At first I found the concept of 'Cyberpunk' really hard to get my head around! This is, because the term can not be defined as a certain thing, rather it is better to talk about it as common styles, themes and ideas such as: corporate control, mutation, negative human behaviour, technology.
These ideas are combined in science-fiction to raise awareness of certain issues or get you thinking. The first movie that sprang to mind for me.. although it did not involve robotics or mutation was one that Will Smith starred in called "Enemeny of the State". The main ideas of the movie focused on the American Governments control of society through technology, although I wouldn't call it sci-fi for me I would put it's themes into the cyberpunk category. What do you think?
The cyberpunk nerds on cyberpunkreview.com (the most comprehensive resource site I found) failed to name Enemy of The State as a cyberpunk movie.. perhaps they missed it. However well known movies that they do name include: The Terminator, Alien, 12 monkeys, Robocop, Irobot, The Matrix, Total Recall & most recently AVATAR.
I really like the cyberpunk genre as I feel it even though in most cases it is just weird and wonderful fiction, it highlights the way technology, government and commercialisation are rapidly taking over our lives. If we are already creating robotic animals where does it stop?!
"Classic cyberpunk characters were marginalized, alienated loners who lived on the edge of society in generally dystopic futures where daily life was impacted by rapid technological change, an ubiquitous datasphere of computerized information, and invasive modification of the human body." – Lawrence Person
Who is WILLIAM GIBSON?!
William Gibson is one of the most well known and respected science fiction writers. He is often labelled the king of the cyberpunk genre of science fiction and is credited with predicting the rise of reality television.
Gibson began writing sci-fi novels in the 1970's. The cyberpunk movement emerged in the 80's "with Gibson at its helm, as an apparent manifestation of countercultural art (Vogler, 2010). Gibson's success was due to his first hit book "Neuromancer" which hit cult status and created the genre of cyberpunk.
IDEAS WE DEFINED IN THE LECTURE AS CYBERPUNK:
- Fusion of man and machine - Robots, cyborgs
(The Terminator, Robo cop, Hancock
- Corporate control over society - Large corporation, government (conspriacy theories), removal of civil liberties.
- Story focuses on the underground - Unground society, anti-hero, uprising
(Avatar)
- Ubiquitous Access to information - Hackers, internet, viruses, blurring of internet & reality
CYBERPUNK STYLE: charcters are dirty, hyper-realistic, neon colour schemes, slick tyle
(12 monkeys, the chick with the orange hair)
Source: http://www.cyberpunkreview.com/what-is-cyberpunk/
No dicussion of CYBERPUNK is complete unless we mention Boston Dynamics Robotic Dog:
or what about Toyota's violin playing robot... call me crazy but WHAT THE??!!!!
'
It creeps me out! and to think with all the millions of dollars this robot took to develop, you think they would have made him do something a little.. I dunno.. USEFUL!
CYBERPUNK NEWS STORY
ROBOT SOLDIERS TAKING OVER WAR!
http://www.metro.co.uk/tech/811174-stephen-sackur-how-robot-soldiers-are-taking-over-war
ALTERED NEWS STORY!
ROBOTS TAKING OVER WORLD WAR III
June 15th, 2035
The nanobots are now the U.S military's strongest force in the war. In the air, robotics is pretty well advanced. Drone planes being used in Afghanistan are using technology which has been around since the mid-1990s. They were initially designed for surveillance but are now armed with potent missile and bomb systems to annihilate al-Qaeda.
They don’t get tired, they don’t get bored and thousands of significant terrorist leaders have been killed by them. The nanobots were originally developed as a bomb disposal robot for IEDs (roadside bombs). But the US subsidiary of the company has now weaponised it, either with an M16 or a grenade launcher, to make the first real ground-based robot soldier.
This generation of robots have much more autonomy. Once you introduce real autonomy the machine itself, with highly sophisticated computers is, in a very real sense, making its own decisions. These robots are so sophisticated they can identify the enemy before opening fire, they can also analyze a persons biological age from 200m away. There are designed not to fire upon anyone under the age of sixteen.
The US plans to have 80 % of its military aircraft unmanned. It has trained almost all incoming pilots to never leave the ground. This war has become a war fought by electronic counter-warfare and hacking into satellite links and communications.
References:
William (Ford) Gibson Biography
http://biography.jrank.org/pages/4355/Gibson-William-Ford.html
http://project.cyberpunk.ru/idb/williamgibson.html
http://www.williamgibsonbooks.com/
Robert K. J. Killheffer, an Interview with William Gibson in Publishers
Weekly, Vol. 240, No. 36, September 6, 1993, pp. 70 1. online: http://www.library.spscc.ctc.edu/electronicreserve/swanson/InterviewwithWilliamGibsonFall2002.pdf
http://www.cyberpunkreview.com/what-is-cyberpunk/
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