Easy Money Units – EMUs

EMUs first appeared in Life in the Bubble World novella,  Geoff Davis, 1997.

Easy Money Units are used for payments in the fictional universe of the Bubble World. EMUs were used as a portable currency to handle transactions from stores of value for blood, data, sperm, money. The chief evil guy was called ‘Mr Banks’.

This was published in three volumes of Em, a mixed media book from London.

EMUs were stored in handbags (wallets), which could be degraded (hacked). In the story the bags are attacked and EMUs stolen by members of the Gunn Family, who are AIs programmed to feel guilt when they shoot and kill, as a way to control lethal autonomous weapons (LAWS). But they do it anyway.

The protagonist is a fraudulent plastic surgeon. The story addresses the complications that arise when transactions are not honoured, or are converted to the advantage of larger players or aggregators.

Life in the Bubble World is online at the Geoff Davis Org website – LIBW story (new page, original layout and plugins).

An online multimedia piece was displayed during the original book publication, designed by Paul Greenleaf. The two illustrations shown here are from that. The Em book cover here was designed by Charlie Mitchell, who also did 3D and print illustrations for the story.

Easy Money Units in 1997 are an early published instance of an electronic currency, with a structure and a purpose (criminal). The story was written around 1995, originally for Elaine Palmer’s Pulp Faction series. My previous cyberpunk novel Nnn Goes Mobile was published in 1994, and was distributed by Forbidden Planet. Other fiction includes my first story in PEN New Fiction, with Ben Okri, Deborah Levy, Iain Sinclair, etc., edited by Peter Ackroyd.

The first cryptocurrency was eCash, from David Chaum’s DigiCash 1990.

‘Credits’ have been used in SF stories since the 1930s. For a list of SF books with electronic currencies please visit:

https://cointelegraph.com/news/sci-fi-books-that-had-told-us-about-crypto-before-satoshi-did (new page)

Circular River, the new novel by Geoff Davis, explores Universal Basic Income UBI and features electronic currency Easy Money Units EMUs. This is to be published early 2024.

This is Geoff Davis’s new site for writing, research and more, please visit.

Please see my new site Micro Arts Group for computer art and story generators from the 1980s to 2023. The top image on this site is from there.

Contact using geoffdavis5 AT gmail DOT com

All rights reserved Geoff Davis / Story Software 1997-2023, and the artists.