Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Influence of Neuromancer on Cyberpunk

sabukaru.online

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

241–250 of 404 posts

Re: The Influence of Neuromancer on Cyberpunk

#241

Post by blaser-waffle »

pydry wrote: post #127
the_af wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "the majority of derivatives of the cyberpunk genre I've seen have all usually been cheap cash grabs with less than any real messaging behind it" Agreed, and it's important to note that the message "evil corporations are greedy and use tech in soulless and alienating ways" used to be a radical message but it's not anymore. Now it's just a trope. So I disagree with what some are saying that cyberpunk is currently us…

>Agreed, and it's important to note that the message "evil corporations are greedy and use tech in soulless and alienating ways" used to be a radical message but it's not anymore. "The Nazis are evil" is also an overused trope and is hardly radical but by reusing it it helps protect us on a civilizational level from actual nazis. Tropes can be sort of like cultural T cells. I'd rather see more "nazis are bad" and cyb…

> "The Nazis are evil" is also an overused trope and is hardly radical but by reusing it it helps protect us on a civilizational level from actual nazis.

Hows that working out? Cuz it doesn't look like it's doing much except creating painfully generic stock villains.

People forgot how popular the Nazis were, both in the US and elsewhere. And no one can really articulate why they're popular now outside of "day racis", which is a thought terminating cliche.

Re: The Influence of Neuromancer on Cyberpunk

#242

Post by blaser-waffle »

willis936 wrote: post #200
Mountain_Skies wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry to gatekeep but corporate produced anything cannot be punk. At most, they can serve as a rent seeker for passing along punk to the masses but that's not even what Cyberpunk 2077 is. This is 100% corporate, focus grouped, committee approved, beige trying too hard to be punk. Which is fine if taken for what it really is but what it really is, which isn't punk.

Then there is no punk now. Every inch of life within society has been co-opted by moneymen. You, by living in society, are not punk. The novels you label as punk are not punk because they are made for profit, advertised to appease and sedate a sense of counterculture, and bought with money made from corporate work. Chan manifestos are the only thing that might qualify.

> Chan manifestos are the only thing that might qualify.

Plenty of other punk types. Train hopping crusty punk types come to mind. Moxie Marlinspike has a few great stories about hanging with that crowd.

Re: The Influence of Neuromancer on Cyberpunk

#243

Post by blaser-waffle »

jrochkind1 wrote: post #111
mherdeg wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I liked Paolo Bagciaglupi's "The Calorie Man" (which I read in "Rewired: The Post-Cyberpunk Anthology") as an example of this kind of "if we project today's state of affairs 30 years into the future, what is the dystopia it produces?" line of reasoning. The story is about megacorporations greedily controlling the supply of food via patents on GMO crops in a post-peak-oil society. There's no artificial general intelli…

I really recommend Bagciaglupi's "The Wind-Up Girl", which is kind of the novel expanded from The Calorie Man. It is dismal.

Great book.

My friend is Thai and said he (Bagciaglupi) couldn't speak the language to save his life, but otherwise liked the book.

Re: The Influence of Neuromancer on Cyberpunk

#244

Post by pydry »

brazzy wrote: post #227
pydry wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Agreed, and it's important to note that the message "evil corporations are greedy and use tech in soulless and alienating ways" used to be a radical message but it's not anymore. "The Nazis are evil" is also an overused trope and is hardly radical but by reusing it it helps protect us on a civilizational level from actual nazis. Tropes can be sort of like cultural T cells. I'd rather see more "nazis are bad" and cyb…

> "The Nazis are evil" is also an overused trope and is hardly radical but by reusing it it helps protect us on a civilizational level from actual nazis. ...or helps a dictator dehumanize the population of a country he wants to conquer for propaganda purposes.

Yeah, so creating a nazi military batallion out of a nazi paramilitary to fight an ethnic civil war against Russians may not have been the genius military move Poroshenko thought it was :(

Re: The Influence of Neuromancer on Cyberpunk

#245

Post by pydry »

blaser-waffle wrote: post #241
pydry wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Agreed, and it's important to note that the message "evil corporations are greedy and use tech in soulless and alienating ways" used to be a radical message but it's not anymore. "The Nazis are evil" is also an overused trope and is hardly radical but by reusing it it helps protect us on a civilizational level from actual nazis. Tropes can be sort of like cultural T cells. I'd rather see more "nazis are bad" and cyb…

> "The Nazis are evil" is also an overused trope and is hardly radical but by reusing it it helps protect us on a civilizational level from actual nazis. Hows that working out? Cuz it doesn't look like it's doing much except creating painfully generic stock villains. People forgot how popular the Nazis were, both in the US and elsewhere. And no one can really articulate why they're popular now outside of "day racis",…

>How's that working out? Cuz it doesn't look like it's doing much except creating painfully generic stock villains

Those tiki torch people arent exactly running the country now are they?

