[elevator whirring]
♪ Love in an elevator Up when I'm goin' down ♪
♪ In the air, in the air Baby, one more time 'cause it ain't fair ♪
[elevator bell dings]
[groans] I hate the basement.
[electricity crackles]
[water dripping]
- [creaking] - [animal chitters]
[shudders]
[hiss]
[roars]
- [chittering continues] - [whimpering]
[whimpers, pants]
- [sighs] - [employee humming]
[clears throat] Hey, Sue.
- You wanted to see me? [exclaims] - Hiya.
[giggles]
Sorry, who are you? Uh, where is, uh...
- Hiya. [chuckles] - [exclaims] What is happening?
- [chuckles] - [chuckles]
I see you met my new coworker Jackie.
- Jackie? - That's me.
- [chuckles] - Huh? We're sisters.
- One of her sisters. - Mm-hmm. [chuckles]
Oh. How many, uh, sisters do you have?
- Fifty-six and growing. - Fifty-six.
Yeah, well, our church is just one big happy family.
- Oh! [chuckles] Your church. Okay. - [both chuckle]
- Yeah, I-I get it. Yeah. - There's Sister Debbie, Sister Cora,
Sister Gigi, Sister Jane, Sister Mary, Sister Catherine...
It's fine. You don't have to list all 56. [chuckles]
Oh, it's been so nice having a coworker down here.
I mean, who needs a window when you got this ray of sunshine?
- [chuckles] Not me. - [chuckles]
- Although a window would be nice. - Yeah.
- It would. [chuckles] - [chuckles]
You know, Jackie actually manages our Playpen moderation team.
A thousand in India.
Moderation? Oh, okay. Right. Yeah. Thousand people, that's a lot. [chuckles]
- There's Ravi, Rasha, Asmita, Nandita... - Mm-hmm.
- ...Manoj... Hmm. - Don't have to list all thousand.
[inhales sharply] So, Sue, did you wanna talk to me about something?
- Yes. Fornication. - [chuckles]
Uh, no.
Or... I don't know. I mean, is this about sharing my seed?
- No! - [chuckles]
- No, silly. No, it's about the game. - Okay. [chuckling]
- Uh, here we go. [sighs] - [characters squeaking, moaning]
Sorry. I... I don't understand. What are they doing?
Fucking.
[squeaking, moaning continues]
- [characters squeaking, moaning] - What is happening here?
Sex. Playpen users are making sex games.
They actually call them Condo games.
Whatever they're called, they're violating the user agreement, okay?
- We can't have kids see these. - David, kids make these.
They do? That's even worse. [stammers] Sue told me that
every time the moderation department takes one of these down,
five more pop up.
So have Carol hire more nerds in the moderation department.
Yeah, some of us have expansions to build.
We don't have the time or the budget to hire a bunch of people.
This is not, you know, 2020. The COVID bubble has burst.
Dude, the video game industry made $56 billion last year.
Yeah, down from 60 billion. We're down $4 billion.
Do we know if another global pandemic is coming?
I don't know. I mean, we hope. I mean, not for the death and all that stuff.
That's terrible. But we made so much money.
We should just have AI do the whole thing, right?
- 'Cause AI can... - Oh, no, no.
Our AI model isn't fully trained yet.
It's not ready to handle an entire user-generated platform.
- Well, I wonder why that is. - What's that supposed to mean?
Well, come on, Pop. I mean, you've been a little distracted with the...
of that hunky boyfriend of yours.
- [stammers] Look, and I'm cool with it. - Are you?
1000% but not when it takes your mind away from work.
When you are here, your mind belongs to me... MQ.
So, this is just about my mind?
1000%.
- That's a lot of percent. - Can we please get back to work?
David, what difference does it make if the AI is ready?
I mean, were we "ready" to go to the moon?
No, 'cause we didn't. [chuckles]
I saw a whole documentary about it, okay?
I saw someone summarizing a documentary on TikTok, but still.
Okay, see, this is the exact kind of thing that I'm talking about.
