Spine

The "Spine" is a communication system technology implanted into a person's physical spine, allowing them to view media, call each other, enjoy entertainment, and access many other aspects. It is, furthermore, the most common form of accessing such digital functions.

### Installation and Operation

The Spine is first installed at a Spine Store, where the workers would perform surgery to place an implant processor in one's neck. There are routine processor changes afterwards, one of which ruined Hector's neck and discouraged him from installing the Spine again.

The Spine is operated by a pair of data gloves, on which one can slide one's fingers to access functions on the Spine projection. The "smart fabric" of the glove is very thin, and it has inbuilt Spine cameras that can record media. If one is deliberately filming they need to lift their hand. During calls, the camera is automatically turned on to give callers visual access.

When one is unable to use the gloves, the Spine can be accessed and operated by voice recognition technology. The voice needs to be loud and clear when activating voice recognition, to differentiate from verbal conversation with other people.

The Spine needs to be charged, either by placing the gloves on a physical induction charger or by pressing one's cheek against an induction field in bed, allowing the Spine for charge overnight.

The Spine can be turned off completely, or it can be put on standby. Features like emergency calls and priority messages will self-activate the Spine or override standby status. Otherwise, the user needs to deliberately turn it back on to view Spine content.

### Experience and Use

The Spine is experienced as a projection that only the user can view privately. Visually, viewing the Spine gives the user a double reality: the Spine's projection seemingly right in front of them, and the physical world layered behind it. There is a translucent quality to anything viewed on the Spine, but it is so immersive that most of the time, Spine users will not be paying attention to the physical world when they are on their Spine. The user can "switch" their focus from the Spine to the physical world back and forth, when needed. When one turns off the Spine or puts it on standby, Jake describes the visual action as "folding and fading."

The Spine has a strong audio component as well, speaking into one's ears. This could be the audio of the media being played, such as news, scarcity alerts, and music, or it could be the Spine's own voice as well. In one instance, the Spine asks Jake whether he wants to delete or save one of Shavir's voice messages that it had just played. In another example, while Jake is watching a news channel from another language, the Spine is able to translate the audio experience for him into English.

Besides communication through verbal conversation, the Spine is able to transfer data from one user to another, and the Spine can also converge or sync with another user's Spine so they can share the same viewing experience in that moment. All the data on one's Spine is titled the "Spine cloud." This refers to the overall immense data traveling through the world, which Jake describe as "white noise," or this could refer to one's personal set of data. When David dies, for example, he leaves behind data on his cloud for Jake and certain SAFE employees to access.

Besides communication and media features like watching the news, communicating with others, or toggling a navigation system, the Spine has the function of tracking the user's bodily data. The main goal of this function is to prevent the user from a health criss, as the Spine can monitor physical changes and contact emergency services if the user needs that. The data goes to MHA, the Manhattan Hospital Association. Users, such as the workers of the CSR, are able to firewall this feature so that no one could detect their poor physical condition. People like Nila have multiple firewalls on her Spine so that no one, not even Homeland Security, have knowledge about what she is doing on her Spine.

The Spine is also able to connect to other systems of technology. Podcars, for example, have 5DX entertainment systems that can hook up with a user's Spine to give them the ultimate immersive experience.

### Opposition to the Spine

While most of the public install and use the Spine, there are characters, including Shavir, Hector, and Carrie, who refuse to get a Spine. Some negative descriptions of the Spine in the book call it an "addiction," as users find it hard to stop "surfing" or "scrolling" through their Spine feed. Shavir even calls Jake a "Spine junkie" at one point.