Re: The Influence of Neuromancer on Cyberpunk

#246

Post by jvanderbot »

pmoriarty wrote: post #112
sneak wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be honest, the descriptions of the metaverse are the parts of Neuromancer that hold up least well. The dirtbags, crime, sex, and drugs are all still perfect, and I imagine will remain so.

"the descriptions of the metaverse are the parts of Neuromancer that hold up least well" I'd be interested in reading descriptions of cyberspace that are better than Neuromancer 's. So far I haven't found any.

The commentary I've read (and agree with), is that the metaverse itself just didn't hold up.

The internet did not become a new reality. Instead, our own reality is melding with the internet through always-on devices and miniaturized sensors and wide wireless networks.

Instead of some kind of digital lovecraftian portals hidden away in parts of realspace that connect to this magical deadly realm, the modern vision of cyperbpunk should probably have included something more like an ethereal plane -- a perfect mirror of the real world that happens to ignore its physical constraints and provide ways to manipulate and bypass the realspace.

Re: The Influence of Neuromancer on Cyberpunk

#247

Post by pkdpic »

mmaunder wrote: post #68

I’m constantly amazed at how Metaverse aficionados quote Snow Crash and and other 1990s works as cornerstones of cyberspace, when Gibson invented the term and Neuromancer was written in 1984. Gibson is the original. The passage where Case connects to the matrix (also a Gibson term) again for the first time once his nervous system is repaired is heartbreakingly beautiful. I relate to it as a young phone phreak growing…

And didn't Gibson write the screenplay for the film adaptation of Johnny Mnemonic where they coined the term iPhone in that one random scene for two seconds? Or did I imagine that?

Anyway I guess thats like the opposite of cyberpunk... or is it? :shrug-emoji:

Re: The Influence of Neuromancer on Cyberpunk

#248

Post by relaxing »

pmoriarty wrote: post #112
sneak wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be honest, the descriptions of the metaverse are the parts of Neuromancer that hold up least well. The dirtbags, crime, sex, and drugs are all still perfect, and I imagine will remain so.

"the descriptions of the metaverse are the parts of Neuromancer that hold up least well" I'd be interested in reading descriptions of cyberspace that are better than Neuromancer 's. So far I haven't found any.

Depends on your criteria, I guess. As a poetic fantasy, they are superb. But it's maddening how little sense they make as a way to navigate computer networks. (Why would you visualize servers and executing code in a 3D space that you have to physically navigate, when you could just... execute a command. Gibson's genius was recognizing that real computer hacking wasn't cinematic, and making up his own system.)

I still love his vision.

Re: The Influence of Neuromancer on Cyberpunk

#249

Post by jvanderbot »

mmaunder wrote: post #146
sneak wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be honest, the descriptions of the metaverse are the parts of Neuromancer that hold up least well. The dirtbags, crime, sex, and drugs are all still perfect, and I imagine will remain so.

They're a 38 year old metaphor. Neil Stephenson's Smartwheels don't exist either, and we still don't have "professional road surfers", but that doesn't make Snow Crash any less relevant: "Smartwheels use sonar, laser range finding and millimeter wave radar to identify mufflers and other debris. Each one consists of a hub with many tiny spokes. Each spoke telescopes into five sections. On the end is a squat foot, rubb…

I just don't like snow crash. Does that make me an outlier? The whole thing was silly and far too jrpg for my taste.

I mean, stealing the whole "skitchn" thing and slapping "Smooth move, ex lax" on a car when they try to shake you is just campy.

"Poor impulse control" -- just slapstick comedy at that point.

Re: The Influence of Neuromancer on Cyberpunk

#250

Post by whiskyant »

Krasnol wrote: post #196
sho_hn wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're talking in a pop culture context here, where even just in 2020-2022 Korea and Korean culture/heritage has had significant soft power success in a number of markets/media: - Export of majorly successful pop music (e.g. BTS, Blackpink - those hits are often penned by Western composers however, so a bit murky on what product is flowing there) - Ditto TV (e.g. Squid Game setting TV records with a lot rooted in Kore…

Germany here. Besides Squid Game and Parasite, I've not heard of most of them and in the case of PUBG, I wasn't aware it was from SK or in any way special in this seemingly endless pool of "the same game with another skin"-genre.

The recently popular Lost Ark is another video game by Korea.

I'm surprised you've never heard of the kpop groups BTS or Blackpink in Germany.

Post reply on HN