Finally got around to reading Cory Doctorow's Down & Out in the Magic Kingdom,
and though I loved it, I wish it were longer. Or, at least,
I'd love to see more stories from the same setting or playing with the
same themes of the Bitchun Society. I have seen some of these things
in stories before, though. So, hey, I haven't posted anything here in
a few days - have some babble and book links (feel free to comment and
leave some more links):
Of course I love the notion of ubiquitous computing and personal
HUD's. I've babbled about that at length for sure. If you want more
of that, go check out Vernor Vinge's
Fast Times at Fairmont High.
Mediated reality with P2P computing woven into clothing and projected
across contact lens displays. A little less obtrusive than
seisure-inducing in-brain electronics, but just as post-human.
And then there's backup-and-restore and the cure for death. Although
in David Brin's
Kiln People,
things start with disposable
doppelgangers, survival of personality after bodily death is promised
in the ending. What could change human nature more than transcending
mortality?
As for deadheading, check out Vinge's
Across Realtime
series. In
particular, read up on bobbling in Marooned in Realtime. There's also
Orson Scott Card's The Worthing Saga.
A one-way trip into the far future
through geological periods of time seems particularly external to
known human experience, especially when combined with immortality.
One thing I've yet to see much in stories or speculations is how
society could function in a post-mortality and post-scarcity
conditions. I've never been satisfied with the way Star Trek dodges
the day-to-day realities of a post-capitalistic Federation of plenty.
Walter Jon Williams' Aristoi
explores an interesting track with a
meritocratic society whose top members have godlike powers matched to
godlike creativity and self-possession (not to mention possession by
multiple selves).
But so far, Whuffie and its currency in reputation is the best game
I've seen yet. Since, even if the problems of mortality and material
scarcity are solved, human attention and cooperation will never be
gratis. So, how else do you herd the cats when you can neither
threaten nor reward them via any physical means? Seems like the
blogosphere, gift culture, and open source noosphere brought to
reality.
Kinda makes me want to get back to fiction writing meself and finally
get out the dozen or so stories I've had bouncing around in my head
these past years. Doesn't necessarily mean I'd churn out anything
good, but who knows? Maybe after some work and some stumbling I could
produce something passable. All those creative writing classes in
college and short stories in spiral-bound notebooks from high school
have to count for something. I'd even love to squat in the Bitchun
Society for a few stories, but that might be a bit presumptuous, even though
Mr. Doctorow himself has let on
that he's not likely to write more
tales from the same Bitchun universe.
Better to get some practice in before jamming in someone else's club.
shortname=down_and_out
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