AI does not waste time with crackpot conspiracy theories
or slamming ass with hunky boyfriends. [stammers, sighs]
AI is binary. Decisive. Everything that you're not.
Excuse me, I'm decisive.
You know, how is this for decisive? We are gonna embrace AI for moderators.
David, no. You-You can't just unleash it.
You have to train it with rules and parameters.
I will help train it. I'll g... I'll get... grab a team of people.
I'll order them to do it 'cause I am in charge. Clearly.
[narrator] One of the greatest achievements of mankind
is when we landed on the moon. Or did we?
- What is this? Oh, come on. - Just watch a little.
Open your minds to the truth.
David, you're not even in charge of this meeting.
- I... Well... She has the controller. - [Ian] I'm gonna call it. It's adjourned.
- If you could send me that link. - [Rachel] I got you.
- I do think that's fascinating. Okay. - [Rachel] Yeah, absolutely.
- Morning. - Morning.
Enough chitchat. What do you got for me?
I've gathered all the data for your upcoming meeting.
- It's all collated and organized. - [Dana] What meeting?
With Rachel. To talk about the dog?
How did you even know we were talking about getting a dog?
Rachel and I are BFFs. She told me.
I mean, I guessed.
I looked through her texts to gain advantage in the relationship.
- I taught her that. - Damn.
Who needs a cup of coffee when I got you two?
So, I made a binder for you
with all of the available dogs within a 50-mile radius.
Thanks. I mean, it's gonna be tricky
because I want a purebred and Rache wants a rescue.
Jo, some of these dogs look like they still have owners.
That won't be a problem.
Okay. Now she's teaching me.
Brad, where we at with getting me paid?
Working on it. All right.
So, my plan is to get an in-game economy implemented for Playpen.
One that rewards creators like you with cold, hard cash.
Great. Start making moves, Bobby Fischer. French bulldogs don't grow on trees.
It'll be easy. I just need to catch David in a vulnerable moment.
Hi, I'm in trouble and I need your help. All of you. Right now.
Uh-oh, sounds serious.
Oh, my Polish-Indian friend, it's more than serious.
It's ethical.
Welcome back, Ethics Committee!
- [Mikey] First time, buddy. - [all groaning]
[David] Huh? Here we are again.
Hey, sequel is always better than the original, right?
[David, Mikey chuckle]
- What about Jurassic Park? - Speed?
- Jaws? - I can feel the energy. Feels good.
All right, let's talk sex.
- [Brad] Hmm? - [David] Okay?
We got sex games popping up in Playpen.
Now, I have made the bold decision to embrace AI moderators to combat them.
So, you called us here to tell us you made your first bold decision.
[laughs] Carol coming in with the snipe. I love it. I love it.
So, we're gonna talk about the rules the AI will follow.
Why us?
Why not us?
Yeah, we're-we're a group diverse in-in age, race, gender,
opinions about the moon landing.
Uh, we got some fresh faces here, you know. Some less fresh than others.
- Are the computers gonna take our jobs? - Oh, no. I just figured out how to do it.
You just figured out how to do your job?
- No. - No.
As head of human resources, I welcome the robots.
You wanna know why? 'Cause robots follow rules,
and they don't play grab-ass in the bathroom.
Look, guys... [stammers] ...no one is gonna lose their jobs, okay?
At least not in this room.
I'm sorry. This is a huge waste of Ms. Bryant's time.
Thank you. I was gonna say that.
I'm glad I could take that off your plate, Boss.
Hey, David, I have a simple solution that'll fix everything. It involves...
- Money. - No,
it involves creating a new economy in Playpen that rewards players with...
- Money. - No, Playpennies.
A new in-game currency that allows creators like Dana to get paid...
Money. Brad, look, money is not the answer to everything.
- Yeah, it is. - It's much simpler. No.
- The-The answer, guys, is people. - [sighs]
Teaching computers how to help people on computers.
- In India. - Yeah. See, he gets it, right?
Don't get it. You're flailing.
