you’re in doubt, talk to me and I’ll decide. But be liberal with them. I want them to have what they need.’

  ‘Andrei, I’m not the right guy this.’

  ‘No, you’re the perfect guy for this. But no obstruction. Don’t play any games. When we decide to give them something, we give it to them. As quickly as we can. And we give them the complete data set that covers whatever we’ve agreed on. We don’t get them to keep coming back saying they’re missing this or they’re missing that. They get what we agree to, period.’

  ‘Dude, where’s the fun?’

  ‘Kevin, three hundred people are dead. We’re implicated. Our reputation, our ability to continue as a business, depends on how we respond.’

  ‘You know, you can have one reputation with one audience and another with another.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘The Feds are going to love you. But you should see the shitstorm that’s going on in the Grotto.’

  *

  Predictably, the Grotto had erupted like an underwater volcano at Andrei’s statement. While large segments of the press just as predictably accused social networks of being uncontrolled hotbeds of extremism and conspiracy, the 300 howled at what they saw as a betrayal of privacy. Karl Morrow reached heights of invective extraordinary even for him. Andrei’s approach was outrageous. It was weak. It was deceitful, said those who attributed negative motives to everything they saw. It was entrapment, said the full-blown conspiracy theorists. The Dillerman stoically led a small group of supporters, but his voice was almost drowned out by the howls of anger in the Cavern.

  It was accepted wisdom at Fishbowl that if they ever lost the Dillerman on an issue – if such a thing were possible – they would know without doubt that they were doing the wrong thing. Amongst some of the longer-serving Fishbowlers, it had reached almost the level of a superstition. People spoke only half-jokingly of the Curse of the Dillerman, according to which Fishbowl would disappear as a company if ever the Dillerman deregistered his account.

  Andrei looked at the Grotto for himself. The overwhelming flood of opinion was negative, abrasive, abusive. He followed the debate for a couple of days and then ignored it. The voices in the Grotto represented only a tiny proportion of the Fishbowl member base, and most users never went near the place. More worrying was an Andrei Koss can’t be trusted School page that was set up and drew over half a million users. Some of the comments on the page were so vitriolic that Andrei had trouble reading them. He wondered what these people thought he owed them.

  But, more importantly, under the light and noise of the reaction, the statistics showed that users continued to access Fishbowl at the same frequency as before. And, needless to say, the critics who were protesting within Fishbowl were, after all, protesting within Fishbowl. Ben, with whom Andrei spoke a number of times during these days, said that he should take it as a positive. People don t protest if they don’t care.

  That was the line Andrei took when he posted a second statement in the Grotto. This time he checked in with James before he posted it. Relations with James had been frosty, to put it mildly, since Andrei had posted his first statement, but they both knew that the company couldn’t afford an open schism in the leadership at this moment of crisis. Somehow, they kept working together, but only just.

  James didn’t even read the statement. ‘Do what you want. Show it to legal. Or not. Up to you.’

  The lawyer suggested a couple of word changes but said that since the new statement gave essentially the same message as the first one, it would make no difference to Fishbowl’s legal position.<
br />
  The statement started by thanking the protesters for their words and recognizing that they were loud because they were passionate about Fishbowl. Andrei then said that he had done what he had done only after long consideration and deep soul searching. He reassured them that anything the law enforcement authorities took from the material Fishbowl provided would relate only to the Denver bombing. He reiterated that it was something he would only ever consider doing in extreme circumstances, and he felt the circumstances after the Denver bombing were extreme. He would do it again in the same circumstances, he said, but only in those.

  As it happened, the FBI data trawl turned up very little. There were conversations between Andrew Buckett and a number of other right-wing extremists, including some general musing about an American Taliban organization that presumably had morphed into the United Taliban of America in Buckett’s twisted mind. But there was nothing that could be even tenuously construed as advance knowledge of the Denver plot or of sharing of any knowhow that might have enabled Buckett and Hodgkin to plan and execute it. On the other hand, more conventional lines of inquiry led to the arrest of two people who had been instrumental in helping Buckett and Hodgkin obtain ingredients for their truck bomb and in procuring the truck itself, which had been rented. It was clear they must have known that some kind of an attack was in the offing, although not necessarily that the Lacey Building was the target or that Hodgkin would take a sniper’s rifle to the survivors.

  The anger amongst Fishbowl’s users spluttered on for a time but gradually died out. And the overwhelming majority of users hadn’t protested at all. In all likelihood, they thought what Andrei had done was perfectly reasonable.

  Once again, just as he had experienced when he had brought advertising onto Fishbowl, Andrei Koss had felt the storm wind of user anger blowing like a hurricane into his face and had seen it, like a hurricane, blow itself out meekly. He wondered just what one would have to do to make people get up and walk away. Not that he wanted them to. But he felt vindicated. By cooperating with the investigation, Fishbowl had been absolved of involvement with the Denver bombing in a way that might have taken many months, or might even have been impossible if he had complied only with the letter of the law. Not only that, for anyone who believed that social networks were breeding grounds of conspiracy, Fishbowl had shown itself to be prepared to face up to its responsibility.