ReadingList/Cline, Ernest - Ready Player Two.md

# Title: Ready Player Two

## Author: Ernest Cline

**Started Reading**: 2020-11-24

**Finished Reading**: 2021-04-27

[Goodreads Link](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/26082916-ready-player-two?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=iWcx1KK4lO&rank=1)

---

### Reading Notes:

This book felt like such a slog at times.  It took so long to finish it.  Yet every time I picked it up I was drawn back in for a few chapters.  The problem is, it just never drew me back.  I'd eventually feel guilty that I wasn't reading it and told myself I shouldn't start something new until I finished it.  Then I'd pick it up and get engrossed for another few chapters.

It definitely suffered from the sophomore slump, and I've heard that there are plans to try to make this one a movie, too.  
Good luck with that.  It was a good book — but I don't see myself re-reading it like I did with the original.

---

Highlights:
* Cutscene
  "“In other words, the ONI allows you to relive moments of other people’s lives. To see the world through their eyes, hear it through their ears, smell it through their nose, taste it with their tongue, and feel it through their skin.” Halliday gave the camera a matter-of-fact nod. “The ONI is the most powerful communication tool humans have ever invented. And I think it’s also probably the last one we will ever need to invent.” He tapped the center of his forehead. “Now we can plug right in to the old noodle.”"


* Cutscene
  "Warning! For safety reasons, the OASIS Neural Interface headset can only be used for a maximum of twelve consecutive hours at a time. When this limit has been reached, you will be logged out of your account automatically, and you will be unable to use your ONI headset again until twelve hours of downtime have elapsed."


* Cutscene
  "As the timestamp faded away, it was replaced by a short message, just three words long—the last thing I would see before I left the real world and entered the virtual one.
			But they weren't the three words I was used to seeing. I — like every other ONI user to come — was greeted by a new message Halliday had created, to welcome those visitors who had adopted his new technology:
			
				READY PLAYER TWO"


* 0000
  "We didn't make our decision lightly. We weighed all of the pros and cons. Then, after a heated debate, the four of us held a vote. The ayes had it. And just like that, we changed the course of human history forever.
			After another series of safety trials, GSS patented the OASIS Neural Interface technology and began to mass-produce the headsets. We put them on sale at the lowest possible price, to make sure as many people as possible could experience the OASIS Neural Interface for themselves.
			
			We sold a million units that first day."
  
  Note
  This part seemed kind of rushed. I feel like we needed to hear each the  groups opinions on whether to do this or not. But I get that he needed to cover some ground to get to the next part - namely that once sales reached a certain level, the new game kicks off

* 0000
  "A few seconds after the OASIS servers reached 7,777,777 simultaneous ONI users, a message appeared on Halliday’s long-dormant website, where the Scoreboard for his contest had once resided:
			
				Seek the Seven Shards of the Siren’s Soul
				On the seven worlds where the Siren once played a role
				For each fragment my heir must pay a toll
				To once again make the Siren whole
			
			It came to be known as the Shard Riddle,"


* 0000
  "The “Siren” seemed to be a reference to Kira Morrow, Og’s deceased wife and Halliday’s unrequited love."


* 0000
  "Kira had named her Dungeons & Dragons character Leucosia, after one of the Sirens of Greek myth."


* 0000
  "Other companies made attempts to reverse-engineer the ONI headset and steal our neural-interface technology—but the software and processing power required to make the ONI technology function was all part of the OASIS. Experiences could be recorded offline as an .oni file, even a bootleg one, but the file could only be played back by being uploaded to the OASIS. "
  
  Note
  Uh oh, vendor lock in. Did they learn nothing from Apple?


* 0000
  "“Sims” were recordings made inside the OASIS, and “Recs” were ONI recordings made in reality. Except that most kids no longer referred to it as “reality.” They called it “the Earl.” (A term derived from the initialism IRL.) And “Ito” was slang for “in the OASIS.” So Recs were recorded in the Earl, and Sims were created Ito."
  
  Note
  I feel like this will get confusing if I don't remember this terminology


* 0000
  "Moderating all of this user-generated content was a challenge—and a huge responsibility. GSS implemented CenSoft, our custom strong-AI censor software, which scanned every .oni recording before it was released and flagged suspicious content for human review."
  
  Note
  Youtube?


* 0000
  "Finally, out of a mixture of disgust and desperation, I offered a billion dollars to anyone who could provide me with information on how to locate just one of the Seven Shards."
  
  Note
  Parzival turns into Sargento before the book even starts?


* 0000
  "just a few weeks after the third anniversary of the ONI’s launch, it finally happened. An enterprising young gunter led me to the First Shard."


* Level Four
  "To win the videogame of life you just have to try to make the experience of being forced to play it as pleasant as possible, for yourself,  and for all of the other players you encounter in your travels."


* 0001
  "Samantha shakes her head. “No amount of money will be able to undo the damage these headsets are going to cause,” she replies, sounding defeated now. "
  
  Note
  Seems obvious.





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