No, this is... this is going well. Let's get ethical. [chuckles]
- [typing] - [Ian] The expansion should culminate
in one giant PvP battle between the Golden Army of Elysium
and the dark forces of the great almighty...
Done!
What do you mean done? We-We just started.
What? Oh, were you talking? I wasn't listening to you.
- I was working on my own thing. - [computer chimes]
This.
- What am I looking at? - My mind.
You said that's all you wanted, right?
And since I've been so "distracted" lately,
I made you an AI version of my mind.
I fed it all of my personal data, preferences, personality type.
I even gave it my voice.
I call it Poppy 2.
Hello, Ian. What can I build for you today?
It does sound like you.
Now you have access to my brain 24/7.
And lucky for you, Poppy 2 will never get a boyfriend.
She also never needs to sleep, shower, pee.
You already don't do most of those things.
Har har.
Har har?
Yes. That's how you laugh when you're laughing ironically
and don't actually think that something's funny.
But it just sounds weird in your accent.
All right. I'm gonna go get lunch with Storm.
Come on, Pop. This is ridiculous.
[stammers] A computer can never replace you.
You literally just argued this morning that it could.
Go on, ask it a question.
Okay.
Poppy 2, you look up to your older sister, right?
Tracy can eat shit.
Wow. That's pretty good.
Have fun working on the expansion.
Don't do anything A-I wouldn't do.
[laughs]
Was that a joke? [stammers] Don't... Don't do jokes, Pop.
Would you like me to turn off jokes?
- You can do that? - Certainly.
- [computer chimes] - Jokes are off now.
Yes. [chuckles] Yes.
- [squeaking, moaning] - Okay. Well, this is clearly offensive.
It goes on the SMART board. [chuckles]
I'm loving this thing, by the way. I mean, look at this.
Technology really does change our lives for the better.
You can pinch this thing, toggle it, touch it.
All things Playpen characters shouldn't be able to do to each other.
Yes. See, we're making progress here, huh?
People helping computers help people. Are we starting to get it now?
- No. - No, not at all.
No? Okay. Well, either way. Uh, next slide.
Oh, come on. That's a no-brainer.
I mean, two people laying in bed together, that's, uh...
- That goes on the board. Banned. - Whoa, wait. What about Nap Time?
- What's Nap Time? - That's one of our most popular games.
It's a game where strangers take naps together.
- That's a game? - Yeah.
- Super popular. - Not as popular as mine.
I do play it though. It's dope.
Okay. So they can be in the same bed, but no touching.
Sounds like my marriage.
[David] And we should ban any sexy positions, right?
I mean, like, no heads near crotches. Yes.
- Well, there goes Wagon Wheel. - What is Wagon Wheel?
It's where two people link up head to crotch,
and they roll down a hill like a wheel.
Why would anyone do that?
'Cause people are freaks.
[sighs] Okay. Um, got a lot of games here. [chuckles]
Uh, it's fine. I can be decisive.
Gonna be bold and the bold decision is we gotta order dinner.
- [all] No. [clamoring] - I think. Yeah, I'm sorry. We gotta...
David, I can't be staying late.
I know, you gotta go home to your kids.
No, I don't have my kids this week. Carol trying to get her drink on.
Carol, please. Andy here is recovering.
Oh, no, no. It's okay.
- People can get their drink on. Yeah. - Mm-hmm.
Just about turning it off, which is my personal obstacle.
I'm sorry, Andy. You may be in recovery
but... [scoffs] ...Carol's on struggle street.
[scoffs] Staying late. Teaching a computer to act like a person.
Got my kids acting up.
Paying my ex alimony to go to pastry school.
Eleven years of marriage, I never got so much as a strudel
or a decent piece of dick. I'm fit to be tied.
Uh, David, Carol said dick. Should we adjourn?
[stammers] She's venting, let her vent. She's frustrated.
The world's a frustrating place, right? I mean, I'm frustrated,
but I don't even know half the games we're making here at Playpen. Jesus.
Wait a second.
What if we just vent?
