Media Junkie

Negative Quality: Media Junkie
Bonus: 5–30 Bp
This obsession with news, information, videos, forums, and social networking sites is a form of the Addiction quality (p. 80, SR4), and acts as a mental addiction. It requires that the character have Matrix access, either via commlink or by virtue of being a technomancer. The BP bonus of this quality is dependent on its severity:

Mild (5 BP): At this level, the obsession seems more like a hobby. The character spends about two hours a day on the Matrix browsing through various public nodes and sites, but can skip a day without adverse effect. She also suffers a –2 dice pool penalty to Willpower Tests to resist the urge to surf the Matrix and to Addiction Tests.

Moderate (10 BP): The character has an obvious Matrix habit. If she does not spend at least four hours a day surfing the Matrix, she obsesses about her Matrix friends and the trivia she is
missing, suffering a –1 dice pool penalty to tests involving Mental attributes, Resonance, or Magic. She takes a –4 dice pool penalty to Addiction Tests and to resist subscribing to her favorite nodes.

Severe (20 BP): At this level, the character clearly has a problem. She needs to spend at least eight hours a day browsing the Matrix, and she is fixated on the fan fiction, viral videos, email threads, and other trivia in which she is involved. Without her fix, she suffers a –2 dice pool penalty on tests involving Mental attributes, Resonance, or Magic. She also suffers a –6 dice pool modifier to Addiction Tests and to keep from logging on to her “My Favorites.”

Burnout (30 BP): The character lives in a daze of Matrix sites and AR windows. She spends almost all of her time cycling through sites, constantly refreshing them to see if anything new has been posted. She sleeps very little and misses meals. Her Essence is reduced by one. If she fails to kick the habit, her Essence or one of her Mental attributes (gamemaster’s option) will be reduced at a rate determined by the gamemaster.