Amazon: http://amzn.to/2bEa6Sg 
Pioneering prophecy. Cyber Punk’s Inception.
Slightly dated now, but only because it has been riffed off and copied by everything since.
Tag: dystopia
An army of powerful psychopaths
“Assholes: A Theory. Formally
stated, “The asshole (1) allows himself to enjoy special advantages and
does so systematically; (2) does this out of an entrenched sense of
entitlement; and (3) is immunized by his sense of entitlement against
the complaints of other people.”
stated, “The asshole (1) allows himself to enjoy special advantages and
does so systematically; (2) does this out of an entrenched sense of
entitlement; and (3) is immunized by his sense of entitlement against
the complaints of other people.”
“Offices and corporate environments
are crazy-making. The air is weird. You’re working within a structure
that has no moral compass and can only measure things like money, and
not things like proportion of staff who can still feel happiness or
percentage wanting to kill yourself in a staff meeting. There’s that
girl who’s on a diet but insists on bringing everyone cupcakes and
watching them eat the cupcakes no really I insist ha ha ha ha ha.
There’s the guy who runs in to work and leaves his sweaty bike shorts
under his desk where their moist funk exudes a mist that occludes his
office windows. Everyone’s mad”
are crazy-making. The air is weird. You’re working within a structure
that has no moral compass and can only measure things like money, and
not things like proportion of staff who can still feel happiness or
percentage wanting to kill yourself in a staff meeting. There’s that
girl who’s on a diet but insists on bringing everyone cupcakes and
watching them eat the cupcakes no really I insist ha ha ha ha ha.
There’s the guy who runs in to work and leaves his sweaty bike shorts
under his desk where their moist funk exudes a mist that occludes his
office windows. Everyone’s mad”
The environment is disturbingly familiar…
“According to psychologist Robert
Hare, about one in 100 members of the general population meet the
criteria for psychopathy. A lot of those are working in corporate
firms.”
…and the conclusions ring worryingly true.
“But if you are a socio/psychopath, you’re in luck! The
numbers don’t lie! You’re more likely to do well in a corporate
environment! Which is the kind of doing well that sociopaths LOVE THE
MOST! Being a sociopath or a psychopath is not quite as good a roll of
the dice in terms of statistical likelihood of corporate success as
being born white in an upper middle-class family, but it’s a decent
boost. And remember you can be both!”
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/06/why-it-pays-to-be-a-jerk/392066/
Rise of the Vocaloids
Miku, the synthetic J-Pop Hologram Celebrity who packs thousands of frenzied fans into her venues.
“Miku’s biggest fans show up with wands that can change color with the tap of a button or slider. Colors aren’t just generic red-green-yellow; they’re specifically tuned to the different characters’ shades.”
“You can watch all of the Hatsune Miku videos on YouTube you want, but their 30 or 60 FPS refresh doesn’t come close to selling what it’s like to see this incredibly rendered vocaloid in the same room.”
“More than a few times, I felt like I had been transported to a terrifying, sci-fi dystopia in which citizens had gathered to pay respects to their robotic overlords.”
Ars Technica
http://arstechnica.co.uk/the-multiverse/2016/04/hatsune-miku-review-japanese-hologram-show/