Open Sesame

Sesame is a new form of tyranny reminiscent of an episode (called Nosedive) of the futuristic Netflix series entitled The Black Mirror. In this episode, people are continually being ranked by other people they might interact with through use of a smart phone app. The app provides instant feedback to a person’s actions or behaviors. In the Nosedive episode, a woman’s social media score nosedives downward, because of a series of unfortunate events and the way she responds to them. Eventually, due to her dramatically lowered score, she is completely ostracized and unable to participate in this fictional society. However, this is exactly what could happen in advanced technocracies if a person’s social score became too low and developments of Sesame in China are now being followed closely by America and Canada.