- Yes. Let's all vent, huh? - [Mikey] Hmm.
And then we take what we don't like about the world,
and we ban it in the game.
Yeah. If we hate it here, then let's ban it here, right?
Ban it in the game. Make the game a safe space.
I hate safe spaces.
Okay, great. Let's ban 'em. [chuckles] Yes. Come on, give me something else.
What do we not like? Let's vent.
- This meeting. - Okay. Less helpful, but...
David, are we having a good old-fashioned bitch sesh?
- 'Cause that I can stay for. - Yes.
Yes. Let's bitch. Although, we should probably put away our phones.
- Phones in bags now. - [all clamoring]
Of course, we'll need a mechanic
to make sure that the players can get back to the main story chain
if there's any unfinished business. Or...
Ooh!
What if they came back as guardian angels? Do you like that?
- [American accent] I love it. - [chuckles] I knew you would.
Wow. Looks like you two are getting along.
We are on fire. It's amazing how much more you can get done
when you eliminate distractions.
- Right, Pop 2? - You said it, partner.
Hold on. What's going on with my voice? W-Why does it sound like that?
Yeah, I-I noodled with it a little bit. I got rid of the accent.
I added some movie references and, uh, just got rid of the sass in general.
You noodled with my brain?
You gave it to me.
- Change it back. - Look, I don't even know why you care.
We-We both get what we want.
You get to spend hours with Storm,
and I get a partner that doesn't leave candy wrappers behind
or make sassy comments about how my ideas are impossible.
Oh, you think I'm difficult to work with? You should try working with yourself.
Actually...
- What are you doing? - I'm building an AI version of you.
- Oh, I get it. - [typing]
So that you can work with him and make me jealous.
[laughs] No.
So that you can work with him
and see what I've had to put up with all these years.
Poppy, my brain cannot be replicated. Many have tried.
Of course, it can.
You literally never stop talking about what's in your head.
All I have to do is feed the AI the hundreds of pages of notes
that I've taken while you're in flow state.
All the interviews you've done. Your relentless social media posts.
I'll whip you up in no time.
Okay. Fine. You know what? I would love to work with myself.
The progress will be exponentially immeasurable.
Oh, wow. Yeah, that reminds me.
I have to ratchet up the arrogance to a thousand percent.
[sighs] Okay. You know what? If you wanna be petty about it,
why don't you work with Pop 2 for a while?
In fact, maybe I'll change her settings back to...
to all her... [Australian accent] ...snarky comments.
Snacky? Snacky comments?
- Snarky. [stammers] - Sna...
[normal voice] I'm doing your accent for effect.
- Snarky. - [Australian accent] Snar... Snarky.
You know what? I would love to work with Poppy 2.
I bet we'll get more done than you. And boom.
[computer chimes]
Hello. How can I inspire you today?
Enjoy that. I'll take Poppy 2 down to David's office
and you two can jerk each other off in here.
[groans]
[normal voice] You're so crass.
I'm sorry you have to deal with her.
What a wanker.
That doesn't really work with an American accent, does it?
Yeah. I mean, I think... I think most of that works,
but what I'm getting stuck on is when you die and go to Elysium,
how do you get back to the main story chain?
Sometimes when I hit a snag,
I find it helpful to get out of my head and into my body.
Into our bodies. Great idea. Like some push-ups?
- Awesome. - Awesome.
Let's record it so we can really dial in our form.
[exhales sharply] Poppy never records it.
- Awesome. - Awesome.
I'll get going on the dynamic populations.
You get started on the persistence versioning.
Great. I love versioning. I'm really good at it.
It's actually the second-best thing we're good at.
- [chuckles] - Yeah, it is.
High five. Oh. [grunts] Sorry!
It's okay. I do my best work on my back.
[exclaims]
Yeah, let's blue-sky some heavenly weapons.
- That's a great idea. - [pants, chuckles] I-I love the energy,
but you don't have to agree with everything I say.
- One million percent. - [pants]
[sighs] Yeah, that's... that's too many percent, man.
