3 ms·

>To me, having the box sitting next to me every day, with "infinite reality" label on the top reminds me of those days when anything seemed possible and all of

>To me, having the box sitting next to me every day, with "infinite reality" label on the top reminds me of those days when anything seemed possible and all of it was magical. I miss that sense of wonder and infinite possibilities... In the recent 3-5 years, there is a clear revival of the cyberpunk subculture online. Many related hobbyist websites appeared, many new cyberpunk-inspired independent art, music and games are composed, new communities are formed, etc. Themes include a general nostalgia of the 80s, especially vintage computers, also the 90s early pre-Web 1.0. The reason? We can clearly see. The lost future that never comes...

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
erikpukinskis 8y ago
It’s coming. Birthing something like that requires patience. And it always takes longer than you think. It will come slowly at first, and then all at once.
- bcaa7f3a8bbc 8y ago
  >The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed. Nobody is denying it, indeed we see many related development. However, it's not only about "the lost future that never comes", I think it's also due to the people being increasingly alienated about the current state of computing. Primarily, it's about the lost mentality of the future. Cyberpunk promised a future where computing is the disruptive technology. Since 2006, the ever-increasing clock speed came to a halt. Since 2013, the general performance of Intel processors remained constant. Selling of PCs keeps declining. No major breakthrough in practical operating systems are made beyond Unix (http://herpolhode.com/rob/utah2000.pdf http://herpolhode.com/rob/utah2000.pdf). Cyberpunk promised a future where megacorps and governments being increasingly oppressive to the population with technology, it has occurred as predicted. Cyberpunk also promised the "cyberspace" is going to be the electronic frontier where technologists reclaimed liberty... Today, the damn web browser that runs all the craps written in Electron and JavaScript is hardly the "frontier", neither Facebook, Twitter and the endless timeline of buzz, which constitute 90% of the Internet activities count. Also, from 2000-2013, decentralization was killed, not built. Move importantly, today, we don’t even know how to waste time on the Internet anymore (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17068138 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17068138). Though, It, still, has arguably occurred to some extents too, but progressed slowly, even the basic tech like HTTPS was only deployed after Snowden. A future where anything seemed possible and all of it was magical is definitely gone. But the new generation of developers, armed with decentralization, P2P, cryptography, and trustless system, no matter if it's going to be successful or not, would bring the Internet back to its cyberpunk ideals, revive the dream and set the history forward.
spitfire 8y ago
Links? I loved Neuromancer, Snow Crash and others of the time.
- currymj 8y ago
  The recent game EXAPUNKS is definitely like this, and worth playing, although it's assembly language programming puzzles so might be a sort of busman's holiday for a lot of HN readers.
- SSLy 8y ago
  More aesthetic oriented: http://reddit.com/r/outrun/ http://reddit.com/r/outrun/
- nailer 8y ago
  Check out Daniel Suarez daemon and freedom. Not saying more as I don't want to spoil anything.
- bcaa7f3a8bbc 8y ago
  Another example is Neocities, the old 90s Geocities personal webpage culture brought to life again.
aaaaaaaaaab 8y ago
Are you talking about vaporwave?
- SSLy 8y ago
  That's just one face of the movement.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

erikpukinskis 8y ago

It’s coming. Birthing something like that requires patience. And it always takes longer than you think. It will come slowly at first, and then all at once.

bcaa7f3a8bbc 8y ago
>The future is already here — it's just not very evenly distributed. Nobody is denying it, indeed we see many related development. However, it's not only about "the lost future that never comes", I think it's also due to the people being increasingly alienated about the current state of computing. Primarily, it's about the lost mentality of the future. Cyberpunk promised a future where computing is the disruptive technology. Since 2006, the ever-increasing clock speed came to a halt. Since 2013, the general performance of Intel processors remained constant. Selling of PCs keeps declining. No major breakthrough in practical operating systems are made beyond Unix (http://herpolhode.com/rob/utah2000.pdf http://herpolhode.com/rob/utah2000.pdf). Cyberpunk promised a future where megacorps and governments being increasingly oppressive to the population with technology, it has occurred as predicted. Cyberpunk also promised the "cyberspace" is going to be the electronic frontier where technologists reclaimed liberty... Today, the damn web browser that runs all the craps written in Electron and JavaScript is hardly the "frontier", neither Facebook, Twitter and the endless timeline of buzz, which constitute 90% of the Internet activities count. Also, from 2000-2013, decentralization was killed, not built. Move importantly, today, we don’t even know how to waste time on the Internet anymore (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17068138 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17068138). Though, It, still, has arguably occurred to some extents too, but progressed slowly, even the basic tech like HTTPS was only deployed after Snowden. A future where anything seemed possible and all of it was magical is definitely gone. But the new generation of developers, armed with decentralization, P2P, cryptography, and trustless system, no matter if it's going to be successful or not, would bring the Internet back to its cyberpunk ideals, revive the dream and set the history forward.

spitfire 8y ago

Links? I loved Neuromancer, Snow Crash and others of the time.

currymj 8y ago
The recent game EXAPUNKS is definitely like this, and worth playing, although it's assembly language programming puzzles so might be a sort of busman's holiday for a lot of HN readers.
SSLy 8y ago
More aesthetic oriented: http://reddit.com/r/outrun/ http://reddit.com/r/outrun/
nailer 8y ago
Check out Daniel Suarez daemon and freedom. Not saying more as I don't want to spoil anything.
bcaa7f3a8bbc 8y ago
Another example is Neocities, the old 90s Geocities personal webpage culture brought to life again.

aaaaaaaaaab 8y ago

Are you talking about vaporwave?

SSLy 8y ago
That's just one face of the movement.