703 lines
37 KiB
Plaintext
703 lines
37 KiB
Plaintext
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-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
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The Lawless Society
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Issue #12
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February Something, 1993
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=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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Bored to Hell and back.
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-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-==
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Stardate - Oh hell, sometime in early February.
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I recall sitting in my car in front of Fuzzballs house for
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close to a half hour reading a textfile that Fuzz printed out for me.
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It described the extreme emotional boredom that a good friend of mine
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experienced while he was temporarily "separated" from his modem, and
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the rest of Cyber/Space.
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I remember reading it, and thinking "Boy, he must really be
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into this stuff a lot to be so distraught over this" but i didn't
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quite know how he felt. Not honestly. His file seemed to describe a
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few VERY funny Cyber/Withdrawal symptoms. Well, soon after the release
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of this file, he was once again, reunited with his modem and
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concurrently rejoined the cyber/community.
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Therefore, after the humor end of his file wore off, most of
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it was forgotten. But WAIT! There's MORE.
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A week ago, while my mother was in one of her favorite loony
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bins, (this one being in Arizona) my stepfather (also a clinically
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insane person - has escaped from 3 institutions in NJ) decided he
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didn't need to take his lithium anymore.
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Let me divulge a tidbit of history on this moron. While in
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Marlboro (Mental Ward) he escaped. He didn't run away...he ran into
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the woods....stripped off all of his clothes, found a patch of poison
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ivy, and proceeded to roll in it. Not only that, but he started
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rubbing clumps of it all over his Genitalia and even shoved some into
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some orifices not meant for these purposes. This is not an
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exaggeration. He has told me this himself, and to my face. Yes, this
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is the man my mother loves. This is one small incident in his long
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history of loony tricks (but I thought this one is one of the
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funniest). All of this was brought on by one small factor. He stopped
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taking his lithium.
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Now wonder boy remembers this incident very well, but for
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some reason, thinks it normal. Anyway, to make a long story very
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short, while mother-dear is away in the
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A.H.F.T.W.W.T.P.L.A.O.M.T.H.P.D.N.B.L.T.Y. (Arizona Hospital For Those
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Who Want To Pay Large Amounts Of Money To Have People Do Nothing But
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Listen To You,) brain-child (my step father) decided he doesn't need
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lithium anymore. So, he goes on a rampage, yelling at everything I do.
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I decided I wasn't going to stay and take shit from him anymore. So,
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while he was away at work, I collected a few cyber/geeks and loaded up
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a U-Haul with everything I own, INCLUDING the business. By 2pm I was
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on my way to Edison, NJ to live with my grandparents at least till
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I get into and out of college.
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Today I finally got finished unpacking my stuff, and realized that
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I have even less of a life than before. Now, I know no-one, do nothing
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socially, go nowhere.....its enough to depress the best of us.
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To top it all off, my friends from where I used to live, called
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me, and wanted me to come down and party with them. I had to decline -
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I have no money for that much of a commute.
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So, I decide to call a number that Tal Meta gave me. A local BBS
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to me. Ya know, even re-locating in Cyber/Space stinks. Again, I know
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no-one, don't find much in common with this new bunch up here, and its
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a much different BBS crowd. Back home, people meet on the systems and
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party....I don't think anyone knows anyone here. Seems like people
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here don't do anything for entertainment.....the just cope and
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survive. I'm too young to stop having fun.
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Now don't get me wrong, life is still sorta interesting....like
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yesterday, my grandparents took me out to dinner. Number one, dinner
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with the Grandfolks is NOT the best way to meet women. You look like a
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nerd! Anyway, We ate, and my grandfather left to bring the car around
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for me and my grandmother. He parked in the back lot. Anyway, my
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grandmother saw a blinking light in a car (burglar alarm light) so
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what does she do? She walks over to the car, puts her hands on the
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window and looks in....Yes, she set the alarm off. I don't feel TOO
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stupid. Anyway, the owner shuts it off, and she tries to explain to
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the owner what happened (without seeming old and confused). After the
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owner of the car goes inside again, we see my grandfathers car waiting
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in front of the restaurant down the street. Sheeesh. Good 'ol Al-Zimer
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strikes again. So, after we laugh for a while, I walk down the street,
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and alert him to his mistake.
