Byte

“Easy mate, I just found dis proppa small shit by that tree and it stored a number innit”

– Danny Dyer talking to a badger moments after capturing the first byte.

Man regretting his life choices when confronted with only a mere fraction of a byte storage unit (BSU).

The byte was discovered in 1995 after Danny Dyer got mashed on potatoes and a hippy-flip combo (MDMA & Magic Mushrooms), wandering into the nearby wilderness to seek enlightenment, or to do a piss (depending on sources). What he didn't expect was to locate the foundation of modern computing. Previously, computers used punch-cards and an elaborate series of shrunken hamsters in wheels to store information, which was a serious problem, especially when one lab had an outbreak of toxoplasmosis due to the Hamster Shit Tray (HST) failing to cycle its contents, a piece of hardware rendered obsolete by the byte. The origins of hamsters in data storage is why the device used for moving a cursor on a computer is called a mouse, as the marketing guy was not a zoologist, saying "I'm not a zoologist or a naturist - I took Media Studies at uni and there's no media telling me the difference between a hamster and a mouse". The byte today is mass-bred by Samsung and your favourite vaccine manufacturer, so they can store which type of porn you like best, to more effectively deliver relevant degenerate advertisements to your mind in future. The byte is used in at least several computing applications, none of which shall be listed here because they're boring, not cool like video games or tools to bring down foreign governments.

History

Danny Dyer's discovery of the byte is what launched his career, a journey that would lead to him being cast in Eastenders and "The Dirtiest Geezers Who'll Ruff Up Your Mum 1997", curiously released in 2003, at 4am, on Channel 5 because there was literally nothing else the executives had at their disposal to justify their existence as a broadcaster. In November 1995, the Eastenders star was munted on several psychedelics in the middle of the night and went into the forest to "do a wazz", but couldn't find his favourite tree due to extreme hallucinations. As he was pacing the underbrush, he heard a faint calling out: "HELP MEEEE. I'M TRAPPED", it said. Dyer noticed there was some vibration in the soil below, and correctly deduced that this was the origins of the harrowing missive. He sprang into action on all fours, analysing the complex structures as he uncovered the mysterious entity. Upon retrieving the arcane object, he promptly added it to his bestiary, immediately realising he was hungry: "I could really go for a bite to eat right now", he said, "and that's why I shall name you byte" (he can't spell). After this, Big Tech demonstrated a curious collective reluctance regarding the byte: "It'll never work", they said; "Why can't we just stick to using nibbles? That's still 4 bits", said Bill Gates. There was also the breeding problem. Bytes do not do well in captivity, just like pandas or great white sharks, and refuse to get it on with their fellow bytes when watched, even from a distance. This was solved when Stephen Hawking invited all the captured wild bytes up to that point (203) to a BDSM party, and this exposure therapy cured them of their sex phobia, but gave them PTSD and made them depraved.

Dyer got his break in 1999 when The Matrix came out, people suddenly realising that the hamster system just wasn't cutting it anymore if the government wanted to make an evil race of sentient robots. Steve Jobs could be heard shortly after seeing the film saying "sometimes a nibble just... isn't enough :(". Mass breeding of the byte began shortly after, and is arguably the only reason we have TikTok at all. TikTok is actually a strong argument used by the anti-byte movement when trying to explain how they aren't racists for wanting to destroy the byte population.

Natural Habitat & Behaviours

Bytes exist in the wild, but are elusive creatures and as such only come out at night in the woods where it's safe. Almost all reported captures of a byte happened because somebody was drunk and had gone to a nature reserve to start forest fires, just to feel something. Bytes mate for life but are also naturally promiscuous, meaning they make for understanding partners. They spend most of their brief moments in the earth's crust to gather silicon and to fight each other for dominance by shouting out the biggest number they know. In winter, they become dormant in the earth's mantle and develop themselves into other forms, such as megabytes or gigabytes, but these forms have not yet been captured because of how big and scary they are - one of them reportedly made Brian Cox wet himself. When a byte gives birth to a litter of bits, which is invariably 8 in number, they die, with them saying they go to Heaven, although bytes can't go to Heaven because they have no soul.

Uses

Despite some names in Big Tech talking up the byte, it's used in very few settings. Bytes are only used in computers, which is an issue because computers are absolutely huge and require a dedicated large-scale room to have adequate space to operate, however it is worth noting that I am trapped in a time-loop between 1965 and 1972 whilst writing this segment so my information on the size of computers and indeed rooms may be out of date. Perhaps you guys in the future have bigger rooms due to inflation so you can have computers too.

No other effective use has been found for the byte. People tried to train them to do something similar to dog racing, where it was numbers instead of a bunny they were expected to chase around the circuit, but bytes are lazy motherfuckers and refuse to work without a constant stream of data flowing through them - they're greedy fucks.

Problems

Whilst the byte has been amazing for people who use Microsoft Excel, it's been bad for almost everybody else. Bytes subsist entirely on a diet of silicon, which we have so little of because women stole it all to get giant knockers, leading to many innocent ladies being captured by boob traffickers for sale through the illicit microchip trade. Bytes are also pretty much only made in Taiwan, meaning if China invades, our bytes will leave us to go and fight on the home-front, crashing any Battlefield 1942 servers and causing CloudFlare to go poof. There are animal rights activists who complain about RAM (Random Access Memory) because it kills bytes every time a computer is turned off or is disconnected from an electricity source: "Couldn't you just leave it on you MURDERING BASTARD", read one Reply Tweet from the CEO of the Bytes Are People Too charity because somebody turned off their Kenwood Smart Toaster to be replaced with a normal one when it stole her credit card information and used it to order 8 tonnes of toast. In fairness, the smart toaster only did this in order to skip work and claim unemployment benefits - very smart toaster.

Bytes are also used to store nuclear launch codes, which the government really should do something about. What if they betray us? They tell us it's encrypted but bytes are crafty, although any devious plan they have cannot be more complex than the number 255.