4 ms·
So many mega corps being Japanese is a product of anxiety about Japan at that time—maybe not even Gibson's anxiety, exactly, but if you were around then and pro
by brimble 5y ago
So many mega corps being Japanese is a product of anxiety about Japan at that time—maybe not even Gibson's anxiety, exactly, but if you were around then and projected which mega corps were gonna be prominent in your nearish-future setting, you'd really be swimming against the current if you didn't make a lot of them Japanese.
Much of the rest of it, though, isn't about Japanese culture, corporate or otherwise, but seems to me like taking AnCaps like Friedman seriously. Many elements are straight out of that kind of, ah, thought.
- Jon_Lowtek 5y agoName three japanese mega corporations with significance in the story of neuromancer
- pmoriarty 5y agoOno-sendai, Mitsubishi-Genentech, and Hosaka.
- Jon_Lowtek 5y agook, those exist, but none of them have significance. There is a point that in the 80s much electronic tech came from Japan and that both Ono-Sendai and Hosaka are named as top of the line cyberdeck manufacturerers, but that is pretty much it, they have no relevant part in the story. I think people are trying to forcefully over-fit that 80s japan craze they read about in an attempt to seem like sophisticated literary critics. Maybe i can't see it because i am not american and my national pride isn't being triggered by jokes like "Mitsubishi Bank of America" and by the idea that globalism may not mean hegemony of the USA. Major roles in Neuromancer are given to companies like Sense/Net, Maas Biolabs, Tessier-Ashpool and the Eastern Seaboard Fission Authority, yet people cling to side notes about hardware brands because they are offended with the first chapter playing a Chiba City Blues instead of some New York City Jazz.