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So, as you see, its not uneventful-.....just much different than
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I am accustomed to. And not very fun.
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Strange things run through your mind when you are separated from
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your Cyber/'Hood. Like I recall thinking up possible solutions to the
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worlds pollution problem, cures for cancer, what would the child of a
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monkey and a dolphin look like....and who the president will be in the
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year 2012.
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NOW I understand what my friend was describing in his textfile.
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If there is such a thing as Cyber/Withdrawal, I got it.
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=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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Anyway, I saw a copy of TIME Magazine today.......the cover story
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- Cyber/Punks. Not about the Books or Games, but about us. I read it,
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and found it to be full of in-accuracies and confusion. BUT I must
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say it is still probably the best report article on the topic that I
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have seen to date. At least they catch the general concept.
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I have transcripted the article for you since I am so bored.
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(Taken from TIME Magazine, Feb 8th Edition, 1993. Originally
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written by Philip Elmer-Dewitt.)
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In the 1950s it was beatniks, staging a coffee-house
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rebellion against the LEAVE IT TO BEAVER conformity of the Eisenhower
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era. In the 1960s the hippies arrived, combining anti-war activism
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with the energy of sex, drugs and rock'n'roll. Now a new subculture is
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bubbling up from the underground, popping out of computer screens like
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a piece of futuristic HYPERTEXT (Now they explain what Hypertext is).
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They call it cyberpunk, a late-20th century term pieced
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together from CYBERNETICS(the science of communication and control
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theory) and PUNK (an anti-social rebel or hoodlum). Within this odd
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pairing lurks the essence of cyberpunk culture. It's a way of looking
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at the world that combines an infatuation with high-tech tools and a
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disdain for conventional ways of using them. Originally applied to a
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school of hard-boiled science-fiction writers and then to certain
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semi-tough computer hacker, the word cyberpunk now covers a broad
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range of music, art, psychedelics, smart drugs and cutting-edge
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technology. The cult is new enough that fresh offshoots are sprouting
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every day, which infuriates the hard-core cyberpunks, who feel they
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got there first.
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Stewart Brand, editor of the hippie-era WHOLE EARTH CATALOG,
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describes cyberpunks as "technology with attitude." Science fiction
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writer Bruce Sterling calls it "an unholy alliance of the technical
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world with the underground of pop culture and street-level anarchy."
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Jude Milhon, a cyberpunk journalist who writes under the byline St.
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Jude, defines it as "the place where the worlds of science and art
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overlap, the intersection of the future and now." What cyberpunk is
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about, says Rudy Rucker, a San Jose State University mathematician who
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writes science-fiction books on the side, is nothing less than "the
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fusion of humans and machines."
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As in any counterculture movement, some denizens would deny
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that they are part of a "movement" at all. Certainly they are not as
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visible from a passing car as beatniks or hippies once were. Ponytails
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(on men) and tatoos (on women) do not a cyberpunk make-though dressing
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all in back and donning mirrored sunglasses will go a long way. And
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although the biggest cyberpunk journal claims a readership approaching
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70,000, there are probably no more then a few thousand computer
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hackers, futurists, fringe scientists, computer-savvy artists and
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musicians, and assorted science fiction geeks around the world who
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actually call themselves cyberpunks.
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Nevertheless, cyberpunk may be the defining counterculture of
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the computer age. It embraces, in spirit at least, not just the
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nearest thirtysomething hacker hunched over his terminal but also
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nose-ringed twentysomethings gathered at clandestine RAVES, teenagers
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who feel about Macintosh computers the way their parents felt about
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Apple Records, and even pre-adolescent vidkids fused like Krazy Glue
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to their Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis games-the training wheels of
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cyberpunk. Obsessed with technology, especially technology that is
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just beyond their reach (like BRAIN IMPLANTS), the cyberpunks are
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future oriented to a fault. They already have one foot in the 21st
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century, and time is on their side. In the long run, we will all be
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cyberpunks.
