Print is not dead!, Low tech response to the corp controls Options

[Snow_Fox]

People have been saying for years that print is dead. Newspapers and magazines are failnig and now systems like amazon's Kindle means some people don't even have to carry books. I would expect that trend to expand more, why have a bookshelf groaning under the weight of books when you can just have a device the size of a single book there instead? BUT as runners evolve I think print will have a resurgance.

In RL I was looking at my work e-mail and was reminded that if you use corp systems to e-mail anything, there is the risk that it will be read by the corporation. That's pretty standard, so much so we created the temrs 'work safe' and 'not work safe' for stuff we send to each other on someone else's time.

Well by the 2070's human nature is not going to change but corp controls are even tighter. I mena there are parts of town you can't even walk in without an active comm unit running so you can be identified. For all that we think runners are cutting edge, to be fair at the higher levels corp deckers and mages have more resources and can be just as good or better so they can peer into any dark corner of the matrix to see what you runner or corper is looking at, reading, scheduling etc.

It occured to me that the way around this is something not in the matrix at all. The written word on a hard copy. A book, a magazine, a newspaper that can be printed to spread word away from the controls of a corp and who's source was untraceable. DLN's husband said when he was in school they were going to close up a cold war bomb shelter in his HS and several of them created a time capsule there by hiding an old hand worked printing press, matterials and some Communist propaganda sheets in the area before it was sealed- a teacher helped them. The door was covered by tons of timber for the wood shop but should that ever been moved and someone goes in long after the actors are long gone...

The corp might not like you reading certain books- look at modern China in RL but it becomes much harder to control if a corper has a copy of Catcher in the Rye or Animal Farm in her purse.

A runner's plan of a target's shcedule might be picked up in the matrix- lots of search activity around X sir, but the trail ends when the stuff is just written on a piece of paper.

Lastly nothing is ever really erased in the matrix, evidence can always be found, but a lighter and a few minutes can destroy the evidence of paper.

What do you think?

[CanRay]

All of these things I've used. Good old spy tricks like flash paper ("Watch this magic trick!" Hold over a candle at a table and done.) and such are great tools. Disintegrating paper is also handy.

Another thing you can do with paper but can't do with electronic format is FOLD it. Like those Mad Magazine covers we all loved as kids (Except for you young whipper snappers out there! Go to school!). Secret messages you can hide in the folds are great.

One character that a friend made (He works out character ideas in his head constantly, and I yank 'em for NPCs.) has his SIN Registry information on print-out, using UCAS Census Letterhead, just in case of another Matrix Crash. He's an Elf, so he might live to see another one...

Disposable commcodes written on Cocktail Napkins replace old phone numbers. Same deal, really.

I also wrote in my Shadows of Winnipeg that Horizon is doing Print on Demand for books, for the folks that like that "Old World Feeling", using Hemp Paper. I left it up to the reader/GM/whoever is using it to see if the reason is Sinister or not, but in my mind they're just getting set up for if/when it takes off again, attempting to get people really literate rather than "iconoliterate". Educated consumers make educated choices, and Horizon is on the ground floor of all those types of things.

Finally, I see a number of characters having some ancient phone books hanging around to beat people with, like old school policemen. It just makes sense.

[Xahn Borealis]

Like those Mad Magazine covers we all loved as kids (Except for you young whipper snappers out there! Go to school!).

Hey! I know what Mad Magazine is! It was on the Simpsons! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[Yerameyahu]

Nah, print is dead. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Use more creative security, erasure, etc. Read-only media, physical destruction, whatever seems fun.

[hobgoblin]

I also wrote in my Shadows of Winnipeg that Horizon is doing Print on Demand for books, for the folks that like that "Old World Feeling", using Hemp Paper. I left it up to the reader/GM/whoever is using it to see if the reason is Sinister or not, but in my mind they're just getting set up for if/when it takes off again, attempting to get people really literate rather than "iconoliterate". Educated consumers make educated choices, and Horizon is on the ground floor of all those types of things.

The Bible, by Horizon...

[CanRay]

Oh, I'm sure there's still orders of Monks out there hand-making bibles.

They'd make great Foci for the Catholic/Christian Magicians!

[Xahn Borealis]

"The power of Cline compels thee!"

[longbowrocks]

Oh, I'm sure there's still orders of Monks out there hand-making bibles.

They'd make great Foci for the Catholic/Christian Magicians!

With all that latent potential for unarmed damage, how do the monks make bibles without turning them into dust? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[longbowrocks]

The corp might not like you reading certain books- look at modern China in RL but it becomes much harder to control if a corper has a copy of Catcher in the Rye or Animal Farm in her purse.

That's a good idea! I never thought of anchoring a concealment spell to a book! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/grinbig.gif)

[Fortinbras]

Nah, print is dead. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

That's what they said when TV came around, but tell that to some schmuck named Bob Woodward.

Seriously though, when one format of media comes around that surpasses another, it rarely means the death of that media, simply it's transformation.
To give some examples, folks thought movies would be the death of theater, but it changed theater dramatically(pun intended.) Because plays could no longer be about two good looking ingenues running around looking for a money purse, you could now get that for a nickle at the picture show. Now it had to be about realism, connection and truth, which is where the modern theatre movement came in.
Same thing with painting and photographs, giving us everything from cubism to modern art. Same thing for photography when film came around, truning photography into an art rather than another form of media.
Even television forced newspaper reporters into a more focused form of journalism that brought us Woodward and Bernstein, which before could not have existed in the Hurst days.
To give an example from a different medium, cars saved horses as we know them. No horses are a thriving industry supported mostly by those who can afford to care for and put a great deal of thought into their ownership, whereas before internal combustion, they were a means to an end.
Cars didn't kill horses and movies didn't kill theater, and so computers will not be the death knell of books. There will always be collectors and specialists and people like me who simply prefer the smell.

