A Digital Short
19,000 words
Blaine Stevens and his friend Jones team up to build a new kind of social network. Thugbook arms citizens with cameras and gives them the power to take back the streets.
At first only the brave dare photograph a crime in progress, fearing retaliation, but soon gang members are the ones who are afraid.
Criminals appear on the web by the hundreds, their pictures on a city map identifying them and their turf. The cops ignore the crime-stopping technology, but a more sinister group embraces Thugbook and begins stopping criminals permanently.
Thugbook is engulfed in a swirl of lawsuits and threats to shut the company down. As the stock soars skyward and the site rivals the popularity of Facebook and Google+, two founders with very different agendas battle to fulfill their mission.