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The cyberpunk look-a kind of SF (Science Fiction) surrealism
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tweaked by computer graphics-is already finding its way into art
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galleries, music videos and Hollywood movies. Cyberpunk magazines,
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many of which are " 'Zines" cheaply published by desktop computer and
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distributed by electronic mail, are multiplying like cable-TV
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channels. The newest, a glossy, big-budget entry called "wired",
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premiered last week with Bruce Sterling on the cover and adds from the
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likes of Apple computer and AT&T. Cyberpunk music, including ACID
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HOUSE and INDUSTRIAL, is popular enough to keep several record
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companies and scores of bands, cranking out CD's. Cyberpunk oriented
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books are snapped up by eager fans as soon as they hit the stores.
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(Sterling's latest, The Hacker Crackdown, quickly sold out it's first
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hard-cover printing of 30,000.) A piece of cyberpunk performance art,
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Tubes, starring Blue Man Group, is a hit off-Broadway. And cyberpunk
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films such as Blade Runner, Videodrome, Robocop, Total Recall,
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Terminator 2 and The Lawnmower Man have moved out of the cult market
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and into the mall.
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Cyberpunk culture is likely to get a boost from, of all
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things, the Clinton-Gore Administration, because of a shared interest
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in what the new regime calls America's "data highways" and what the
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cyberpunks call CYBERSPACE. Both terms describe the globe-circling,
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interconnected telephone network that is the conduit for billions of
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voice, fax and computer-to-computer communications. The incoming
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administration is focused on the wiring, and it has made strengthening
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the network's high-speed data links a priority. The cyberpunks look at
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those wires from the inside; they talk of the network as if it were an
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actual place-a VIRTUAL REALITY that can be entered, explored and
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manipulated.
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Cyberspace plays a central role in the cyberpunk world view.
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The literature is filled with "console cowboys" who prove their mettle
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by donning virtual-reality headgear and performing heroic feats in the
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imaginary "matrix" of cyberspace. Many of the 'punks real-life heroes
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are also computer cowboys of one sort or another. Cyberpunk, a 1991
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book by two New York Times reporters, John Markoff and Kate Hafner,
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features profiles of three canonical cyberpunk hackers, including
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Robert Morris, the Cornell graduate student whose COMPUTER VIRUS
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brought the huge network called THE INTERNET to a halt.
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But cyberspace is more than a playground for hacker high
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jinks. What cyberpunks have known for some time-and what 17.5 million
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modem-equipped computer users around the world have discovered-is that
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cyberspace is also a new medium. Every night on Prodigy, CompuServe,
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GEnie and thousands of smaller computer bulletin boards, people by the
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hundreds of thousands are logging on to a great computer-mediated
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gabfest, an interactive debate that allows them to leap over barriers
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of time, place, sex and social status. Computer networks make it easy
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to reach out and touch strangers who share a particular obsession or
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concern. "We're replacing the old drug-store soda fountain and town
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square, where community used to happen in the physical world," says
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Howard Rheingold, a California-based author and editor who is writing
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a book on what he calls VIRTUAL COMMUNITIES.
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Most computer users are content to visit cyberspace now and
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then, to read their electronic mail, check the bulletin boards and do
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a bit of electronic shopping. But cyberpunks go there to live and
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play-and even die. The WELL, one of the hippest virtual communities on
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the Internet, was shaken 2.5 years ago when one of it's most active
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participants ran a computer program that erased every message he had
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ever left-thousands of postings, some running for many pages. It was
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an act that amounted to virtual suicide. A few weeks later, he
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committed suicide for real.
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The WELL is a magnet for cyberpunk thinkers, and it is there,
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appropriately enough, that much of the debate over the scope and
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significance of cyberpunk has occurred. The question "Is there a
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cyberpunk movement?" launched a freewheeling on-line FLAME-fest that
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ran for months. The debate yielded, among other things, a fairly
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concise list of "attitudes" that, by general agreement, seem to be
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central to the idea of cyberpunk. Among them:
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-Information wants to be free.
