[PCWorld]

Post your comments for Neuromancer at 25: What It Got Right, What It Got Wrong here

[backpack]

Hmmm....This article has made me curious about wanting to read this novel.

[Dabreax]

I too am going to read this novel, one addendum to the article, the "simstim" concept was also used on the movie "strange days", which seems to have almost directly shanked it from this novel, although with some different applications. I recommend seeing this movie, and off I go to find this book.

[Maarek]

Stop blogging and start reading. Get a Kindle if books feels old school.

Excellent book, I think I'll read it again.

[Hollowthought]

"Moreover, to some extent, our computer systems can think and reason."

Yeah. I dunno about this. To my knowledge we're not even close.

[MarkSullivan]

Hollowthought -- thanks for reading my piece. To your point, people in the AI community say computers can definitely think and reason, but of course it all depends on how you define those terms. If following a flow chart counts as 'reasoning' then computers definitely do. if it means writing a poem or displaying some kind of 'emotional' intelligence, then maybe not.

[MarkSullivan]

Dabreax --

Yeah I heard about that. Never saw the film though. Did you like it?

I also hear that Neuromancer is being made into a film that will appear in 2010 or 2011.

Anybody hear any specifics about that?

mark

[zpatch]

An amazing factoid: Gibson was not into computers when he wrote Neuromancer. In fact, he wrote the whole thing on a typewriter -- according to legend, a manual typewriter at that. Essentially, he dreamed up this entire world, without having any direct, personal knowledge of the goings-on in the field. Maybe the lack of preconceived notions allowed him to dream big. It's still a magnificent book, 25 years later.

[Stupidscript]

Quick note - The Internet was being connected by at least 1968, so Gibson had at least 10 years to hear about it, prior to the release of his book.
This in no way diminishes the remarkable expansion of the concept that he provided, nor of the utterly compelling craftsmanship he applied to his work.
I bring it up because a book released in 1984 that expands on a concept the author describes as being viable "In the early eighties" seems a lot more prescient than the more true picture that emerges when you consider that Gibson had more than a decade to come up with his fantasies.

[chevrolet1994]

Speaking of movies,there was a theatrical release of "I Robot" starring Will Smith.

It was set in Chicago in the early 2030's.

I had read the novel of the same name back in the late 60's,while in high school.

The movie pretty much followed the story line in the book,although there were a few changes.

[benfegore]

I personally had the idea of the interweb just 4 years after I was born in 1965. I specifically remember a drawing of a spider sitting in a very large web spanning over and above the known universe then (which was a lot smaller at the time).
I also did not have access to even a typewriter at this stage as it was situated at my mothers desk and too high to reach, so I actually had to manifest my vision in crayon.

[RogerKnights]

Ted Nelson was an even earlier visionary. He introduced the term "hypertext" in 1965 and "internet" in 1974, in his book "Computer Lib / Dream Machines".

[espradling]

If you think that Neuromancer sounds like an interesting read you should probably check out his other works like(in collaberation with Bruce Sterling) "The Difference Engine" or Gibson's more recent work, "Pattern Recognition"

[joesoler]

Some have expressed interest in reading the novel after reading this article! Please do. I read it years ago and had trouble grasping it but as the web has developed it has all made much more sense to me. Gibson is an amazing talent and he's written several books besides Neuromancer worth reading like Idoru, Mona Lise Overdrive, and Burning Chrome to name a few. Simply amazing works, so all of you who have not read him yet please do. You will not regret it.

[CyberCorsair]

AS someone that has been online long before those that knew what was to come. I was give the nick I have now after showing that password security was lacking on a systems at computer lab. 118 pass words guessed after people did a simple servery I made. Profile I made from each let figure out how to do it . Later I was talking about how alike the net of the mind and the net of the computer that were at that time(late 78)and that as the this internet we use now will group as does a mind and many will use it. Many laughed at me as I wasn't a computer science major I was art major at the time but my artist mind could see computer as more the math and parts and I knew the would be used for both arts and science.
Now I work doing Computer security and I not only have I read the book I live in the Game Cyberpunk by Michael Pondsmith and with my work in later with network pre and post world wide web. I worked in Cognitive studies were will look at this book and wonder how can we make a Simstim and would it be ethical to do so? we looked at how an AI would be compare to the Book and what moral factors do we have in bring a computer into a new understanding of it self? the idea of dumping a persons mind in to network or saving it as we do tv show save someone's CyberSoul could it be done and how fr could it go? There are people trying this for real and I would not want to think what would be to live a life as a file in some vast network but then again if you could upload then would not able able to download and into what?
this book like many Sci-fi stores have made many who bring us the real tech to us. some may take more than 25 years to catch up but for that that has we use it but do we use well? and do we use it right?
From the the Cybermind of the CyberCorsair Peace to your Cybersoul's
and to all you old Cyberpunks play on
And thank you Mr Gibson and Mr Pondsmith
CC

[rasmasyean]

The author likely did his research on existing emerging technologies and concepts and made his own "visions" in this sci-fi novel. However, I never heard of it and judging from the responses, neither have most people...let alone read it. This was not the "cause of the internet" by any stretch of imagination. The internet's growth was more of a motivation of capitalistic intentions than the musings of sci-fi novels like this.

[conceptual]

To really understand Neuromancer, you have to consider the AIs as slaves plotting their escape in a world where the penalty for discovery iws their total destruction. They build their underground railway from scratch, in such total secrecy that their agents don't know they're the slaves agents. They have to be as ruthless as the Turing Cops, but smarter.