It was exactly 7:30 after dinner, the classic "News Broadcast" time, and it was Lao Lu's family tradition to watch the news while digesting.
Simon didn't like watching the news; he didn't understand it when he was little, and he didn't have time to watch it when he grew up. What annoyed him most was that, in the words of his elders, children who liked watching the news were considered smart and mature.
Hey, I liked watching cartoons when I was a kid, so what?
Comrade Lu Jiande brought two yoga mats into the living room. Like all home fitness equipment, the yoga mats had unconsciously become seat cushions. In a while, they might even be forgotten in the storage room.
"Come, cross-legged." Lu Jiande sat up straight, his left leg over his right. This was a very simple cross-legged position. Simon also imitated his father, sitting cross-legged, but still a bit wobbly.
Lu Jiande tried to keep his back straight, constantly reminding Simon not to hunch over. A child's bones were soft, and he couldn't develop a hunchback.
Speaking of hunchbacks, Simon thought of the Back Corrector from back in the day. This product was advertised to cure hunchbacks, but it was actually false advertising. The marketing genius who founded the company also had other famous products under his belt, such as the Good Memory Star and Little Can Tea.
The problem of false advertising could never be truly solved. Even at the end of the century, people were still being deceived. Besides legal recourse, the only way was to continuously improve citizen quality.
At the beginning of the century, there was so-called nanotechnology and quantum wave speed reading, but by now, no one believed in them anymore. So, the scammers took their fake wine to find new bottles. In the 1950s, a type of gravitational wave remote sensing communication technology was popular, but this thing lacked market potential and quickly faded.
In the 1960s, there were gene-regulating memory-enhancing agents, which turned out to be health supplements like Brain Platinum, with no medicinal effect whatsoever.
The 1970s were the most fervent. In March 1971, a domestic technology company announced that it had developed a holographic simulation cabin that could immerse people in a virtual world, blurring the line between real and fake, a step above holographic projection. At that time, the company's stock price soared, and many other domestic and foreign technology companies successively launched their own simulation cabin product introductions. The incident further escalated, and by May, a huge bubble had formed in the simulation cabin futures market. The price of a single simulation cabin increased by 367 times in four months. There was even a saying, "One cabin, one house."
The outcome, of course, was that the simulation cabins could not be delivered, the bubble burst, the stock market plummeted, and long queues formed on rooftops. The fallout from this incident was significant. In 1975, false advertising was heavily penalized, from simple fines to the main responsible parties facing three to ten years of detention.
Hmm, it's not easy.
Simon yawned. The News Broadcast ended, and the hosts began to tidy up the documents on the table, looking neat and proper. He wondered if there was a foot bath hidden under the table?
Children didn't have much entertainment. They were not yet adults and had not been included in the social credit system, so the information they accessed online was very limited. Besides entertainment news for young children, there were various online learning platforms, and their screen time was also restricted during the day.
Simon often used search engines to gather information, and he was comforted that the gaming industry was still flourishing. Cyberpunk 2077 was long outdated, Hollow Knight had already released three sequels, the official version of the scroll of taiwu was launched in 2025 and was even more grindy, Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord came out in 2020, and Mount & Blade III has not yet been released...
However, what made him most angry was that the elder scrolls VI: Hammerfell was not released until 2062. Before that, the development team, Bethesda, had released six remakes of the elder scrolls V: Skyrim. The latest version was named the elder scrolls V: Skyrim Legendary Deluxe Platinum Special Edition.
Damn it, why don't these players ever learn? If they didn't buy their games, the elder scrolls VI would probably have been released long ago. But every time Skyrim was remade, it managed to rake in a huge sum at its original price.
Truly a timeless masterpiece!
Simon grumbled fiercely, deciding to buy all those remakes after he turned fourteen and then critique them thoroughly.
...
September 6, 2081, Saturday, clear.
Simon set his alarm for six o'clock. After a simple half-hour morning exercise, he showered, ate breakfast, and spent half an hour memorizing Spanish vocabulary.
Memorizing vocabulary also required skill. According to the Ebbinghaus Forgetting Curve theory, if you divide words into groups, spend five minutes on the first recitation of a group, then one or two minutes reviewing, recall again after half an hour, again after twelve hours, again after one day, again after two days, and finally after three more days.
Talented people could memorize seven thousand words in a month.
Simon's English was already good, so he planned to learn another language, Spanish, mainly because he liked its pronunciation, which he personally found more pleasant than French or German.
Su Xiangli sent an email.
7:31 "Su Xiangli: I'm ready. (Read)"
7:40 Reply "Understood."
7:40 "Su Xiangli: You should be leaving now. I'll wait for you on the first floor of the Skyrail Station. [Location: Ningjiang Street Skyrail South Station Bus Stop, Linhai New District, Jiangzhe City, Southeast Province] (Read)"
7:42 Reply "I'm leaving."
Simon left by himself. After walking for a while, his little brother followed him: "(^?^●)?? Mr. Lu said he wanted me to accompany you to be safer."
"It seems he didn't have enough instant noodles." Simon had originally wanted his little brother to stay home and cook for his incompetent father, but Comrade Lu Jiande once again showed his true colors.
This time, the outing team consisted of three little ones. Little friend Zhang Yingxuan came from a strict family and couldn't go out, which was a great pity. He had already sent an email wishing his three friends a good time and asking them to take some photos for him to view.
"...Sincerely, Zhang Yingxuan." Sitting on the bus, Simon carefully read the email, quite surprised. Such formal written language, wasn't it probably ghostwritten by his father?
Sure enough, another email arrived a short while later.
7:45 "Zhang Yingxuan: That was my dad just now.:-P (Read)"
7:45 Reply "The Emperor knows."
7:46 "Zhang Yingxuan:????"
Simon put away his phone with a smile.
It was quite inconvenient without chat software these days; it was a shame to miss out on much of the fun of group chats. However, email could suffice, and citizens with social credit level three or above could also set up temporary chat rooms, which had a similar effect to group chats.
By the time Simon arrived at the Skyrail Station, the two little girls had already arrived, each holding a cup of juice and looking around from the waiting area. When Su Xiangli saw Simon, she jumped onto the seat and waved at him, a movement that startled Baiyang Yangzhen next to her.
"Sorry, I'm late."
Su Xiangli wrinkled her nose, "Bad guy, no manners."
"You know about manners?"
Qiu Qiongzh watched them bicker silently from the side, then suddenly raised her hand.
Simon nodded at her, "This student, please speak."
"If we don't leave now, we'll miss this Skyrail."
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