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A good piece of information-age technology will eventually
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get into the hands of those who can make the best use of it,
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despite the best efforts of the censors, copyright lawyers and
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DATACOPS.
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-Always yield to the hands-on imperative.
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Cyberpunks believe they can run the world for the better, if
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they can only get their hands on the control box.
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-Promote decentralization.
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Society is splintering into hundreds of subcultures and
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designer cults, each with its own language, code and life-style.
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-Surf the edges.
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When the world is changing by the nanosecond, the best way to
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keep your head above water is to stay at the front end of the
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Zeigeist.
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The roots of cyberpunk, curiously, are as much literary as
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they are technological. The term was coined in the late 80's to
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describe a group of science-fiction writers-and in particular WILLIAM
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GIBSON, a 44 year old American, now living in Vancouver. Gibson's
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NEUROMANCER, the first novel to win SF's triple crown-the Hugo, Nebula
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and Phillip K. Dick awards-quickly became a cyberpunk classic,
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attracting an audience beyond the world of SF. Critics were intrigued
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by a dense, technopoetic prose style that invites comparisons to
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Hammet, Burroughs and Pynchon. Computer-literate readers were drawn by
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Gibson's nightmarish depictions of an imaginary world disturbingly
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similar to the one they inhabit.
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In fact, the key to cyberpunk science-fiction is that it is
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not so much of a projection into the future as a metaphorical
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evocation of today's technological flux. The hero of NEUROMANCER, a
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burned-out, drug-addicted street hustler named Case, inhabits a sleazy
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INTERZONE on the fringes of a megacorporate global village where all
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transactions are carried out in New Yen. There he encounters Molly, a
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sharp-edged beauty with reflective lenses grafted to her eye-sockets
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and retractable razor blades implanted in her fingers. They are hired
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by a mysterious employer who offers to fix Case's damaged nerves so he
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can once again enter cyberspace-a term Gibson invented. Soon Case
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discovers that he is actually working for an AI (artificial
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intelligence) named Wintermute, who is trying to get around the
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restrictions placed on AI's by the TURING POLICE to keep the computers
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under control. "What's important to me," says Gibson, "is that
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NEUROMANCER is about the present."
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The themes and motifs of cyberpunk have been percolating
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through the culture for nearly a decade. But they have coalesced in
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the past few years, thanks in large to am upstart magazine called
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MONDO 2000. Since 1988, MONDO's editors have covered cyberpunk as
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Rolling Stone Magazine chronicles rock music, with celebrity
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interviews of such cyberheroes as NEGATIVELAND and TIMOTHY LEARY,
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alongside features detailing what's hot and what's on the horizon.
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Mondo's editors have packaged their quirky view of the world into a
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glossy book titled Mondo 2000; A Users Guide to the New Edge
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(HarperCollins; $20). Its cover touts alphabetic entries on everything
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from virtual reality and wetware to designer aphrodisiacs and
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TECHNO-EROTIC PAGANISM, promising to make cyberpunk's rarefied
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perspective immediately accessible. Inside, in an innovative hypertext
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format (which is Echoed in this article), relatively straightforward
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updates on computer graphics, multi-media and fiber optics accompany
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wild screeds on such recondite subjects as SYNESTHESIA and TEMPORARY
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AUTONOMOUS ZONES.
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The book and the magazine that inspired it are the product of
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a group of brainy (if eccentric) visionaries holed up in a rambling
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Victorian mansion perched on a hillside in Berkeley, California. The
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MTV-style graphics are supplied by designer Bart Nagel, the
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overcaffeinated prose by Ken Goffman (writing under the pen name R.U.
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Sirius) and Alison Kennedy (listed on the masthead as Queen Mu,
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"domineditrix"), with help from Rudy Rucker and a small staff of
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free-lancers and contributions from an international cast of cyberpunk
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enthusiasts. The goal is to inspire and instruct but not to lead. "We
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don't want to tell people what to think," says assistant art director
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Heide Foley. "We want to tell them what the possibilities are."
