Avogadro Corp Read online

  Contents

  Dedication

  Praise

  Definitions

  Preface to the Second Edition

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Epilogue

  Next

  Preview Book 2

  Author's Note

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Avogadro Corp: The Singularity Is Closer Than It Appears

  William Hertling

  Copyright 2011, 2014 by William Hertling

  Smashwords Edition

  For Rowan, Luc, and Gifford.

  “A tremendous book that every single person needs to read. In the vein of Daniel Suarez’s Daemon and FreedomTM, William’s book shows that science fiction is becoming science fact. Avogadro Corp describes issues, in solid technical detail, that we are dealing with today that will impact us by 2015, if not sooner. Not enough people have read these books. It’s a problem for them, but not for the [emergent] machines.”

  —Brad Feld, managing director Foundry Group,

  cofounder Techstars

  “A highly entertaining, gripping, thought inspiring book. Don’t start without the time to finish—it won’t let you go.”

  —Gifford Pinchot III, founder Bainbridge Graduate Institute,

  Author of The Intelligent Organization

  “An alarming and jaw-dropping tale about how something as innocuous as email can subvert an entire organization. I found myself reading with a sense of awe, and read it way too late into the night.”

  —Gene Kim, author of The Phoenix Project

  “Hertling builds a picture of how an AI could emerge, piece by piece, from technology available today. A fascinating, logical, and utterly believable scenario—I just hope nobody tries this at home.”

  —Nathaniel Rutman, Senior Systems Architect

  Avogadro

  Avogadro’s Number: The Avogadro constant (symbols: L, NA) is the number of “elementary entities” (usually atoms or molecules) in one mole, that is (from the definition of the mole), the number of atoms in exactly 12 grams of carbon-12: 6.022 x 1023.

  Avogadro Corporation: Avogadro Corporation is an American corporation specializing in Internet search. It generates revenue from paid advertising on search, email (AvoMail), online mapping, office productivity, etc. In addition, the company develops a mobile phone operating system called AvoOS. The company name is based on Avogadro’s Number, or 6 followed by 23 zeros: 600,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.

  elope

  v. To run away; abscond. From Middle Dutch ontlopen, to run away.

  n. ELOPe: Email Language Optimization Project. An Avogadro Corporation R&D project to improve email communication effectiveness.

  Preface to the Second Edition

  I conceived and wrote Avogadro Corp.: The Singularity Is Closer Than It Appears in 2009.

  Since then, IBM’s Watson competed on Jeopardy. Google announced they could compose automatic Twitter replies, in your authentic voice and to the tweets you’d normally respond to. Google also built floating barges covered with shipping containers.

  Last year, Google hired Ray Kurzweil, one of the most outspoken proponents of artificial intelligence. Google also bought Boston Dynamics, one of the leaders in mobile robotics, as well as many leading artificial intelligence companies. Many believe Google wants to win the race to develop strong AI.

  I’ve enjoyed seeing so many predictions come true, but it’s also a little scary.

  This second edition has been revised to improve language and add character depth. The structure of the story, plot, and technology has not been changed. I hope you enjoy the result.

  William Hertling

  May 2014

  Prologue

  David Ryan stood on tiptoes and craned his head over the crowd. He smiled at the sight of his wife’s blonde hair, only ten feet away. Turning sideways, he pushed into a gap between a sequined dress and a suit. An arm jostled him, and champagne sloshed towards the rim of the three glasses he balanced in both hands. Shuffling through the dense crowd, he finally rejoined Christine, who stood chatting with Mike Williams, his lead developer and good friend. He handed them their drinks with relief.

  A banner year at the world’s largest Internet company meant another no-holds-barred Christmas party, continuing a longstanding tradition. Avogadro Corp had again rented the Portland Convention Center, the only venue large enough to hold their ten thousand Portland employees. A jazz band played on stage, part of this year’s Roaring Twenties theme, while usually reserved geeks danced and became inebriated on free alcohol. Glasses chimed in toasts, lights flashed, and laughter sounded from everywhere.

  David glanced at Christine, stunning and exotic in a black sequined flapper dress. He smiled, happy to be celebrating, and with good cause, too: his project was successful, he was married to a smart, funny woman, and he had a great friend and technical lead in Mike. He had every reason to be happy.

  David took a self-congratulatory sip of champagne and Mike nudged his arm, sending the drink over the rim. “Here comes Sean,” Mike said, eyebrows raised.

  A bit of awe and hero-worship made for a moment’s hesitation. Sean Leonov, cofounder of Avogadro, was something of a demigod. A brilliant scientist who not only designed the original Avogadro search algorithms and cofounded the company with Kenneth Harrison, he also continued to write research papers while helping lead the company.

