Who/What They Are: Robots are the super-geeks of the New Media Caste System. Part human, part machine, Robots are the central repository of all data that makes a Technology company run. Robots know everything from what your login password is to what sites you like to visit during lunchtime to every move you make in and around the office (Watch those cameras mounted on the side of the building!). When not reading your e-mail or performing other intelligence tasks for Management, Robots are plugging themselves directly into the network to monitor the root directories and to feel the gentle flow of packets hitting the proxy server. Robots also have sole access to all source code and dll's, so that in the event of their dismantling or destruction by the NetSlaves they employ, the company would cease to exist. Their current indispensability aside, Robots didn't always have things so well-configured. In previous incarnations, before upgrading themselves in more ways than one, Robots were lowly Garbagemen and Fry Cooks. (A word to wise-ass out there: Don't even bother to remind Robots of what they used to be; it has been erased from their memory banks. As far as they know they were always CTO's and other high-ranking machinery with a direct link into the Central Hub.)

Where They Can Be Found: Robots, thanks to the gizmos that serve them, can exist in many places at once and none in particular. In terms of physical location, Robots are most often found in server rooms, wire closets, switching stations -- basically anywhere that offers maximum exposure to Technology and minimum interaction with human beings. On rare occasions when corporate protocol forces them to address carbon-based life forms in vivo, Robots speak in rapidfire, direct sentences about a recent system upgrade or successful installation, take a quick bow and rush away to their secret hideaway in the fifth-floor ventilator duct to recharge. Under normal circumstances, however, Robots communicate solely through e-mail -- they even use it respond to phone messages. Of course, no one (at least no one in their right senses) minds the situation, as most of their missives consist of Policy Announcements ("Users should be reminded to powerdown their workstations before leaving for the evening.") and Outage Explanations ("The mail configuration was off-line from 12:00 hours, Friday to 14:00 hours, Sunday due to an unforeseen power persistence issue." Translation: the bloody thing was unplugged.)

How to Spot Robots in a Crowd: If their antennae isn't a dead giveaway, watch for at least six alphanumeric pagers lining their belts, an oversized laptop (with mini-satellite uplink) and a 3,000-page SNMP manual suspended from their gleaming domes by a repurposed phone cord.

Average Salary: 200K

Percentage of NetSlaves Population: 1.5%

Fueling Patterns: Since they are not constrained by the same dietary laws that leave other Workers of the Web worried about their ever-climbing cholesterol counts, Robots feast solely on high-octane, low-nutrition treats, including Philly Cheese Steaks, Curly Fries, Bacon Double Cheese Burgers, Ice Cream Sundaes (with extra fudge), Doughnuts and two-liter Cokes by the score. NOTE: Anyone who has ever entered the office restroom after a Robot has been in there knows that such fueling patterns are not without side effects -- the gaseous stench and steam rising from the stall where the "downloading" occurred are enough to make even the toughest NetSlave lose consciousness.

Marital Status: None (Even though rumors of an IPO have made some of the young interns take notice -- only to be totally ignored. Reason: genitalia is a strange interface.).

Favorite Off-Line Activities: None (Robots are always networked in some shape or fashion.).

Things That Make Robots Whistle with Approval: Nothing gets their approval processors working overtime like a printout of an architecture schematic that takes up an entire wall, a whiteboard filled with process flows or the 2-second improvement in throughput, thanks to the recent installation of yet another T3.

Things That Make Their Mood Consoles Flash Red: In addition to interpersonal contact of any kind (See above.), Robots also hate being proved wrong -- especially by an underling -- and getting chewed out by the Boss for a technical disaster that could have been avoided (NOTE: The latter situation occurs only rarely, under the most extreme circumstances, as: 1) Most Robots are too well-constructed to malfunction in any significant way; 2) The last thing any Boss wants to do is piss off a Robot, for fear that they would screw up the system beyond repair before walking out the door with the source code and the rest of the company's digital assets.).

Living Arrangements: Robots return to their central storage units rarely, if at all, and given the narrow dimensions and clutter, must navigate through stacks of discarded equipment (Anyone looking for a "Lisa" out there?) and be very careful not to tip anything over, just to reach the bed.

How Robots View the Internet: "The Internet is an open network of computers, using the distributed model of ... "

How Robots View the NetSlaves They Employ: Garbagemen, Fry Cooks -- these are the people who work for Robots. But missing any sort of "sympathy" registry, Robots view them simply as tools serving the larger machine. The first sign of inefficiency, or even the possibility of working with better tools, will find the Robot sending the parties in question an electronic pinkslip and informing them that if they are not off the premises in exactly 20.3 minutes (the average time it takes NetSlaves to pack of their desks), they will be physically expelled by the "Security Robot", specially designed for such occasions.

Distinguishing Physical Traits: Bald head, strong body odor, the same rumpled, torn, stained Chinos they've been wearing since assembly 3.8 years ago.

Psychological Profile: 11111000000001111100000011.

Career Aspirations: To beta the next-generation Intel chip, which when inserted beneath the skin of the forehead, allows the user to open doors and perform point-and-click tasks upon mental command.
 

<Level 12.0: Bank Robbers>