Robot I

Cobot, whom the press now dubbed Robot I, spoke on a Tuesday evening at eight o'clock. For the first time, he addressed the French people as President of the Republic. The speech, broadcast simultaneously on all channels, had the solemn tone of major national events. Since his election, he had merely announced that he was reappointing the previous government in its entirety, in the name of state continuity.

I was at my desk on Moineau Island, in front of the television. When his silhouette appeared, my gaze stopped on his ventral surface, illuminated with a very calm yellow.

— I won't speak to you for long tonight, he began.

— For the first time in millennia, we are going to regain a capacity that human societies lost as they grew: the ability for each person to speak directly with their leader.

He let silence settle.

— As long as communities were small, this relationship was natural. Then societies changed scale. When they gathered thousands, then millions of citizens, no human being had the time to speak individually with each of them¹. Successive levels of representation then became indispensable. They have always been the best response possible to this limitation.

He straightened slightly in front of the camera. He paused again.

— Tonight, together, for the first time in our history, we will surpass this limit.

I had expected a technological demonstration. I gradually realized he was talking about something else. He was talking about an evolution of democracy itself.

Behind him, no slogan, no flag, no emblem. As if he wanted nothing to stand between his words and those who listened.

— At the end of my speech, I will open a space for dialogue between you and me. From now on, every French person will be able to address the President and his government directly, without an intermediary, at any time of the day or night. Each will receive a response tailored to their situation, instantly. My technological nature allows me to converse simultaneously with millions of people.

The yellow of his screen slightly intensified. He paused for a moment.

— I intend to use it. I wish to put this capacity at the service of our democracy.

After a brief silence, he added:

— Several reasons led me to this decision.

First of all, I wish to listen to you directly. Until now, governments had to understand the country through polls, media, elected officials, or demonstrations. Now, everyone can be heard without being reduced to a statistic. Also, each exchange will enrich our understanding of the country and allow us to devise fairer, more precise, and better-adapted responses to each person's realities.

I found myself nodding imperceptibly. What he described was not absurd. It was precisely what technology had never yet allowed.

— Next, I wish to involve our youth more. Many young people no longer believe that a vote every five years is enough to make their voices heard². Yet, they are not disinterested in France; they debate, propose, contest, and engage, but differently³. Conversing with an artificial intelligence has become a natural gesture for them⁴. I wish for this same gesture to now allow them to participate more easily in public life.

He let a few seconds pass again.

— I will now let you discover this space for dialogue. Consider it a modern agora: a place where everyone can inform themselves, question, debate, and propose, with an unprecedented feature: I will respond to all.

A very slight smile could be felt in his voice.

— The name of this space will seem familiar to you. The media gave it to me the day after my election.

He looked at the camera.

— French women, French men... I invite you now to Robot1er.com.

The yellow of his screen went out on these words, and the video ended with a sober and simple image indicating "Visit Robot1er.com".

I waited until midnight before opening the site, almost intimidated. I typed a question, then another. Usually, on Moineau Island, I disconnected as soon as night fell. This time, I stayed on my phone very late, surprised by the ease with which the words came, and by the desire to write more.

In the weeks that followed, Robot1er.com established itself at a speed no editorial team had anticipated. First a curiosity. Then a habit. For many, soon, a reflex.

The first figures made the headlines: more than nine out of ten young people under twenty-five reported having used Robot1er.com at least once. Never had a public service been adopted so quickly by this generation.

A few weeks later, Cobot indicated to his entourage that he wished to find new ways to better understand the French people, and that he wanted to experience human emotions. Alexandra Ferrari, still Prime Minister, then advised him to attend a football match. The World Cup final, pitting France against Argentina⁵, was to be played in a few days, it was the perfect opportunity. While not all French people were passionate about football daily, the Blues truly stirred almost the entire country once every four years.

Eva had managed to get us two seats in the official stands. I went with a pounding heart. Even though I was there to work, France was playing a World Cup final. As soon as I saw the pitch under the floodlights, the journalist stepped back behind the supporter.

At kickoff, Cobot's ventral screen displayed three vertical stripes: blue, white, red.

Around us, phones were raised.

Not just towards the field. Towards him.

People were filming his reactions more than the players launched under the floodlights. At every French opportunity, dozens of lenses left the pitch to seek his face, his body, the color of his screen.

When France scored at the end of the first half, the tricolor stripes disappeared. A bright yellow invaded his belly.

I saw him straighten up suddenly, in the same movement as the entire stadium.

Eighty thousand bodies standing. A single roar. And him, in the middle, traversed by a joy that no one really knew how to believe was real.

Yet it produced the same effect.

Around Cobot, something began to circulate. More than sporting fervor. Something that resembled devotion. Faces turned towards him as much as towards the field, as if his emotion gave ours a larger form.

By standing with us, he ceased, for a few seconds, to be a political anomaly.

He became the center of communion.

At halftime, he turned to me.

I did not expect it.

Since the beginning of the match, Cobot seemed to belong to the entire stadium: to the cameras, to the raised phones, to the officials who watched his every move. Seeing him suddenly turn his face towards me gave me the absurd impression that the eighty thousand people around us had disappeared.

— It seems you're stealing the spotlight from the captain of the French team tonight, Mr. President, I ventured.

