Whether it ’s theFBI secretly using Snapchat filtersto represent all our faces orApple ’s alleged plotted obsolescence scheme , people love a good tech - related conspiracy . So , naturally , the phenomenal success ofPokémon Gohas birthed some truly exceptional theory about its dismal docket .
If the tin can foil - hatted internet sleuthers are to be believed , the massively popular Pikachu - packed augmented reality game is nothing more than a convenient misdirection deploy by the CIA and Michelle Obama in social club to keep the sheeple calm while they collect all our individual data . Or something like that . Here are some of the batshit crazy theories we ’ve found .
It’s to distract us from the news and keep us from rioting
Mere days after it reach the app entrepot last week , rumors circulated on Twitter that it was really a false flag crusade , deployed in the Wake Island of the tragic shootings so as to distract protester and lull everyone down . This is downright absurd since the game wasalready being play in Japan as far back as March , but for the cynic among us it paint a picture that it would n’t take much for the regime to get us to look the other way – but calculate the release of some silly biz that hits the addictive / nostalgic sweet-scented post .
It’s an agent of capitalism to get us into stores and buy stuff
Of all the crazy theories out there , we must accommodate , this one holds the most body of water . Pokémon Gowas build by Niantic , the same developer that built another , much less successful augmented realness game calledIngress . They harnessed a mountain of the exploiter data point from Ingress to ramp up out the single-valued function features ofPokémon Go(this is why people have been findingPokéstops in horribly inappropriate berth ) , which is interesting because of what Ingress ' data was ultimately intended for : advertising .
It’s a surveillance and intelligence-gathering tool for the CIA and/or Google
Pokémon Goaccesses an aggressive amount of your personal information . SeveralredditorsandJames Corbett , of the decidedly fringe situation The Corbett Report , believe that Niantic – the game ’s developer – is just acting as a creature for Google , which own the society until last year . The possibility is that they ’re helping Google build a database of maps of the Department of the Interior of peoples ' homes , building , or other private spaces that Google Van and the society ’s single-valued function squad do n’t have access to , by simply tap into players ' cameras .
The other argument is that they ’re collecting all this info ( and solicit your photographic camera ) for the CIA . The truthers trace this all back to Niantic Lab ’s beginner and CEO , John Hanke . Before Niantic , Hanke started Keyhole , Inc – a software package company whose groundbreaking mapping platform eventually became Google Earth – with avail from the CIA ’s own venture majuscule arm , In - Q - Tel . Just some food for thought as you chamfer that Snorlax around your apartment .
It’s the big wireless carriers' scheme to make you pay for more data
If you ’re one of the bajillion hoi polloi currently in the throes of aPokémon Goaddiction , you ’ve probably notice it drains the hell out of your battery . You may have also point out it ’s a data pig like none other . Could it be that Verizon , AT&T , Sprint , T - Mobile , and other toter colluded with Niantic in rules of order to create a guaranteed hitting of a game that would also eat through your data plan and force you to furcate over overage fees like a despairing junkie?Some hoi polloi seem to guess so .
It’s Michelle Obama’s way of getting kids to go play outside
Ahhhh , that gratifying , sweet life as a lame - duck president . People seem to think that since the Obamas clearly have nothing else going on , they determine to dream upPokémon Goas one final push to wire Michelle’sLet ’s Move!campaign . After mark how speedily it ’s mobilized an otherwise sedentary universe of young the great unwashed , quite a few are meditate that this was all just a brilliantly executed stunt to get kids exercise out of doors . Which , well , you sleep with … there are risky things .
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Daniel Fishel/Thrillist