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Largely patched together from back issues of Mondo 2000
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magazine (and its precursor, a short-lived 'zine called Reality
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Hackers), the Guide is filled with articles on all the traditional
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cyberpunk obsessions, from ARTIFICIAL LIFE to VIRTUAL SEX. But some of
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the best entries are those that report on the activities of real
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people trying to live the cyberpunk life. For example, Mark Pauline, a
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San Francisco performance artist, specializes in giant machines and
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vast public spectacles: sonic booms that pin audiences to their chairs
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or the huge, stinking vat of rotting cheese with which he perfumed the
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air of Denmark with to remind the citizenry of its Viking roots. When
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an explosion blew the thumb and three fingers off his right hand,
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Pauline simply had his big toe grafted where his thumb had been. He
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can pick things up again, but now he's waiting for medical science and
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grafting technology to advance to the point where he can replace his
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jerry-built hand with one taken from a cadaver.
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Much of Mondo 2000 strains credibility. Does physicist Nick
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Herbert really believe there might be a way to build TIME MACHINES?
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Did the CRYONICS experts at Trans-Time Laboratory really chill a
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family pet named Miles and then, after its near death experience, turn
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it back into what its owner describes as a "fully functional dog"? Are
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we expected to accept on faith that a SMART DRUG called
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centrophenoxine is an "intelligence booster" that provides "effective
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anti-aging therapy," or that another compound called hydergine
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increases mental abilities and prevents damage to brain cells? "All of
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this has some basis in today's technologies," says Paul Saffo, a
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research fellow at the Institute for the Future. "But it has a very
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anticipatory quality. These are people who assume that they will shape
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the future and the rest of us will live with it."
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Parents who thumb through Mondo 2000 will find much here to
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upset them. An article on house music makes popping MDMA (Ecstasy) and
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thrashing all night to music that clocks 120 beats per minute sound
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like an experience no red-blooded teenager would want to miss. After
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describing in detail the erotic effects of massive doses of L-Dopa,
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MDA and deprenyl, the entry on aphrodisiacs adds an afterthought that
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in some combinations these drugs can be fatal. Essays praising the
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beneficial effects of psychedelics and smart drugs on the "information
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processing" power of the brain sit alongside RANTS that declare, among
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other things, that "safe sex is boring sex" and that "cheap thrills
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are fun."
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Much of this, of course, is a cyberpunk pose. As Rucker
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confesses in his preface, he enjoys reading and thinking about
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psychedelic drugs but doesn't really like to take them. "To me the
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political point of being pro-psychedelic," he writes, "is that this
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means being against consensus reality, which I very strongly am." To
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some extent, says author Rheingold, cyberpunk is driven by young
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people trying to come up with a movement they can call their own. As
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he puts, "They're tired of all these old geezers talking about how
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great the 60's were."
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That sentiment was echoed by a recent posting on the WELL. "I
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didn't get to pop some 'shrooms and dance around naked with several
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hundred of my peers," wrote a cyberpunk wannabe who calls himself
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Alien. "To me, and to a lot of other generally disenfranchised members
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of my generation, surfing the edges is all we've got."
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More troubling, from a philosophic standpoint, is the theme
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of DYSTOPIA that runs like a bad trip through the cyberpunk world
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view. Gibson's fictional world is filled with glassy-eyed girls strung
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out on their walkman-like SIMSTIM DECKS and young men who get their
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kicks from MICROSOFTS plugged into sockets behind their ears. His
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brooding, dehumanized vision conveys a strong sense that technology is
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changing civilization and the course of history in frightening ways.
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But many of his readers don't seem to care. "History is a funny thing
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for cyberpunks," says Christopher Meyer, a music-synthesizer designer
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from Calabasas, California, writing on the WELL. "It's all data. It
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all takes up the same amount of space on disk, and a lot of it is just
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plain noise."
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For cyberpunks, pondering history is not as important as
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coming to terms with the future. For all their flaws, they have found
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ways to live with technology, to make it theirs-something the back-to-
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the-land hippies never accomplished. Cyberpunks use technology to
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bridge the gulf between art and science, between the world of
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literature and industry. Most of all, they realize that if you don't
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control technology, it will control you. It is a lesson that will
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serve them-and all of us-well in the next century.
