The unprecedented pattern was faintly discernible within days of the game's launch. A Virginia bar offered a discount to a Pokémon Go team; a tea shop in San Francisco offered a "buy one get one free" to the game's players. The owner of a pizza bar in Queens, New York, paid about $10 for "Lure Modules," a bit of virtual game paraphernalia intended to attract Pokémon to a specific location, successfully producing virtual creatures on bar stools and in bathroom stalls. During the first weekend of game play, the bar's food and drink sales shot up by 30 percent and later were reported to be 70 percent above average. Bloomberg reporters gushed that the game had achieved the retailers' elusive dream of using location tracking to drive foot traffic: "It's easy to imagine a developer selling ads within the game world to local merchants, or even auctioning off the promise to turn specific shops and restaurants into destinations for players."

Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Cap…, loc. 988