I see a great deal of dyspepsia about technology along with a willingness to embrace anything that comes along. Cyberpunk seems to be filled with grim predictions about the future coupled with a willingness to hasten its advent by whatever means possible.
Predictor: Barlow, John Perry
Prediction, in context:In a 1992 article for The Boston Globe, Nathan Cobb covers what it means to be a “cyberpunk.” He quotes Electronic Frontier Foundation founder John Perry Barlow. Cobb writes: ”The cyberpunk future includes the likes of a computer-generated artificial environment known as virtual reality … It includes dreams of virtual sex … It includes further developments in robotics, artificial intelligence, even artificial life … ‘Cyberpunk is the natural inheritor of that American cultural movement that called itself beatniks and later hippies,’ says John Perry Barlow, a writer, Wyoming rancher, Grateful Dead lyricist and co-founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a computer civil rights organization. ‘You have a group of bohemians armed with digital technologies and a certain kind of gloomy optimism. I see a great deal of dyspepsia about technology along with a willingness to embrace anything that comes along. Cyberpunk seems to be filled with grim predictions about the future coupled with a willingness to hasten its advent by whatever means possible.'”
Biography:John Perry Barlow helped found the Electronic Frontier Foundation in 1990 with WELL (Whole Earth ‘Lectronic Link) members Mitch Kapor and John Gilmore in direct response to a threat to free speech. Barlow’s was one of the loudest voices in the battle to keep the Internet unfettered while still encouraging that it become a tool available to everyone. (Advocate/Voice of the People.)
Date of prediction: November 1, 1992
Topic of prediction: Community/Culture
Subtopic: Cyberpunks/Hackers
Name of publication: Boston Globe
Title, headline, chapter name: Cyberpunk: Terminal Chic – Technology is Moving Out of Computers and into the Culture
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://web.lexis-nexis.com/universe/document?_m=1b6c3032419cccfe8c6279e902526ea8&_docnum=1&wchp=dGLbVlz-lSlzV&_md5=c4f6ed32ef7e59f0618f6630c1f81950
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Garrison, Betty