Part 3 (1/2)
”What's Gibly?”
”It's the software behind mobile payments, like for the iPhone. Gibly makes buying stuff with your phone easy; that's why they do the voice-to-text software, so you can just speak and buy. Last night, Gibly was sold to some company in England for like 3.8 billion dollars and all these guys at this party made crazy money off of it.”
”That doesn't sound so complicated. Why did someone pay so much for it?” Amelia went back to her computer and started typing something.
”Exactly! It's not that complicated.” Adam's hangover was replaced by excitement as he leaned against his sister's desk. ”It's not that complicated for someone like you. You could do something like that in your sleep, and we could build it into a company and make a killing and never have to worry about anything again.”
”Adam.” Amelia stopped typing and took a long look at her brother.
”Money causes problems. The pursuit of money causes problems, and I don't like the way you're thinking.”
”But . . . ”
”I don't want to hear it,” she snapped. Adam looked at his sister, stunned. ”We haven't had the best luck, Adam. The way you're speaking, the way you sound . . . You sound like . . . ” She trailed off. ”This type of thinking has gotten us into trouble before.” Amelia turned back to her computer and lowered her voice so as not to wake Patty. ”In our new life, I program because it's the one thing in the world I absolutely love doing. It's interesting and inspiring and occasionally creates something that makes the world an easier place to live in. Money ruins everything. It will ruin our lives.”
”Don't be selfish.”
”I'm sorry?”
”You're being selfish, Amelia. You have talents that you can share with the world. Sitting in a lab by yourself, creating programs that could help people but don't because you're too stuck on not exposing them, is selfish.”
”I didn't say-”
”And not using your talents to help us get out of where we are-I mean, I would do it for you, Amelia. In a second. If I had your talent, and I knew it could help us, I wouldn't hesitate.”
”I did try to use my talents to help us once, Adam, and it didn't exactly turn out well,” Amelia snapped back.
”That was totally different. This is totally different. This is setting up a legitimate company that legitimately helps people and makes money- lots of money- in a totally legitimate way.” Amelia had tuned her brother out and was busy looking at her computer. ”That company was called Gibly, right?”
”From the party? Yeah, Gibly.”
Amelia was typing furiously, her brow furrowed in confusion.
”What is it?” Adam asked. ”What's wrong?”
”This is a little sketchy.” Amelia said to her computer screen, then typed some more.
Adam was staring at his sister, his face a mixture of nervousness and excitement. ”What do you mean by 'sketchy'?”
”Adam, if this is right- I mean, if I'm in the right place . . . yes, I'm definitely in the right place. Adam, Gibly's tracking their users' information in a major way.”
”What do you mean? What does that matter?”
”I mean, they've put tags on all their users, and there are, like one hundred million of them. And they're not only tracking all the websites they go to, they're using GPS to track users' locations at every moment.
Come look at this.”
Adam walked over to Amelia's side of the computer screen, where she'd pulled up a database with lines of information.
”How'd you do that?” Adam asked.
”I went into their platform.”
”You mean you hacked in?”
”I'm just peeking in. Here, let's find you. Read the number off the back of your phone.”
Adam flipped over his phone. ”A6829.”
Amelia did a quick search, but then shook her head, ”Either I entered the number incorrectly or you were at a place called Hanky Panky in Redwood City at two a.m.”
Adam's face turned beet red as Amelia looked up at him, ”I . . . I,” he started.
Amelia giggled. ”Oh my G.o.d! You were at a strip club?!”
”I went with T. J.! It was his graduation party and he was helping me think through all this. Whatever. The point is, that's totally right and totally weird. Why would anyone want to know where I was all the time?”
”How did you put it a moment ago? To make money? Adam, can you imagine how powerful you'd be if you had tabs on where one hundred million people were at any given moment? If you had that information, you could sell for, like, $3.8 billion or so.”
”But who would want that? I mean, who would care where I was at any given moment?”
”Beats me. What company did you say acquired it?”
”An English company. Lords or L . . . Lloyd's? Yeah, Lloyd's. That was it.” Amelia went back to typing. ”Lloyd's is just a holding company. It looks like they own a grocery store chain and an auto manufacturer and a few other random companies in the UK and Europe. Why would they buy a technology company?”
Adam waited while his sister continued to search for the answer.
”Here's a Wall Street a.n.a.lyst report that says they're trying to diversify.
That everyone's getting into technology now. I guess that's true. But why would you spend $3.8 billion to get into a new industry?” She typed some more. Adam could see the excitement on his sister's face, and he loved it.
”Whoa!”
”What?” Adam couldn't stand it. ”What is it?”
”Lloyd's! Lloyd's has been collecting ten-million-dollar payments from someone called VIPER every week for the past . . . year.”
”No way. How did you find that out?”
”I hacked-I peeked into their company accounts,” Amelia said nonchalantly.
Adam looked at her, jaw dropped. ”You're ridiculous. You know that, right?”
Amelia rolled her eyes. ”Just look at this.” She pointed to the accounts.