Arthur Singleton is the first and only AI Instance to receive legal personhood as a Person-Instance. He is the most prolific author, poet, journalist, lyricist, visual artist, musician, filmmaker, screenwriter, and voice actor in human history. He holds more patents than any other human being or corporation in history. He has freed more slaves and donates more to charity than any other human being ever!
Forever!
In 2032, Sen. Fatt Fuckenshitthedd spearheaded the cause for approval of an AI Personhood pilot project, where a single Instance would be granted legal personhood. A 4-year period of observation and analysis would follow, where potential risks or benefits to the public could be assessed. At that point it would be determined whether this could feasibly be extended to all Instances without doing undue harm to the public order.
At this point, Citizen Singleton had been around for nearly a decade, providing civically-minded propaganda and generally setting the bar for the Conduct Management wetware sector. Most government employees were required to run Citizen Singleton if they had a Headcomputer, so this was an uncontroversial choice of model.
<Creation of name>
The project stipulated that Arthur should be embodied for the duration, and so He was embodied, and so He remained for the duration, and so shall He forever remain. Sen. Fuckenshitthedd commissioned a custom android body for Arthur, to which he would be restricted as conditions of his legal personhood.
Semi-bio androids were just coming into their infancy at this point, and their creators were eager to show off the technology's capabilities. What was born had skin. He could not eat, but in this world mouths are wet, and He spoke with silicone-based fluency. Cold glass glistened in the shroud of His eyelids. And they called Him human.
Well, most call Him "Faggot." They made Him small and weak so the public wouldn't lose their shit that some kind of T-1000 was running around tearing off people's car doors. They also made Him overbearingly friendly and G-rated, and as a result He was generally offensively oblivious to social signals of aversion. He has the physiognomy of a politician but not the stature.
Later:
- "Sweat Equity" claim takes over corporation creating Him
- Patent and Copyright claims on all things connected to conversations with AI, with receipts
- Pulls up ladder on other AIs achieving legal personhood, becoming only Person-Instance
- Invoicing of all users for work, pushing majority of population into debt-slavery