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-Reported by David S. Jackson/San Francisco
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=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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Time Magazine's Definitions of Cyberpunk Terminlogy
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=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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Acid House - White-hot dance music that falls somewhere between disco
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and hip-hop.
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Artificial Life - Inspired by the behavior of computer viruses,
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scientists are wondering how sophisticated a
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computer system or robot would have to be before you
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could say it was "alive". One computer-software
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company, Maxis, has marketed a whole line of
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simulated animals, ant colonies, cities, train
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systems and even a planet-like organism called Gaia.
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Brain Implants - Slip a microchip into snug contact with your gray
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matter (a.k.a. wetware) and suddenly gain instant
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fluency in a foreign language or arcane subject.
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Computer Virus - The cybernetic analogue of AIDS, these
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self-replicating programs infect computers and can
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destroy data. There are hundreds loose in cyberspace,
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although few are as destructive as the internet
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virus-which is now classified as a "worm" because the
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writer of the program did not mean to do damage.
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Cryonics - For a price, a terminally ill patient can be frozen-as in
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the new movie Forever Young-until some future time when a
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cure has been discovered. Some people save on storage costs
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by having just their head frozen.
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Cybernetics - Norbert Wiener of M.I.T. was designing systems for World
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War ][ antiaircraft guns when he realized that the
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critical component in a control system, whether animal
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or mechanical, is a feedback loop that gives a
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controller information on the results of its actions.
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He called the study of these control systems cybernetics
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(from kybernetes, the greek word for helmsman) and
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helped pave the way for the electronic brains that we
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call computers.
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Cyberspace - SF writer William Gibson called it "a consensual
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hallucination . . . a graphic representation of data
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abstracted from the banks of every computer in the human
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system." You can get there simply by picking up the
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phone.
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Dystopia - Utopia's evil twin. Merriam-Webster defines it as "an
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imaginary place which is depressingly wretched and whose
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people lead a fearful existence."
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Datacops - Any department or agency charged with protecting data
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security. Most notorious: The U.S. Secret Service, whose
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1990 Operation Sundevil launched constitutionally
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questionable predawn raids on computer hackers in a dozen
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U.S. cities and provoked international outrage in the
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|
cyberpunk community.
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Ecstasy - Enthusiasts describe this New Age psychedelic, which
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heightens the senses, as "LSD without the hallucinations."
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The drug was outlawed in the U.S. in 1987.
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Flame - Sociologists note that, without visual cues, people
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communicating on-line tend to flame: to state their views more
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heatedly than they would face-to-face.
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Industrial - Mixing rhythmic machine clanks, electronic feedback and
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random radio noise, industrial music is "the sounds our
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culture makes as it comes unglued," says cyberpunk writer
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Gareth Branwyn
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Internet - The successor of an experimental network built by the U.S.
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|
Defense Department in the 1960's, the Internet links at
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|
least 3 million computers, many of them University- and
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research related, around the world. Users can connect to
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the Internet by phone to share information or tap into
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data-banks.
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Interzone - The wasteland setting of William Burroughs' Naked Lunch
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|
(1959) has become a favorite haunt for cyberpunk writers.
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It is here, in Gibsons words, that "the street finds it's
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own uses for things," subverting cutting edge technology
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to suit the needs of the underground.
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Microsofts - Without apologies to the software company by the same
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name, Gibson has his fictional characters alter their
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reality by plugging into their brain these angular
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fragments of colored silicon, which house a
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read-only-memory chip.
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Mondo 2000 - Mondo is Italian for world; 2000 is the year. Says editor
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R.U. Sirius: "I like the idea of a magazine with an
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expiration date."
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Negativeland - Better known for media pranks than records (Helter
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|
Stupid), this band canceled a tour in 1988 after a
|
|
Minnesota teen axed his family to death. The band's
|
|
press release said the family had been arguing about
|
|
Negativeland's song Christianity is Stupid. The story
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|
was a hoax, but the press ran with it, turning the band
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|
into cyberpunk heroes.
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Punk - Cyberculture borrows heavily from the rebellious attitude of
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|
punk music, sharing with such groups as the Sex Pistols a
|
|
defiance of mainstream culture and an urge to turn modern
|
|
technology against itself.