  “Well, David, Mike, Christine—Merry Christmas!” Sean said, demonstrating the amazing memory that was one of his many talents. He clasped David’s shoulder and shook hands with Christine and Mike. He turned to David and smiled. “It’s been a while since we talked, but I heard through the grapevine about your progress. When do we get a demo?”

  “Any time you want, we’re ready. The results are more promising than anyone expected.”

  “I’m glad. Send me an email, and I’ll have my admin set up a meeting. Now, I hear Ops is complaining about the servers you need.”

  David groaned inside. Ops, short for Operations, was the Avogadro department responsible for maintaining and allocating the all-important servers. More than a million computers spread across nearly a hundred data centers around the world hosted all of Avogadro’s websites and applications. Ops was also David’s Achilles’ heel right now.

  David loosened his jaw and struggled to keep his voice calm. “We’re consuming somewhat more resources than projected. But we are functionally complete, and user testing shows ELOPe’s effectiveness is higher than expected. Resource utilization is our last major hurdle. When you see the results, I think you’ll agree the resources are worth the investment.”

  “It’s not the money I’m worried about,” Sean said, “but the scale. I’ve already pulled strings to get the project onto the production servers for more horsepower. But before you release, you’ve got to fix these scalability issues. Hundreds of millions of eager customers will hit the application on day one.”

  David winced. Sean’s tone made it clear he expected David to solve the problem.

  Sean turned to Christine. “So how’s the gaming business?”

  She smiled. “Good. We’re building on a new RPG with a free-form magic system. User-designed spells. It’s gonna kick butt.”

  “How
do you balance power so the spells don’t get out of hand?” Sean asked.

  “That’s the cool part,” Christine said. She went on about the self-balancing system she’d invented that correlated magical impact with spell cost.

  David tuned out of the conversation and fumed inwardly at Sean’s comments about Ops. His project was going to change the face of email—hell, all communications—forever. Server resources should be inconsequential by comparison.

  Sean chatted with Christine for a minute about her work and then said quick goodbyes as he noticed someone he wanted to talk to.

  After Sean left, David turned to Mike. “Damn Gary and his whining. He’s going to sabotage the project before we even get a chance to prove success. Why can’t he just leave us in peace?”

  Christine put a hand on his arm. “With a presentation to Sean, you’ll have more management support. Gary is not going to kill your project or he’d have done it already. ”

  “But—” David began.

  “But nothing. You’re a few months from release, and then the server resources are someone else’s problem.” She smiled and raised one eyebrow playfully.

  David returned the smile without much conviction. She was right on a theoretical level, but it didn’t change his anger at Gary Mitchell, the Vice President of Communication Products.

  Six months earlier, when David realized ELOPe needed far more computing resources than the typical R&D projects, he’d gone to Sean, who quickly gave David’s team access to the production servers in the Communication Products group. They had massive spare capacity, and it was an easy choice.

  Gary Mitchell had resented Sean’s decision, arguing an R&D project could compromise the stability of production servers. He remained vocal in his opposition over the last half-year, and since he couldn’t take out his frustration on Sean, he took it out on David and his team. Eager for any excuse to get ELOPe booted from what he regarded as his own backyard, Gary scrutinized their every action.

  “Hey, you can hardly blame him,” Mike said. “We’re using five hundred times more processing power than we predicted, which has got to be a record for any research project. We’re like a black hole for computational resources.”

  David ignored his lighthearted tone. Amid the glitter and glamour of the party, and despite their efforts to cheer him up, a burning resentment rose in David’s stomach. The project was an ideal match for his technical skills, in an area he was deeply passionate about, and also strategically important to the company. It was the kind of perfect storm that came along once or twice in a career, if you were lucky. Damn it, he just wanted the thing to succeed.

  He swallowed his champagne in a gulp. “I’ve given ELOPe everything and we’re so close. I’m not going to let this opportunity get away from me.”

  Chapter 1

  David arrived at the executive conference room ten minutes early, his throat dry and butterflies in his stomach. He struggled to keep his mind focused on preparing for the presentation, pushing aside his nervousness. Project managers rarely, if ever, presented to the entire Avogadro Corp executive team.

  He was the first to arrive, which meant he could set up without pressure. Syncing his phone with the room’s display took only a few seconds. There was no overhead projector here, just a flush-mounted panel in the wall behind him. He ran his hand over the polished hardwood desk and leather chairs. It was more than a small step up from the plastic and fabric in the normal conference rooms.

  David took some comfort in the ritual of getting coffee. He poured two raw sugars into a steaming mug and smiled at the lavishly-stocked buffet containing everything from tea and juice to breakfast pastries and lunch foods. Avogadro was an egalitarian, geek-culture company, but top executives had their perks.

