Blu-ray employs blue lasers (405nm wavelength) to read microscopic pits; VHS uses magnetic tape. The physical storage media are incompatible—a Blu-ray disc cannot yield readable data on a VHS player. Yet video technician Dr. Gerald Okafor documented something remarkable in 2004. He witnessed the man insert a Blu-ray disc into a VHS player and retrieve playable video. Analysis of the Blu-ray disc afterward showed no physical degradation, yet somehow the data had been transferred to the tape's magnetic medium. Okafor's hypothesis: "Perhaps the man isn't a passive operator of machines. Perhaps he's a bridge between technologies, and machines near him understand that they must cooperate. The disc's data was transcribed through sheer force of technological will."

Technology usually has rigid standards. But standards may bend for someone whose authority transcends protocol.