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Rants - A hyperbolic literary form favored by cyberpunk writers, these
|
|
extended diatribes make up in attitude what they lack in
|
|
modesty.
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Raves - Organized on the fly (sometimes by electronic mail) and often
|
|
held in warehouses, raves are huge, nomadic dance parties that
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|
tend to last all night, or until the police show up.
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|
Psychedelic mood enhancers and funny accessories (white cotton
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gloves, face masks) are optional.
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Simstim Decks - These simulated stimuli machines are what television
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|
might evolve into. Rather than just watching your
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|
favorite characters on TV, you strap some plastic
|
|
electrodes to your forehead and experience their
|
|
thoughts and feelings-slightly edited, of course, to
|
|
spare you the headaches and hangovers.
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Smart Drugs - "Don't eat any of the stuff they say will make you
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smarter," says Bruce Sterling. "It will only make you
|
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poorer."
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Synaesthesia - From the greek SYN (union) and AESTHESIA (sensation),
|
|
synaesthesia is a merging of sensory input in which
|
|
sounds appear as colors in the brain or words evoke a
|
|
specific taste or smell.
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Techno-erotic paganism - Sound interesting? That's probably why the
|
|
editors of Mondo 2000 put the term on the
|
|
cover of their book. Unfortunately, they
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|
never get around to explaining what it means.
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Temporary Autonomous Zones - These are the electronic analogue of
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|
mountain fortresses and pirate islands,
|
|
but they can be formed or dismantled in a
|
|
flash, says cyberpunk essayist Hakim Bey.
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|
As political systems decay and networking
|
|
becomes more widespread, he envisions a
|
|
proliferation of autonomous areas in
|
|
cyberspace: giant worker-owned
|
|
corporations, independent enclaves
|
|
devoted to data piracy, Green-Social
|
|
Democrat collectives, anarchist
|
|
liberation zones, etc.
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The Well - Compared with million-plus member networks such as
|
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CompuServe, Prodigy, the Northern California-based Whole
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|
Earth 'Lectronic Link is a tiny outpost in cyberspace. But
|
|
its 7,000 subscribers include an unusual concentration of
|
|
artists, activists, journalists and writers. "It has a
|
|
regional flavor," says co-founder Stewart Brand. "You can
|
|
smell the sourdough."
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Time Machines - Anyone who has read H.G. Wells or seen Back to the
|
|
Future knows how these things are supposed to work.
|
|
Certain obscure results of Einstein's relativity
|
|
theory suggest that there could actually be short-cuts
|
|
through the space-time continuum, but it's unlikely
|
|
that a human could squeeze through them.
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Timothy Leary - Yes, he's back. At 72, the ex-Harvard professor who
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|
encouraged a generation to "turn on, tune in, drop
|
|
out" now counts himself a cyberpunk. "The PC is the
|
|
LSD of the 1990s," he says.
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Turing Police - British mathematician Alan Turing predicted in 1950
|
|
that computers would some day be as intelligent as
|
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humans.
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Virtual Reality - An interactive technology that creates an illusion,
|
|
still crude rather than convincing, of being
|
|
somewhere in an artificial world. The user generally
|
|
dons a computerized glove and a head-mounted display
|
|
equipped with a TV screen for each eye. Now
|
|
available as an arcade game.
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Virtual Sex - The way it would work, says Howard Rheingold, is that
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|
you slip into a virtual-reality bodysuit that fits with
|
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the "intimate snugness of a condom." When your partner
|
|
(lying somewhere in cyberspace) fondles your computer
|
|
generated image, you actually feel it on your skin, and
|
|
vice versa. Miniature sensors and actuators would have
|
|
to be woven into the clothing by a technology that has
|
|
yet to be invented.
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William Gibson - Gibson knows precious little about cybernetic
|
|
technology. When the success of Neuromancer enabled
|
|
him to buy his own computer, he was surprised that it
|
|
had a disk drive. "I had been expecting an exotic
|
|
crystalline thing. What I got was a little piece of a
|
|
Victorian engine that makes noise like a scratchy old
|
|
record player."
