Toilet Wars

Based on a slightly true story...

A long time ago, in a city far, far away, a worker at the helm of the municipal waterworks control panel noticed a peculiar phenomenon consisting of regular, sudden significant pressure drops lasting only a few minutes each. Timing them, an odd repeating sequence appeared, with wider, deeper pulses every half hour and shorter, shallow pulses surrounding every ten minutes between.

Forced to work one Superbowl Sunday, e (he/she) brought along a tiny TV, which would be "monitored" along side other critical "gauges". E (She/He) would keep close eye on the game; e's (his/her/s) attendance punctuated by commercial breaks where e would dash off to keep an eye on the equipment e was paid to observe. This would lead to a discovery of epic importance: Each time e went to check his gauges the pressure readings would make a sudden plunge - each commercial break.

This discovery led em (him/her/them) to conclude that the pressure drop was being caused by simultaneous toilet flushings, which were the unintended unanimous voice of thousands of football fans. Further, e deduced, one could determine what channel was being watched by the precise timing of the pressure drop.

E notified e's supervisor, who was quick to recognize the potential of this discovery. Together, they called the largest television network in the country, offering them a ratings gathering system that was far more accurate than a survey. "We can extrapolate our data to tell you what percentage of viewers likely saw which cluster of commercials. We can even tell you what section of the city was more interested in the commercials than the washroom. We're certain that with a little time, we may even be able to detect individual flushings."

Excited, the network immediately sponsored the installation of highly precise measurement and analysis devices. They adjusted - ever so slightly - the timing of their commercials. They judiciously arranged which type of product would be advertised when. They had even begun to attempt control over peoples toidy habits. Power had indeed corrupted this water-network alliance.

Weeks later, after many experiments and prototype devices, they had realized the ability to measure or extrapolate the "business" of each and every individual household across the city. They could see what shows families were watching, or what time wealthy singles were rising in the day. They used super-sensitive hydraulic pressure sensors to detect the "sound" of faucets being turned on and off through the pressurized supply water: Thirty percent of households need new washers for their faucets, they found; then informing a washer manufacturer.

They continued many avenues of research; some yielded fine details about consumer behavior. They were able to determine the popularity of a given commercial by whether it skewed the bathroom visits from the normal level. They could place a beverage ad in one slot, then watch a corresponding bathroom break some forty minutes later. They could predict or cause commercial breaks that would be watched, by creating a lack of need for such a visit in the time slot preceding. They began to integrate the data with corresponding data from the electric company, detailing the telltale spikes of a thousand fridges being opened.

The progress continued for several months. Research, devices, techniques - and lots of money. Then one day, the supervisor was at home with e's spouse, engaged a heated argument. Between battles, e decided to relax in a hot shower. Naturally, the classic tactical move of turning-on-and-off-of-the-taps-while-the-other-is-in-the-shower began, causing the equally classic eruption of various non-hydraulic expletives.

Amidst the deluge of vacillating temperatures - the chilling lows and scalding highs - e had a moment of epiphany. "EUREKA!!", e plagiarized: Techniques of war.

Messages sent in Morse-coded flushings and tap-turnings. Hundreds of faucets set at a trickle awaiting the signal "INVADE!". Thousands of malcontents with every tap on full, flushing night and day, depleting water pressure and causing toilets to clog everywhere - disease everywhere. Filibusters of a strange new kind - conspirators commanding "If the Republican National Convention is on television, all you Democrats get flushing!" Psychological warfare at the very seat of democracy.

E delivered this revelation to a friend, a local Democrat with connections. After a landslide win, the Democrats applied the techniques to peacetime maneuvers. Toilet flushings were used for general elections - "All in favor, flush now". "All registered toilets must flush precisely two gallons. "

A waterworks computer was proposed and passed by this newfound toiletary democracy (affectionately coined a "pee-bo-cite" by the local press) where calculations were made through Boolean algorithms comprised of a series of integrated toilet flushings. People could now vote on everything from municipal by-elections to televised trials-by-peer. People would submit their water-meter readings through a series of tap-on/tap-off codes. Meanwhile, secret votes were being held in the washrooms of City Hall.

The military eventually got wind of this, promptly finding ways of preventing enemies from laying waste to our system of democracy. "May our system of politics forever be in the toilet..." a great leader once said, "...we must defend this system to our very end." Never had more true words been spoken in these lands.