Cyberpunk Article Summary (Week 1)
OVERALL SUMMARY (week 1)
In the 5 articles, they provide a rough idea regarding cyber punk. From definitions, we understand that it is something very subjective as it can differ vastly between people. It is a pop culture phenomenon, where people engage in technology to display their unique ideas and style, explaining the rise of cyberpunk in games and movies.
With GURPS Cyberpunk and Cyberpunk 2020, we see a trend of cyberpunk-themed role-playing games set in a near-future dystopia. It is worth noting the reaction of the government sector toward such creations, as the court case for GURPS had the state asserting that it was a "handbook for computer crime". It was really a case of misinterpretation and this shows the ignorance regarding the cyber punk culture as well as technology.
In Blade Runner, there is a dystopia where characters are a product of the environment. Replicants were at first developed to satisfy human needs but this ideal became distorted as the former gained awareness and had their own thinking. Humans then face ethical dilemmas and raises cyberpunk questions regarding what it is to be human, and why life is so precious.
These issues link up with the role reversal phenomenon as noted in the last article, where humans seem to be gradually replacing their own kind with machines. This defies Nature and the author aims to raise awareness regarding the “robofication” present in society. We should also question ourselves the issue of convergence between machine and man and whether this is a pervasive trend or simply a short-lived fad.
The articles are as follow:
1. Cyberpunk Definitions
http://project.cyberpunk.ru/idb/definition.html
http://project.cyberpunk.ru/idb/time_has_come_today.html
These sites provide a brief overview regarding cyberpunk, where it is a descriptor - to describes something that happens in society. From cyberpunk authors who noted dystrophic literary phenomenon and created stories out of them, it has evolved into a cyberpunk movement. The "cyber" in cyberpunk refers to the technology of computer networks and virtual reality. It involves awareness and tactics to deflect the effect of social viruses with technological vectors, that otherwise seem chaotic.
QN: Are there any real-life situations that can be related to cyberpunk?
2. Steve Jackson Games, Inc. v. U.S. Secret Service
http://www.tomwbell.com/NetLaw/Ch09/SJGames1.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Jackson_Games,_Inc._v._United_States_Secret_Service
This article discusses the court case that arose due to a raid by the United States Secret Service on the Austin headquarters of Steve Jackson Games in 1990.
The USSS' Operation Sundevil, a nation-wide crackdown on ‘illegal computer hacking activities’, viewed Loyd Blankenship as a target as he was a former member of the Legion of Doom hacker group. In 1899, he ran a Bulletin Board System from his home called The Phoenix Project,which had information about the Emergency 911 emergency response system. Blankenship was writing GURPS Cyberpunk, genre toolkit for cyberpunk-themed role-playing games set in a near-future dystopia. At the Austin HQ & Blakenship's home, authorities seized the manuscript for the sourcebook,asserting that it was a "handbook for computer crime". It was simply a role playing game supplement with game rules for pretending to crack fictional computers and rumors about the government's ignorance regarding computer technology quickly spread.
QN: How can the National Security Act of the USA prevent such infringement of privacy (Electronic Communications Privacy Act) from occurring again?
3. Cyberpunk 2020
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyberpunk_2020
It refers to a cyberpunk role-playing game set in a futuristic time frame of 2020, where it depicts an early 21st century from a 1980s perspective. Anachronisms such as omitting the fall of the Soviet Union and not foreseeing the adoption of cell phones as the preferred mode of communication challenge societal norms. A large part of the game system is the player characters' ability to augment themselves with cyber-technology and the ensuing loss of humanity as they become more machine than man. Attempts are made to keep the combat as realistic as possible in a game setting. No matter who the character is, a single bullet can result in a lethal wound. This encourages a more tactically-oriented and sneaky game play, which follows the rough-and-gritty ethos of the Cyberpunk genre.
Qn: Do people play RPGs for a representation of reality or to escape from it?
4. Blader Runner movie (1982)
http://www.cyberpunkreview.com/movie/decade/1980-1989/blade-runner/
http://www.brmovie.com/FAQs/BR_FAQ_Cyberpunk.htm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lW0F1sccqk
Definitive cyberpunk movie as it gave cyberpunk science fiction its visual representation.
The movie is based on Philip K. Dick's book "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep".
Los Angeles, 2019: Rick Deckard is a blade runner, a police man of the future who hunts down and terminates replicants, artificially created humans. Replicants were used to serve in the colonies outside Earth but with fixed lifespans. They were declared illegal after a bloody mutiny on an Off-World Colony, and are to be terminated upon detection. Deckard wants to get out of the force, but is drawn back in when 5 "skin jobs", a slang term for replicants, hijack a ship back to Earth. The city that Deckard must search for his prey is a huge, sprawling, bleak vision of the future.
QN: How do we draw the line between “robotized” humans and “sentient” robots?
5. Man vs. Machine: The Role Reversal Phenomenon in Cyberpunk Fiction
http://jsaw.lib.lehigh.edu/include/getdoc.php?id=1207&article=636&mode=pdf
This article discusses the blurring of lines between man and machine in a cyberpunk world, where contact with each other invariably leaves some impact. Each individual begins at a separate end of the spectrum: human at one end and machine at the other. As the film progresses, the two dots move closer to one another, progressing to the centre where they are almost touching. Finally the two dots pass each other, but only for an instant-this is where each respective entity is most like the other and where one entity must prevail.
QN: How is this “robofication” of humans apparent in current times?
PHENOMENA NOTED:
1. Online collaboration with multiple tools has allowed more information access at asychoronous times and it is some what like the idea of cyberpunk in which it takes apart technology to provide more access to freedom.
2. With more information access and new social networking sites, there is a clear trend of cyberpunk increase due to multiple manipulation & modification by users.
3. With the increasing trend of creating artificial intelligence in science and technology, mankind’s relevance is questioned, as humans seem to be gradually replacing their own kind with machines.
4. Immersion of people in RPGs is increasingly rampant, which leads to our growing dependency on technology for social interaction platforms. Virtual communities construct identities and democratization of players occur because there is a lack of gender and ethnic constraints.
5. This is the most interesting one of all, noting how the hacker culture can develop paranoia of privacy infringement by the government when they infringe others' privacy as well (Refer to Steven Jackson Games' article)
Evernote link:
http://www.evernote.com/Home.action#Thumbs/notebook%253A%2522cyberpunk%2520proj%2522