  Still no one had arrived, so he wandered around the room admiring the view. The dominant feature was the Fremont Bridge over the Willamette River. In the foreground, loft buildings dotted the Pearl District and, to the right, taller structures marked Portland’s downtown. Directly to the east, close to where the upper slopes of Mount Hood lost themselves in dense cloud, the early morning sun broke through a rent in the overcast, sending shafts of light to paint the city orange and rose. He was just wondering if he could see his own house in northeast Portland when he heard a welcoming “Hello David.”

  Sean Leonov entered alongside a tall, dark-haired man, whom David at once recognized from photos and articles: Kenneth Harrison, Avogadro’s other cofounder, respected throughout the company. Sean shook David’s hand and introduced them.

  Other senior vice presidents started to file in, and Sean briefly introduced each in turn. David shook hands or gave nods as appropriate, his head swimming with names and roles.

  For a few minutes, a cocktail party atmosphere reigned as people grabbed food and coffee and socialized. They gradually took seats, arranging themselves in something resembling a pecking order around Sean and Kenneth. One seat at the head of the table was conspicuously empty.

  When the bustle of arriving attendees died down, Sean stood. “I’ve already introduced you to David Ryan, the lead for the ELOPe project. I hired David two years ago to prove the feasibility of a radical new feature for AvoMail. He’s done an incredible job, and I invited him here to give you a look at what he’s developed. Prepare to be amazed.”

  “Thank you, Sean,” David said, walking to the front of the room. “Thanks, everyone, for coming.”

  He thumbed his phone to project his first slide, a black and white of a secretary leaning over a typewriter. “One of the early corrective technologies was Liquid Paper,” he said, to chuckles from the audience. “Highly innovative in its own time, it allowed typists to reduce the rework associated with correcting an error. But correction fluid was nothing compared to the spellchecker, a tool that both detected and corrected errors automatically.” In the background, the slide changed to a photo of a man using a first-generation personal computer.

  “Years later, as processing power increased, grammar checkers were invented. First generation software detected only trivial mistakes, but later versions evolved to both detect and fix a wide range of problems including purely context-dependent issues. These corrective technologies started out in word processors and gradually worked their way throughout the whole suite of communication tools from presentation editors to email.” He paused, enjoying the storytelling.

  David focused his attention on one executive at a time, making eye contact with them before he moved to the next. “Today, the standards of business communication have changed. It’s not enough to have a grammatically checked, correctly spelled email to be an effective communicator. You must intimately know what your recipients care about and how they think in order to be persuasive, using the right mix of compelling logic, data, and emotion to build your case.”

  Pleased to see he had everyone’s rapt attention, he went on. “Sean hired me two years ago to test an unproven concept: an email language optimization tool to help users craft more compelling, effective communications. I’m here today to show you the results of our work.”

  He flipped slides again, popping up a timeline.

  “In the first twelve months, through data mining, language analysis, and recommendation algorithms, we proved the feasibility of the core building blocks. Then we set about in earnest to integrate those pieces in the Email Language Optimization Project, or ELOPe.”

  David clicked again, and now the wall display showed a screenshot of AvoMail, the popular Avogadro web-based email. “From an experience perspective, ELOPe works like a sophisticated grammar checker. As the user edits an email, we make suggestions about the wording in the sidebar.

  “Behind the scenes, complex analysis is taking place to understand user intent and map their goal to effective language patterns we’ve observed in other users. Let me give you a very simple example you might be familiar with. Have you ever received an email from someone in which they asked you to look at an attachment, but they forgot to attach the f
ile? Or perhaps you were the sender?”

  He heard wry chuckles and a few hands went up in the audience.

  “An embarrassing mistake that no longer occurs because AvoMail looks for occurrences of the words ‘attachment’ or ‘attached,’ and checks if a file is present before sending the email. Through language analysis, we’ve improved the effectiveness of the user’s communications.”

  A woman vice president raised her hand. David struggled and failed to recall her name, and settled for pointing to her.

  “That’s a simple example of looking for keywords,” she said. “Are you talking about a stock set of phrases?”

  “No, we don’t rely on keywords at all,” David said. “I’ll explain the process, but I’d like to use a more complicated example. Imagine a manager asking for additional project funding. The decision maker will want a justification for the request. What’s the benefit to the company of the investment? Maybe a quicker time to market, or a higher return. Perhaps the project ran short of funds and is in danger of being unable to complete.”

  David relaxed a little at the sight of nodding heads as the carefully chosen example resonated with his audience of executives. “ELOPe can analyze the email, determine the sender is asking for funding, know the request should be accompanied by a justification, and provide effective examples.”

  David flipped to an auto-play slide. The short video kicked into motion, demonstrating a manager writing an email asking for an expanded budget, as suggested justifications popped up on the right-hand side. Each example already incorporated details gleaned from the original message, like the project name and timeline. David waited while the minute-long video played, noting the soft exclamations of amazement coming from the group. He smiled to himself. As Arthur C. Clarke said, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” Well, this was magic.