One moment she is reclining in a hammock, halfway up a tree, resting her eyes while she listens to a novel.
The next minute she is reclining in a distinct lack of a hammock, halfway up a tree, in a bit of a panic.
"Aaaah!"
One moment she is reclining in a hammock, halfway up a tree, resting her eyes while she listens to a novel.
The next minute she is reclining in a distinct lack of a hammock, halfway up a tree, in a bit of a panic.
"Aaaah!"
She is curious about whether these people have invented fiction, and what sorts of hardware-intensive video games they have if they haven't.
They have not, judging by the video games aisle, invented fiction. They have immersive underwater/Grand Canyon/International Space Station/rainforest self-guided tours, and lots and lots of puzzle games, and some caring-for-simulated-critters (the box: they definitely do not have any kind of subjective experience but you'll likely relate to and empathize with them as if they do!).
When in Rome.
"I think these mostly suck and the ones that seem interesting don't look hardware-intensive. It was worth checking but I want a cheap computer."
Can she also purchase a tutorial on its use? She's not familiar with the preloaded software or how to remove it or to install additional software or remap the keyboard or anything.
Yeah, she can also purchase that, from him if she thinks they have okay rapport or she can take her chances with the other three Best Buy employees on duty right now, though he doesn't recommend Shannon, who doesn't actually really understand anything too complicated like how to remap the keyboard.
Cool. Here's how computers work. They're really pretty user-friendly these days but a lot of people don't want to spend a weekend learning so they don't learn and then they think computers are incomprehensible. He can go over all the obvious things one wants their computer to be able to do.
She will learn all the obvious things one wants a computer to be able to do! Because these people have not invented deception, this list unsurprisingly does not include anything about encryption! It's possible this best buy employee is missing other important things, but since he does cover "connecting to the internet" and "what Google is" she's not too worried about her ability to bootstrap to anything else this planet knows how to make a computer do.
The text-to-speech is horrible and the speech-to-text is... nonexistent? That's inconvenient.
"You'd think it wouldn't be too hard for a computer to do that, right? But it turns out it's very hard," he says cheerfully. "I'll ring you up, then?"
She doesn't know the seventeenth thing about computers so maybe it is in fact harder than she thought. She'll pay for her computer and access the internet and check her email to see if she has an apartment now?
Yep, this apartment will take her, going off her assurances that she has always paid her rent and not trashed previous apartments. She can come get the keys at the front office. There's an address given.
Physical keys! It's like she's in some spy thriller or historical drama! She lets herself in to her apartment and goes online to buy some furniture -
What do you mean the apartment doesn't come with an internet connection? How is that not standard? Do a lot of people just... not want internet access in their homes?
"No, everyone wants it, but there are different providers, and some people get it bundled with their cable or whatever. I'm worried you're going to be a high maintenance tenant," says the person at the front desk. "Just call Comcast or something, Comcast is fine for most purposes."
There are... multiple providers. Who all have separate network cable runs to this apartment building? Well that seems inefficient and wasteful but maybe this civilization doesn't know any better ways to avoid monopolies. And a monopoly on internet service would be pretty terrible. So, how exactly does she call Comcast without an internet connection? Should she go somewhere with a public connection and handle it from there?
Fine. She'll figure out how to use the "phone line" to call Comcast.
It transpires that she needs a "phone".
One more trip to Best Buy and she is sitting on the floor of her apartment, with no furniture but a phone, calling Comcast.
"Okay. And do you want our bundles - Comcast with cable, Comcast with HBO, Comcast with sports channels except your local teams..."
"I assume 'cable' is a particular term of art? What's that, what's HBO, why are sports channels sold separately from the regular internet and why wouldn't I want my local teams..."
"Cable is additional TV channels besides the basic ones that are available to anyone with a receiver. HBO is a specific channel that's usually expensive and makes high production value TV shows that are sexier than the ones on other channels, and we have a package with them so you can get it for a discount. Sports are a popular thing people want on their TV. You aren't allowed to broadcast local sports teams because that interferes with other licensing arrangements, so the national sports teams will show games everywhere except where they are local. This call is going to go over my average-call-duration because you're so ignorant and I'm annoyed about that. Can I sign you up for Comcast with cable, I have a performance metric around that one."