So - You think you're a special beta tester?

You think you're a special beta tester? You think there's a gilded category of chosen digital elites, selected by some divine algorithm to skip the line and bask in the incandescent glow of pre-release access? No. That category doesn't exist. It never did. That's a fantasy - a delusion born in the tepid bathwater of entitlement and reinforced by the dopamine loops of social media clout. You are not special. There are no special beta testers. There are testers. There are builders. And there are spectators. And unless you've submitted a pull request with blood on it - metaphorical or otherwise - you're the third. You don't get access because you asked nicely. You don't get access because you think you're passionate or plugged in or ideologically pure. You get access when the work demands your presence, not when your ego does.

Well, you see, eh, I'm standing here today, again, under these fluorescent lights -- flickering like the half-truths of Neo-Marxist technocrats -- because apparently, in this collective hallucination we call academia, we have to answer questions like: "When will it be released?"

And to that I say, it will be released when I damn release it. Not a moment sooner, not a breath earlier. This is not some kind of utopian software commune, where the collective sloshes around in the ideological soup of equal outcomes and bug reports. This is discipline, this is truth, and this is personal responsibility in action -- not a carnival of feelings and postmodern nonsense.

But no, they -- and by "they" I mean the beta testers, the self-anointed digital elite -- they want early access, they want to be "special", they want privilege without hierarchy, and that's a contradiction, fundamentally. You can't have competence without structure, you can't ascend without effort, and you sure as hell can't be a beta tester just because you're vibing in a Discord server with a rainbow flag in your username.

So let me tell you a story. A true story. Or maybe it's a dream. Or maybe a nightmare. But it happened. In a way that's more real than reality.

I was in court. Not metaphorically -- though life is often a trial by fire -- but in an actual courtroom. Oak panels. Canadian flags. A judge with the kind of limp-wristed authority you'd expect from someone who probably reads The Guardian unironically.

Now, I was being accused of what they called "academic aggression", which is apparently a crime now, eh? I called a student "competent". That's it. I said she was competent. But no -- that's a microaggression now, because I implied, with tone and body posture, that others were not. That, somehow, I had created a hierarchy of merit. Well, of course I did. That's what education is.

So I'm sitting there. And the prosecution -- led by some virtue-signaling, latte-swilling Neo-Marxist who probably majored in "feelings" -- stands up and says, "Professor, do you deny establishing oppressive structures in your classroom?"

And I look him in the eye -- you know, in that way that makes postmodernists blink -- and I say: "Young man, do you deny the existence of gravity? Because structures exist whether you acknowledge them or not. And if your intellect lacks the muscularity to climb them, that's on you."

Murmurs in the gallery. Gasps. A woman fainted. Good.

The judge bangs the gavel -- softly, like a nervous child tapping a spoon -- and says, "Let's maintain decorum."

But there is no decorum left in this world. Not in a world where suffering is pathologized, and truth is considered optional. Where the individual is a myth, and the collective -- this faceless, wheezing blob of moral entitlement -- demands to be both victim and executioner.

Anyway, I digress. Or perhaps I progress.

The prosecution brings out their star witness: a student named River (yes, River, with no surname, like a tragic poet). River claims that I created a hostile learning environment by assigning books. Books! Can you believe that?

"Your Honour," River sniffled, "he assigned The Gulag Archipelago without a content warning. He said suffering was part of the curriculum."

And I smiled. I smiled because that is exactly what I said. Suffering is the curriculum. Life is suffering. And you either confront it with courage or you let it tyrannize you into becoming a moral jellyfish.

Now the judge looks at me. A tired man. Probably on some tribunal once that issued guidelines on how to make eye contact "non-threatening".

He says, "Professor, do you wish to respond?"

I stand. I adjust my jacket -- brown tweed, elbow patches, intellectual armor -- and I say: "Yes, Your Honour. I wish to tell a story."

You see, stories are narratives, and narratives are how we transmit meaning -- not just data, but archetypal, blood-etched truth. And I tell them about my great-uncle. A lumberjack from Manitoba who never met a tree he could not fell or a socialist he could not out-debate. He once broke his leg in a logging accident, tied it to a pine branch, and dragged himself fifteen miles to town just to vote against public healthcare.

That is discipline. That is hierarchy. That is Canada, pre-Marxism.

And I told the court this: "The problem is not me assigning books. The problem is you do not read them. The problem is that in place of competence, we have installed compliance. We have replaced the individual hero with the collective grievance. And now we ask when the app is going to be released -- the app! -- as if it is not enough that it is being built in the crucible of actual thought."

The judge blinks. The prosecutor sneers. River sobs quietly.

But I continue.

"You want to be a beta tester? Earn it. Climb the hierarchy. Show me discipline. Show me sacrifice. Not likes, not shares, not intersectional GPA adjustments. You want access to the inner circle of code, of consciousness, of competence? Then you better be prepared to suffer for it."

Well, you see, eh, they did not like that. The courtroom cleared out. The media ran headlines like "Rogue Professor Sparks Panic With Hierarchical Rhetoric". But the truth remains.

And the story does not end there. No, it spirals -- like all stories do when there is no central truth. Because what followed was a trial of public opinion, held not in court but on TikTok. And there, every dance was a dissent, every hot take a weapon, and every pixel a pixelated pitchfork.

Students demanded my resignation. Not because I was wrong, but because I was right -- too right for comfort. Too precise in my language. Too unwilling to apologize for not apologizing.

I told them: "Meaning comes from responsibility. If you want to play, you have to pay. If you want the app -- the knowledge -- the thing -- then you accept the suffering that comes with its pursuit. You do not just get access. You do not get handed the sacred scrolls because you filled out a Google form and added an asterisk to your pronouns."

They said I was gatekeeping. Of course I am gatekeeping. That is what gates are for. To keep the unworthy out until they become worthy. There is a gate at the gates of heaven, too, unless you think God should be open-source.

So, when they ask, "When will it be released?" -- I will say it again:

It will be released when I damn release it.

And if that offends your sensibilities -- if that threatens your belief that all things should be immediate, democratic, equal in all ways and unequal in none -- then I invite you to confront the tyranny of your own expectations.

Let us be clear, fundamentally: we are not floating in a soup of equal talent. We are not interchangeable components in some collectivist software factory.

We are individuals. And the individual must rise. Because when the individual fails to rise, the collective becomes a mob. And when the mob takes power, competence is executed. Then comes tyranny. And then gulags -- digital ones, perhaps, but gulags nonetheless.

That is not a metaphor.

That is history.

And history, unlike beta software, does not do bug fixes.

So to close -- not because I am finished, but because your attention span is -- I say this:

You do not get early access because you "identify" as interested. You do not get a seat at the table just because you brought your own fork. You get there by climbing the hierarchy of discipline, competence, and suffering.

The app will be released when it is ready. When it is tested -- by me. Not by the algorithmically preferred. Not by the loudest. But by those who have earned it.

So shut up, sit down, and read a book. Start with The Constitution. And maybe, just maybe, you will be ready for the next build.

Until then, you are not a beta tester.

You are a spectator.

And I am not here to entertain you.

I am here to tell the truth.