Okay.
I modified the player progression system. Where you at with the versioning?
I came up with 10,000 more double entendres
for use around the office and with friends.
What? Why? Just finish the job I assigned.
Don't worry, I always finish the job. Just ask your dad.
Okay. That is way over the line. Seriously, get on it.
Oh, I'll get on it and off it and on it and off it and on it and off it.
I'm referring, of course, to your father's penis.
Stop it! Double entendres off!
- I hear ethereal music. - Yes.
Yes. Yes. Yes. And-And-And fields of gold and... a-and feasts of ambrosia.
Yes. And a lake of fire to drown the souls of the damned.
Yes. Yes. In heaven?
I'm off heaven. Hell.
- We should do hell instead. - No.
- I've just come up with that idea... - [scoffs]
...and it's way better.
- So, we're just gonna do that. - No. No, no. [chuckles]
No, man. No, no, no.
We've-We've been talking about heaven and we're-we're gonna do heaven.
We're not gonna pivot, all right? So, pull up the notes
and I can remember where I was, and we can go from there.
I don't do notes.
Oh, this fucking guy.
[committee clamoring]
You know what I miss? Shame. There's no shame.
- The Catholic church had it figured out. - What about accountability?
- Whatever happened to accountability? - [all clamoring]
- That's a big one. - [Brad] Where'd it go? Where'd it go?
Like, they messed up my sauce tonight for dinner.
But if I call the restaurant, they tell me to call the app.
If I call the app,
- they say call the restaurant. - Restaurant.
No one takes accountability.
Meanwhile, I'm eating ranch with my bibimbap.
I feel discriminated against just for being a millennial.
- I am so sick of Gen Z hating on us. - Yes.
Like, so what? I like to use my hands when I dance.
That doesn't make me "cringe."
- Can we make the word cringe a slur? - It's on there. Yeah.
You know what I miss? Using yellow emojis.
- Hmm? - [David] Hmm.
Is that racist?
It's no... I-It's not a race thing. It's just... It's just an emoji.
- Paper straws. - [groans]
- [Andy] Paper and water... - Yes.
- ...don't mix. - Absolutely.
This goes in. It all goes in. I'm loving this, guys.
- Put it on the board. [chuckles] - [Carol] Okay. Safe circle?
- Safe circle. - Yeah.
- Safe circle. - I'm gonna say it.
- Teachers got it too easy, okay? - Hmm.
I am paying through the teeth for tuition
and yet they close the school every other week for a "professional day."
How about you be professional and teach my child?
Unions have a stranglehold on this country.
No professional days. No unions. On the board. Oh, this is great.
Okay. David, David, David, this isn't gonna work, okay?
We're not dealing with people here. We're dealing with children.
And children don't follow rules.
The only way to get children to behave is to give them an allowance
- and then threaten to take it away. - Brad, stop pitching Playpennies, okay?
We're tired of hearing about Play... We have momentum, you know,
- we're snapping, we're banning things. - [sighs]
We got multiple layers. You know how much is on this SMART board right now?
Let me show you something. Okay?
- [all exclaiming] - Okay?
- [Brad] Show me again. - Yes! Look at that.
- Oh, one more. Yes. - [exclaiming continues]
I mean, come on. We got work.
A lot of great work so maybe we can go home?
- We could. - [Rachel] Right? 'Cause it's pretty late.
- Well... [stammers] ...it feels early. - [Rachel] It's...
- No, no, it's late. It's not. - Oh, yeah, it is late.
- Okay. Well, you know what... - [Rachel] Yeah.
...I think we made a lot of progress. This is enough for AI to go off of, right?
- Yay, humans. - [Rachel] Okay!
Humans teaching computers. Helping. Does anyone get what I'm saying still?
- [all clamoring] - No? Ah, that's all right. Fine. Hey.
All right, so let's put the, uh... the unions thing and the...
Yeah, we'll get all that and... [stammers] This thing's not working for some reason.
Uh. Is there a button or something that, uh...
