A stretch, yes. But it’s an interesting model for understanding what communication is. By telling you this, I am manipulating you into understanding my point of view and hopefully getting you to agree with me.

It’s important to note that not all manipulation is negative. I should hope parents manipulate their children into being aware of safety.

Even chit-chat could be seen as manipulating each other into “being social” but even I would say that’s a long shot.

The Dutch system does have fractional representation and multi-party coalition governments, and still the far-right is on the rise.

This is a complex situation, not simply fixed with a magic bullet of voting reform.

Not problems… Opportunities!

(For a select group of already-wealthy people)

You’d think that euronews, a European news org, would know the difference.

Nothing about Lapland in this article 🤷

I agree, but this billionaire can do what few communities can: invest in scale.

Overall I still think this is good news.

I believe some websites say “fuck it, fuck them” and block European IPs rather than put in the work to become GDPR compliant

Also, why not just do what happened with Iodised salt in the real world?

Add a tiny amount of dietary enzymes to certain foods you’re sure will be consumed anyway. Provide the food industry with these supplements free of charge but check this supply strictly. The consumers don’t pay extra but they will have the necessary enzyme intake to stay healthy. If criminals want to extract Intium, they will be forced to buy these food products in insanely infeasible quantities.

Given this scenario, as a policy-maker I would start with statements explaining the issue in a press conference. This should create public support for further measures. I assume the properties of Intium are understood by the general public, as are the reasons for the heavy regulation. The least motivated of the abusers might even come to realise that what they are doing is bad.

After this, my first short-term policy decision is to limit the amount of Intium supplements any one customer can pick up from the grocery store in one visit. Say six months worth (24 pills if once-weekly intake is normal). Stores in our world already do that sometimes when they are running a limited promotion and it’s not too hard to implement. Using existing infrastructure, just asking cashiers to made sure customers can only check out one box at a time.

If these pills only contain trace amounts of Intium, this policy will make profitable backyard chemistry impossible. Going up a level, any organised crime boss will understand that paying people to visit multiple stores and collect enough supplements to process, will cost more than the value of the Intium gained. Of course I would also have the law enforcement agencies conduct investigations into such practices.

If the problem still persists through corruption in supply chains or ineffective enforcement, I would use the population registry to compile a list of those creatures that truly need the supplements. A new government service would be created that mails these recipients their allocation of supplements. Existing government facilities like post offices or pharmacies can also start dispensing smaller quantities without any registration required.

Creating an extra government agency is of course only logical if the costs of manufacturing the misused supplements outweigh the savings that such a service would provide.

Concurrent with all of these steps, I would speak with the pharmaceutical industry and ask if it were possible to create a supplement that did not contain any Intium. Given the high-tech nature of your society, I believe this would be possible.

Even if you limit it by range, like only recolouring things within 1 meter of where you touch… It’d still be a great power! Imagine the money you’d make, flawlessly painting whole rooms in seconds.

What are the titles of those books? I think there are six in the original series by Frank Herbert and there are many other books by his son Brian. I haven’t read all of those.

Yeah! The first sequel, Foundation’s Edge, was excellent! It was written with as much if not more depth as the original series. The second sequel, Foundation and Earth, however seemed like a pulp novel by comparison. The story was simplistic and the conclusion pretty disappointing, although it did bring up an interesting quandary about the future of the galaxy.

What slowed me down a lot with Dune were the many different, unfamiliar names. Once that clicked, the story started unfolding by itself and I could not stop myself reading. It’s been a long time since I first read the original books, but I think I finished all six of them in less than a month. I hope it clicks for you too!

I totally agree. This series, along with the original Dune novels, is the bedrock of my love for sci-fi.