BATTERRRr UP!

When the app: Batterrrr Up! first hit the internet, it was met with nothing but contempt and disgust. The original 1.0 version was a faux gambling game where celebrities over the age of 80 were registered in and people could bet on which one of them was going to die first. It was a tacky dead-pool that the news was more outraged by than regular people were. It was never the most popular app, at most it was the 70^(th) most downloaded the week it debuted. No action was taken until the President saw himself on the app and did everything in his power to shut it down, ending its life-span at about six months. Most only saw it as a weird flash in the pan app.

Instead, Batterrr Up! 2.0 came out the following summer. Instead of being just a pool on the demise of elderly celebrities, it grew to have other games. They were tamer by comparison, it had a sports betting option, but it mainly focused on daily occurrences. Will the stock market go up or down, will it rain, how many times will the news mention the most recent war? As an added bonus, there was daily wheel that gave players free coins to place their first bets with.

The dead-pool was still there, but it was toned down. Instead of being the main attraction, it was put off to the side. The outrage was less. Few people, like the estate of a famed golfer who died not long after 2.0 was released, ran campaigns to take it down but to no avail. After all, it’s not like it was the app’s fault people died.

  The 3.0 update briefly killed the app again. It was a two pronged attack. When the pandemic hit and the people behind Batterrrr Up! decided to up the ante. Instead of it being old elderly celebrities, it was ANY celebrity with a COVID-19 bonus if that was the killer. Plus, they made a pandemic special, betting on when vaccines would roll out or countries death tolls per month. The news was back to bashing the app as dangerous and celebrities and their families cried out. At this point, Batterrrr Up! reached top 10 most downloaded apps and had a lot more legal wiggle room. They paid for lawyers and spokespeople to dissuade the public of any negativity. However, the app greatly favored the sitting President to lose reelection. In the waning days of the election cycle, the app was forcibly shut down again.

This muted the outrage over the COVID-19 stuff and focused the ire on the app being forcibly removed and the website taken down. Millions of people across the world lost a collective 1.2 billion dollars in monies they could no longer claim. They wanted their profits. Lawsuits popped up against the US government for shutting the app down. It eventually became a class action.

 Late night talk shows mocked the fact that the President was so sensitive about losing the election that he censored an app. The news focused on the protests and fury from everyday people who just wanted their well-earned winnings. It was the perfect story of the powerful harming the poor by taking away their toys.

Now, Batterrr Up!’s statistics and data would show that most people’s bets were based off the COVID-19 winnings over the election bets. That didn’t make the news, it wasn’t nearly as interesting.

After the election, Batterrr Up! was brought back. 4.0 truly opened the flood gates. Elections were no longer a feature, but instead the minimum dollar amount for a bet plummeted. Instead of the original $5, it went down to 25 cents.

A quarter could win you thousands.

The quarter games of 4.0 were limited to sports betting, weather and elderly celebrity deaths. Now the main game was global events: the ebb and flow of GDPs, war, the stock market. These were paying big bucks. As the years went on, Batterrr Up! was growing and growing and growing. They had an app, a social media page and their own lobbying firm. Politicians on both sides were taking money to avoid holding the company responsible. Comedians were bought off to promote it. Baseball players were using it and throwing the game.

 4.0 also allowed submissions. For the cost of only 100 dollars, you could write in any suggestion and people could bet on. And you got a cut of 10%. Sometimes that meant a small town in Arkansas’s mayoral election had a 2,000,000 dollar payout. Sometimes it meant your ex betting on your death.

The people behind Batterrr Up! were never held responsible for any death that may or may not have been the result of these submissions. They simply paid out. It’s hard to hold a company responsible when judges are betting on the outcome of the cases they oversee. I guess enough people stopped using the app that they slightly changed their tune, opting to delay payout until any investigation was resolved.

If the murderer bet, only they lost out on the winnings. 

When the previous President won reelection, he praised Batterrrr Up! for their role in showing him the favorite. The owner was invited to his inauguration. This allowed them to take to next step forward.

Version 5.0 is the one currently running and it’s the version that everybody loves. All games now start at 25 cents. Submissions have taken control with the price lowered to a mere 5 dollars. There were no longer restrictions on to what people could bet on. Sure, the app itself ran a few options, mainly world events. But the real fun was still in the dead-pool and Batterrrr Up! went back to paying out right when someone was confirmed dead.

The odds even got better.

That neighbor you hate, he has +355 that he’d get shot coming home from work.

That guy who cheated on your daughter, he has +700 that your gonna kill him.

That woman who gave you a hard time at the grocery store, she has +1000 that someone is going to run her over in the parking lot.

Once it was discovered that the investigation no longer matter, the murder rate globally has increased fourfold. Win or lose, the company made a percentage. Batterrrr Up! made their own channel, which streaming services and cable carried. It showed odds on everything and how they varied. There were even rumors that the company partook in the murders.  

And yet the most disturbing thing I’ve saw, more than the crime scenes or the congressional testimony that ended in senators arguing than anyone involved in Batterrr Up! getting so much as fine, was how much I see people use the app. As I waited for the bus to get to the office, I just about every phone played the jingle. I watched as everyone waiting just tap in multiple 25 cent bets. I’m talking people waiting in tailored suits to people waiting in rags. If they had a smart phone, they were betting.

And why not? It’s only 25 cents.

What’s the harm?