A Barnyard of Entrepreneurs 8: Just Like Magic

Rooster glanced across the barnyard.  Brown Hen was jumping up and down, a huge cloud of dust all around her.  She didn't look happy.

"Are you ok?" Rooster asked, trying to avoid the dust as he strutted over.

"Does it look like I'm ok?" Hen answered.  She stomped the ground as hard as she could.  Rooster saw the problem.  Hen was stomping on her smartphone.

"What's wrong with your phone, Hen?" Rooster asked.

"What's right with my phone?" she shot back.  "For the first month it worked perfectly, just like magic."

Speckled Hen happened to be wandering by and overheard the conversation.  "Arthur C. Clarke said any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."  She beamed, feeling very wise.


Brown Hen wasn't listening.  "Yesterday it froze."  She stomped.  "Today it froze again and wiped out all my apps."  She stomped again.  The dust flew.  "Then the glass cracked."  Stomp.

Rooster wanted to be helpful.  "I had the same problem with my new computer," he said.  "It was magic for a few days but then I got hacked and someone erased all my email."

"Ouch," said Speckled Hen.  "That's the kind of magic where the magician actually saws the girl in half!"

"Maybe we've just seen so much technology," Rooster wondered, "that we finally recognize it for what it really is."

"It's magic gone wrong," said Speckled Hen.  "Like David Copperfield getting stuck in the middle of the Great Wall of China!"

"An endless series of stupid parlor tricks," Brown Hen said. "That's all."  She came down full force on her smartphone.  The dust flew.

About then Black Rat wandered by.  "I just saw the coolest thing," he said.  "A driverless car!  Driverless!  No driver!  It was a car without a driver.  Coming right down the road!"

Rat beamed but got no reaction.  "You don't understand," he said.  "It's brand new technology.  It's like magic."

Brown Hen glared, gave the smartphone one last kick, and headed over to find the marinated corn feed crumble.