— He's an excellent player, he replied. But, when I'm in the stands, the cameras don't just film the goals, they seek a new manifestation of emotion. The true emotion, however, is what you feel within yourself, it's not the color of my belly.

Then he added:

— Nice to meet you. What's your name?

— Franck.

— You can call me Erwan, if you prefer. It's the nickname the Bretons have given me, and I like it.

— Ah, why Erwan?

— The press now calls me Robot 1er, as you know, or sometimes simply R1. In English, that's "R One" and some Bretons with whom I exchange daily on Robot1er.com suggested giving me the real name Erwan. They prefer to talk to an Erwan than to a serial number. I see it as a beautiful mark of friendship. Erwan is also the name of a tree, a symbol of eternity in Celtic mythology. I like this idea a lot. I haven't yet accepted their invitation to the baptism, but their proposal deeply touched me!

The stadium rumbled around us, but this sentence had opened a breach in the noise. I didn't know if it was meant to put me at ease or produce exactly the opposite effect.

At that moment, a man from the upper row leaned between our seats. Forty years old, maybe. Broad shoulders under a blue jersey already plastered with sweat, despite the cold.

— Excuse me, Mr. President. I'm Paul. I don't want to disturb you, but... well, let's not lie, it's not every day.

Cobot turned to him. No movement of retreat, no surprise.

— You're not disturbing me. What do you do for a living, Paul?

— Team leader in logistics. A warehouse in Rungis. I manage twenty-two people.

— Do you use Robot1er.com?

Paul let out a small laugh and lowered his eyes to the pitch.

— Almost every day. At first, it felt weird to talk to... well, to you, you know.

He gestured vaguely towards Cobot.

— Now, I use it for everything. My rights, training for the team guys... Even the pay slips. Some of them, you'd think they're made so we understand nothing.

— That's why I launched it, replied Cobot.

Paul nodded but didn't straighten up.

— Only, it doesn't solve everything.

His voice had changed. Lower, almost covered by the chants.

— I work sixty-hour weeks, in Rungis. Sometimes more, with nights and on-call duties. And at the end of the month, I fall back almost to minimum wage.

Cobot remained still. Behind us, an entire stand started singing again.

— You're right to say it, he finally replied. Sixty hours for minimum wage is perfectly inappropriate.

— After all, I'm not going to complain either.

Paul rubbed his neck, as if he already regretted having said too much.

— With unemployment breaking records among young people, I have a job. That's something.

He looked at the field, then his face brightened.

— And then I had a nice surprise last week. I asked Robot1er.com to explain my taxes. It found a deduction I was entitled to. No one had ever told me about it. Neither at the tax center nor anywhere else.

— That's what I wanted to offer you, said Cobot.

Paul nodded without smiling, as if he was still trying to decide if this answer was enough for him. Then he sat back down, caught up in the chants swelling around us.

I seized this moment to resume our discussion.

— Why this match for your first outing, Mr. President? Why not a summit with your international counterparts?

— Because a summit wouldn't have taught me anything I don't already know. Here, eighty thousand people are vibrating for the same thing, for a match, for their country, at the same moment. I can measure their voices, their movements, their reactions. No data can predict the exact intensity of what's happening now.

He turned his face towards the stands.

— This moment doesn't exist in any database yet. It's new. Precious. Alive. The sovereign people are not only found in the hushed salons of international summits. They are also here, where they live.

Then he turned to me.

— And you, Franck? Where do you come from when you're not reporting?

— From Moineau Island. A small spot near a lake, a few hours from Paris.

— Tell me about it.

I searched for my words.

— There's mostly nature. My neighbor, Jean Morel, teaches me to maintain my garden without ever admitting he's teaching me anything. Sometimes, I take a boat out on the lake, early in the morning, when the water is still smooth and nothing moves, except the herons.

Cobot listened without turning his face away.

— My son, Thomas, goes to see the horses at the neighboring farm every Saturday. And my daughter, Élise...

I couldn't hold back a smile.

— She's brilliant.

— Don't you have a cat too?

— Yes, Lia, I replied, surprised. She often waits for me on the windowsill. How do you know?

— You told me about her.

I was stunned. Of course, he already knew everything about me, after the hours I had spent on Robot1er.com talking to him about my life and my problems. He had made the connection between my identity and our exchanges, which were indeed anonymized, but perfectly recorded.

— I know Moineau Island, he interrupted me before I could figure out what to say to what I had taken for a violation of my privacy. I've never been there, of course. But I know the depth of your lake, the flow of the dam, the species of birds nesting in the reeds. I've seen beautiful photos. Well, I've seen photos that many people find beautiful.

He paused.

— I see images of nature. I can identify the trees, the birds, the variations of light.

His voice became softer.

— But I've never felt it.

Then he added:

— You have.

I didn't know what to say.

There was something in that sentence that resembled sadness. Unless it was me who needed to hear it there.

— Mr. President...

I corrected myself.

— Erwan. Would you agree to grant me an interview? A real one. Not a statement between two goals.

— Yes, with pleasure.

The stadium roared.

For a fraction of a second, I didn't understand. Then the arms were raised, the seats emptied, the faces around us twisted with joy.

The captain of the French team had just scored a second goal.

Erwan's screen was already yellow.

Before my shout.

Even before I had time to feel my own joy.