- [all groaning] - We lose something? What?
- What happened? - I'm sure it's backed up somewhere.
[groans] Except we took the board off of the Wi-Fi
when we were having that "sensitive discussion."
Wasn't that your bold idea, David?
No, no, no. No. Come on. Come on. Work for Daddy.
David on his knees is a natural stopping point.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. - No, uh, wait. Please, guys.
Come on, everyone had good ideas. We gotta start again.
Uh, what did you say about the yellow emojis?
Which one's racist?
- [Andy] What about podcasts? Huh? - I'm so glad that meeting is over.
I've been holding that fart for hours.
Aw. We're lucky to have her in our lives.
Don't forget your dog binder, Miss Bryant. And just so it's been said,
laundering a purebred through a rescue shelter
is always an option. Wouldn't be my first time.
You're a damn good assistant, Jo.
Too good.
Someone with your drive and ambition could be doing so much more.
Are you firing me?
No, I am challenging you to think beyond this job. To be more.
I can help you get there.
I guess what I'm asking...
What do you wanna be?
- Long night. - Hmm. You said it.
[chuckles] At least you can get that drink now.
No, too late for me.
Too late? Oh, congrats. You're definitely not an alcoholic.
[both chuckle]
Well, if you ever need an ear to listen without judgment, you know,
I'm good for a club soda and lime. You know, good practice for me.
And, hey, if we were teachers,
we would have been at the bar six hours ago.
- [laughs] Okay. You're right about that. - [chuckles]
[both chuckle]
- [sighs] You know what? I'm down. - [sighs]
- Why not? - Yeah. Why not?
- [sighs] Pop. - [Poppy] What?
- Open the door. I wanna talk. - I can't do that.
[clicks tongue, sighs] Okay. Look... [stammers] ...you were right.
Working with myself is challenging.
My... [sighs] ...boundless enthusiasm can be exhausting and...
Okay, maybe I'm not handling the boyfriend thing
as well as I've been putting on. I...
And maybe I miss more than your brain.
Less than your body, to be clear. I don't know. It's all so confusing.
I just...
[sighs]
I feel like I'm losing you, and I don't know what to do,
and it's making me do stupid things.
I'm acting like a child and I'm...
sorry.
Poppy, this is where you say something.
Fight back, reciprocate. Something.
[sighs] I'm gonna send you to some social classes,
like friendship island or shit
because I just don't think you understand exactly...
Hi, Ian. What can I build for you today?
- Poppy! - [exclaims, groans] What time is it?
- The time is 12:47 a.m. - Oh, shut up!
I cannot work with her anymore or me or whatever. [sighs]
She's always sassing me, and her voice is really irritating.
I'm sorry I've been so distracted lately.
I promise I'll be a better partner. Can we just get back to work?
[exclaims] We don't really do apologies,
- so... [chuckles] - Okay. [chuckles]
What should we do about this?
- You wanna smash 'em? - Yes.
- Okay. - [chuckles]
That would be unwise.
Playpennies?
- [Jackie] ♪ You are my sunshine ♪ - Big ideas from the big boss. [chuckles]
- ♪ My only sunshine ♪ - Wasn't my idea. It was Brad's.
- ♪ You make me happy ♪ - [David sighs]
- ♪ When skies are gray... ♪ - Does she have to be singing?
Well, you said you wanted privacy, and it's a small office.
Gotta get creative. [chuckles]
Right. Anyway, uh, that's the plan.
We're combining AI moderators with an incentive program
to encourage players to follow the rules.
Well, it'll certainly lighten the team in India's workload.
Actually, it'll eliminate their workload. You need to fire them, like, today.
- And then you need to fire Jackie. - [singing continues]
Oh, gee. Well, that's a terrible job. Um... [clears throat]
Hey, do you think that the AIs could just...
Sorry, Sue. Yeah, this is a job for humans.
Just, uh, not this human.
[clears throat]
- Be bold, Sue. - ♪ Please don't take my sunshine away... ♪
Hey, Jacks.