// CONTENTS
In February 2016 I went to Las Vegas for work and met an android.
Strictly speaking, I met Brent Spiner, the actor who played Lieutenant Commander Data on Star Trek: The Next Generation. But the sign said “Data,” the event was about data, and I was in town to install a data visualizer. It was that kind of week.
The Day Job
I was there for IBM Interconnect, a conference at Mandalay Bay. At Helios I was lead developer on the Interconnect Data Visualizer: IBM’s products and services drawn as a network of glowing nodes, on big tilted touch tables that visitors explored with their hands.
On this trip my job was to oversee the installation. The visualizer ran at four stations on the show floor for four days. That’s sixteen station-days in which something can go wrong in front of a client.
It had a secret, too. Hidden inside one of the nodes was a memory game in the style of Simon. One attendee reached a score of 16, which unofficially beat the Guinness world record of 14. I was filming when it happened, and I wrote it up afterwards in my dev log. I like to imagine that person went back to their desk and told no one.
That was the work. Then there was the sign.
The Sign
It stood on an easel on the show floor.
“Meet Brent Spiner, ‘Data’ from Star Trek. At the ‘Open For Data Dome.’ Tuesday, 6:30 PM.”
And underneath, in smaller type, the directions: “located in the Mandalay Bay Parking Lot near the shark tank entrance.”
I have rarely needed less persuading, and the sign still threw in a shark tank.
IBM had put up a pop-up dome for the conference and called it Open for Data. Once you’ve named a dome Open for Data, there is really only one guest to book. I respect a company that commits to the bit.
Our Favorite Star Trek
Kohaku was in Las Vegas with me, and The Next Generation is our favorite Star Trek series. Both of ours.
Data is a big part of why: an android who can out-think everyone on the ship, and who spends seven seasons trying to work out what it means to be human. A beloved character, and the man who played him was going to be in the parking lot.
So we seized the opportunity. That Tuesday evening we went looking for a dome in a parking lot.
Inside the Dome
It was dark inside. Numbers were projected across the ceiling, a big LED sign glowed OPEN FOR DATA, and a waiter went by with a tray.
And we met him.
I came away with this.
“To Corey.”
In silver ink, in his own hand.
What I Took Home
Data has a way of turning up in what Kohaku and I make.
For Kohaku’s World, the live show Kohaku and I made, I built a parody of the Next Generation title sequence and called it “The Previous Generation.” And when I commissioned a poster for the show, Data went on it, right behind Kohaku’s shoulder, phaser drawn.
Here’s what I take from that week. I didn’t go to Las Vegas to meet anyone. I went to make sure four screens kept working. But the job is what put me on that floor, in front of that easel, and building things for a living keeps doing that. It puts you in rooms you’d never have found on your own.
Sometimes the room is a dome in a parking lot. Go anyway.
These days a lot of what I build is AI agents. None of them is Data. That’s fine.
I’ve met the original.