yeah, Gibson pretty much admits that his cyberpunk was inspired by his love of certain prose styles and how other writers could imply an entire world with a few

yeah, Gibson pretty much admits that his cyberpunk was inspired by his love of certain prose styles and how other writers could imply an entire world with a few well chosen neolgisms (and his distaste for Golden Age scifi tropes), and that he knew almost nothing about the tech and at the time of Neuromancer had never even been to Asia. In that respect Stephenson is the opposite: even in Snow Crash which is basically caricaturing cyberpunk, he feels the need to explain how everything works. Which doesn't necessarily move the plot along on, but there's more depth to the worldbuilding even when the ideas grate. Don't think you'd pick either of them for their characters