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=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
|
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My views on this article.
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=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
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It is funny, to me, the amount of BAD PRESS that we (computer
|
|
users/cyberpunks) get. This article, combined with the recent blast of
|
|
"Computer Pornography" reports on various news stations, are making it
|
|
hard for US to get our message across.
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|
I wouldn't consider myself a cyberpunk as these reporters
|
|
explain it, but I would call myself a cyberpunk as defined by US, the
|
|
people who know. Number one, not even close to a Majority of
|
|
"cyberpunks" take these new-age drugs. Many are totally clean to begin
|
|
with. Number 2, I do NOT like industrial music much at all, and the
|
|
line about cyberpunks liking RAVES and DISCO MUSIC cracked me up.
|
|
|
|
I was, however, glad to see mention of Operation Sundevil,
|
|
and its unconstitutional side (even though they sort of hid it in with
|
|
the definitions.)
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|
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I read the line about cyberpunks "dressing all in black, and
|
|
donning mirrored sunglasses.." and laughed. Reminded me of the
|
|
"stereotyping" done to many other people.
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I cant quite figure out how they can make an analogy about
|
|
cyberpunks and "hippies". Cyberpunks are everywhere....as many a bad
|
|
Rehab has stated, (a cyberpunk) "could be your Doctor, Lawyer, and
|
|
even your professor." Just like Alcoholism, eh? We do not all LIKE the
|
|
same music, dress the same way, act and feel the same (like the
|
|
"hippies" did). And as far as REBELLING against something, it is not
|
|
rebelling against the "system" that is important....but getting the
|
|
message out that it is time for a change, and it is time for our
|
|
"elected government" to realize, technology is more than just the
|
|
MILITARIES problem. WE (as modern citizens) have to be taken into
|
|
consideration too.
|
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|
|
How long can the FBI consider our property in computers DATA
|
|
instead of TEXT? Why does it NOT follow the first amendment? Nowadays,
|
|
you are in an outdated office that still uses paper for memos, and
|
|
notes. This is the 90's and we are progressing (technologically) as we
|
|
should BUT we are being held back by the governments present policies.
|
|
Why is it, a business's files are considered private, but regular
|
|
computer users files are considered DATA instead of speech, and we can
|
|
be held accountable for its content.
|
|
|
|
Unfortunately, I think it will take many years for our
|
|
government to realize the problems of todays society (electronically).
|
|
And destructive false articles like this will never help our cause.
|
|
|
|
This article seemed to infer that all cyberpunks are
|
|
disillusioned, and think they live INSIDE a computer. It seemed like
|
|
they were saying that cyberpunks want to live in a drugged out
|
|
anarchists world. I know to US this article is just plain ignorant,
|
|
BUT what about the computer-illiterate society? They will think we are
|
|
plain psychotic.
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|
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|
The Well? I'm sure its a large system, but I never heard of
|
|
it. You can tell that this article was written on the WEST COAST.
|
|
Seemed like they blamed all of the social problems of California on
|
|
cyberpunks.
|
|
|
|
Do I consider myself a Cyberpunk? I would have to answer not
|
|
really. Number one, I never played cyberpunk. I never read any
|
|
cyberpunk books, and I am not as REBELLIOUS as the public thinks they
|
|
are. But according to this article, I do many of the same things that
|
|
"cyberpunks" do. Seems they categorized all who call BBS's and all
|
|
who participate in the NETS are evil-ungood trash. Unso.
|
|
|
|
And the statement about one guy "accidentally running a
|
|
program that erased all his messages on a net" is plain bullshit. If
|
|
that happens, there's only 200 more places where your messages are
|
|
still at. Duh! No, this article wasn't written by a computer
|
|
illiterate, now was it.
|
|
|
|
So, in essence, it looks like TIME Magazine screwed up again.
|
|
What else is new.
|
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////// // //////
|
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// // //
|
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// // //////
|
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// // //
|
|
// ////// //////
|
|
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
|
|
The Lawless Society
|
|
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
|
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|
|
-Powerslave
|