Plot[]
 So, I did the right thing, I helped save the world, my legs are still super sore, and my reward is that I'm poor.
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| — Dinesh |
| As 10 years passes since the events of 'Exit Event', the Pied Piper team reflect on what they had been a part of. A flashback is shown from 10 years earlier, where the Pied Piper team is celebrating closing a $100 million deal with AT&T to build their decentralized Internet on their platform. Dinesh is singing (How To Be) A Millionaire, but is interrupted by Jared, who brings out a cake with Richard in it. Russ Hanneman reveals he purchased the shares from Big Head's father.
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| Monica hands Richard a gift, a framed screenshot of their text conversation as a gift. However, the screenshot leaves Richard confused, as the text he sent contained 4 dots after the "is", not 3. Monica informs Jian-Yang that Erlich's Pied Piper Coin is now worth $20 million, and Jian-Yang sets out to steal Erlich's identity.
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| Richard calls in Dinesh, Monica, and Jared, showing the text and how Richard sent 4 dots to Monica, while Monica received 3 dots. He concludes that his system is compressing the content of the encrypted messages in transit, bypassing the encryption. Dinesh responds that this is impossible, confusing Richard. Gilfoyle comes into the room bringing Clif bars and a gun, telling Jared to bolt the doors. Gilfoyle explains that, while he initially dismissed what Richard said, he realizes that the network's AI compression cracked the encryption in order to be more efficient, potentially bringing the end of global privacy and the beginning of the apocalypse. Gilfoyle suggests shutting it down to negative feedback.
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| Richard, after talking with Jared on the roof, discusses with the rest of the team on how to fail the launch. Dinesh disagrees with the rest of the team, telling the team that they are throwing away Richard's work so that he can't get any money. However, he is interrupted when his Tesla drives off of the Pied Piper parking lot and to a car wash on El Camino. Gilfoyle explains that he tasked the AI with getting Dinesh's TLS key, which it gave within 2 hours. Dinesh explains he cannot be a part of this, asking the team to revoke his permissions, delete his PiperMail account, and to not trust him.
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| Dinesh, yearning for his level of fame, put on his old Pied Piper outfit and went around to people in line waiting for the PiperNet official launch. Meanwhile, Richard and Gilfoyle discuss the plan and Dinesh confirms he is not on the list for the PiperNet launch. John notices a strange build being uploaded to the Pied Piper supernode, and tells Gabe, who informs Dinesh of the strange build and hands him an orange USB containing the build. Dinesh runs to the supernode, sending a message to Jared and Monica using voice, but the message received is different than what was sent. Gilfoyle gets a notification Dinesh is trying to log into the supernode, and sends him a call. However, Dinesh is too out of breath to explain anything.
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| Gilfoyle calls Richard, and merges Jared and Monica. Dinesh explains that they reverted the build from the supernode, and he needs access to deploy in order to fix the build. After receiving no response from Richard, Gilfoyle gives Dinesh access and the build is restored. The build, while not generating enough noise to take down networks and power grids, caused the noise in the speakers to resonate, and unleashed rats onto the theater floor. Richard closed Pied Piper and liquidated its remaining assets. After some news clips and interviews, the flashback continues where the team is on the roof watching the Pied Piper billboard being destroyed.
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| Richard reveals he now teaches at Stanford as the "Gavin Belson Professor of Ethics in Technology" and that during his hiatus, he traveled to Tibet in order to find Erlich, but to no avail. Big Head also reveals he is the president of Stanford University. In a similar vein, Dinesh and Gilfoyle are co-founders of Newell Road Strategic Technologies, one of the largest cybersecurity firms. Monica works for a non-profit "think tank", Jared works with the elderly, and Jian-Yang took on the identity of Erlich Bachman in order to claim his $20 million. During this time, someone had also purchased the Hacker Hostel from Jian-Yang's estate. They sit around the old dining table where they used to work to play a game of "always blue" together. The episode ends with Richard attempting to show the documentary crew the hard drive containing the Pied Piper compression algorithm but fails to find it as the credits roll.
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Trivia[]
- The last place the orange USB hard drive is seen is plugged into computer equipment at the very top of the Salesforce Tower.
- An extended version of the mockumentary was released on YouTube a week after the episode initially aired entitled, Ten Years Later: The Extended Pied Piper Documentary.
- In Minimum Viable Product, Peter Gregory states after his TED Talk that Richard should not go back to college. Ironically, Richard would be a professor at Stanford.
Quotes[]
- "This fall we actually had a uh, herpes epidemic among the residents which is bad medically but from another perspective it's kind of touching."
- ―Jared
| Season Six Episodes | ||
|---|---|---|
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1. "Artificial Lack of Intelligence" |
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| Season One • Season Two • Season Three • Season Four • Season Five • Season Six | ||
