On Friday, before the screening of Nosferatu in the best cinema hall in Poland located in EC1², I went to a beer pub³ to look at people. At 7 PM, 97% of the crowd in the pub consists of men gathering en masse for what we might euphemistically call “degustatory purposes.” I’ve noticed more than once that these are mainly corporate IT specialists. Some rushed out of their offices so quickly they didn’t even detach their ID badges, and they nervously fiddle with their yubikeys and flash drives as if they held some magical significance. Garlic, cross? Nosferatu.

Next to me sat two men who looked like they stepped out of Tolkien’s world, with long beards and round-rimmed glasses. You could dress them in costumes and send them to a film set as druids. Unfortunately, it would be a film about corporate network configuration problems and how irreplaceable one is, holding godlike status over all those “who don’t know how to fix it.” The engaged speaker was explaining to his colleague, minute by minute, how someone pulled a cable from the switch and how Kasia couldn’t log into her computer, while everything works fine for him because he’s a hacker who manages the corporate network. Actually, pulling the cable out of the switch is the only thing he could personally pull out, but when girls started appearing instead of switches, the crew quickly finished their beers and headed for the exit.

During the film screening, which I won’t spoil, perhaps the most terrifying element was the vampire’s blood slurping. Sonically, it was incredibly well done. Plus the visual layer made, at least on me, a huge impression. This is exactly how the corporation sucks energy from its employees. Can you hear the server hum, see the heartbeat uptime? It sucks all your juices… That’s why the tie-wearing manager concerned with efficiency and productivity tries to provide his subordinates with some magical incentives, group games, dog walking, or paintball. If you don’t show up at such an integration event, all that awaits you is an aspen stake⁴ or, at best, infamy and expulsion.

Leaving the cinema, I looked at the starry sky and the forest of cranes building new office towers and blocks with micro-studios… I’ll have to walk around with garlic and an aspen stake. The city is becoming increasingly dangerous. Corporate rats are spreading the plague.

¹ Corporatu is a wordplay combining “corporation” with “Nosferatu” (the vampire)

² EC1 is a revitalized power plant complex in Łódź, Poland, now serving as a cultural center with one of the most advanced cinema halls in the country

³ “Piwoteka” is a play on words in Polish combining “piwo” (beer) and “biblioteka” (library), meaning a pub specializing in craft beers

⁴ In Slavic folklore, an aspen stake is used to kill vampires, similar to the wooden stake in Western vampire mythology

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