Books and newspapers aren't going anywhere, but they will change a bit and they have a place in the Sixth World.

[Yerameyahu]

Movie theaters *are* dying, though. Took longer. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Newspapers are terminal; a newspaper's website is not the same thing. That's exactly what 'print is dead' means. If something changes that dramatically, it's not honest to say it's not gone.

If you call the state of horses and even of theater 'living', then you're in a different argument than I am. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Cars killed horses… as a mass (or even significant) transport system.

[Fortinbras]

Theater has been "dead" for over a hundred years, yet it somehow finds a way to live on. But I'll agree that it isn't nearly the same as it was at the turn of the last century. That's a good thing, though. Most people in theater today wouldn't recognize theater before it "died." Because it sucked. By all accounts anyway, I wasn't there. It had to change and, in turn, it changed acting with it. The "death" of theater created the theater and acting as we know it. Sure, a lot of theaters are struggling, but that has always been the case. The same can be said of ballet, opera and orchestra. They are in no more danger of disappearing than they were when TV or film came around. They serve a necessary, artistic purpose and they will still be around in 2070 as well.

As for horses being "dead" there are anywhere between 7 to 9 million horses in the US alone. That's hardly on the endangered species list. They aren't used for mass transportation anymore, but that is a very good thing. Horses used to be abused and neglected, as well as poorly bred for a very long time. Making them a beast of burden for ranchers and enthusiast saved the animal from being too genetically homogenized.
Sure they aren't as common on the street of Chicago as they used to be, but most people I know owned at least one at one time in their lives. Of course, I live in Texas and where I game has two horses in the back yard, so I'm probably a skewed sample.

Something changing doesn't mean it's gone. TV changed within the last decade from four camera set-ups about fat ex-comedian dads and their hot wives to reality shows(cheaper) and Mad Men(artistic, but high DVD sales). Well, CBS hasn't changed, but their average viewing age is still worried about attacks from the Kaiser. Would you call TV dead? We're watching more than ever these days.
Change is a natural part of the evolution of media. Technology forces old mediums to either evolve or die. Some mediums really do die off in all but the minds of historians, like vaudeville. Some find a way to persist despite growing trends, and in doing so they have to change. This isn't dying, it's evolving and adapting.

The same will be done print. Books won't be as prevalent as they are today, but plenty of people will still own them. Seeing one won't be odd, but owning a shelf full will. Having a newspaper subscription won't be something everyone has anymore, but knowing the name of your local paper won't be out of the ordinary. In that way, print media will live on. It will also be something the corps can't track, giving it an edge in the underground. Something Shaddowrunner can take advantage of.
If you want to say it's "dead" because not everyone uses it anymore, I'll acknowledge that fact. If you want to say it's "dead" in that books will cease to exist, history is against you on that point.


I would also like to point out that there are a bunch of World of Warcraft players right now claiming table top RPGs are dead. I think we're proving them wrong.

[CanRay]

You do see horses on the streets of Winnipeg on occasion.

Well. One street.

And there is *ZERO* crime when you do see them.

[longbowrocks]

Correlation = causation. Everybody buy a horse! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[CanRay]

Actually, it's more the policemen on top of the horse that does it.

And the sure knowledge that, no matter how fast you run, the horse can beat your hoop hands down.

And that is why there should be more centaur cops in the NAN.

[KarmaInferno]

You do see horses on the streets of Winnipeg on occasion.

Well. One street.

And there is *ZERO* crime when you do see them.

Are you saying the horse is a crimefighting superhero?






-k

[Yerameyahu]

Changes in TV *programming* are the same as changes in the words of a newspaper; no bearing on this discussion.

As I said, Fortinbras, 'the horse' as transportation is (all but, I guess) dead. That doesn't mean horses are extinct. 'Print is dead' doesn't mean that paper doesn't exist, either.

I agree, 'dead' is figurative in this 'print is dead' kind of statement. I do think it's fair to use 'dead' to mean 'a pale shadow of its former self', relegated to specialists and collectors. You're right to point out that it's not literal, but it's not a false statement.

And I still say that various digital technologies would be superior to print for clandestine use in 2070.

[Hocus Pocus]

Are you saying the horse is a crimefighting superhero?






-k

in the world of shadworun it would be a crimefighting superhero technohorse thank you.

[longbowrocks]

It's dead; no pulse.

[Xahn Borealis]

Actually, it's more the policemen on top of the horse that does it.

And the sure knowledge that, no matter how fast you run, the horse can beat your hoop hands down.

And that is why there should be more centaur cops in the NAN.

Everybody buy a policeman! Lone Star does them cheap!

[longbowrocks]

Everybody buy a policeman! Lone Star does them cheap!

Everybody buy a Lone Star! Steak is the new black! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/rotfl.gif)

[Snow_Fox]

And I still say that various digital technologies would be superior to print for clandestine use in 2070.

RL when Amazon came out with Kindle they nearly destroyed it by cancelling a book people had purchased, and deleteing it from their kindles. What they gave they took away. Do you really want to run that risk? They were able to reach out and touch people who had the item, that means they can do it again and that is in 2010. By 2070 the corper's tech will be far superior.

and again the point is that corps don't know what is in the possession of the book reading public the same way they know what is onan e-book. You really think The orps will like people reading Karl Marx? Moa? Che? maybe they will see a reason to reject someone else. Plato? Mill? Gracho Marx?
Someone already suggested they could rewrite books like the Bible?

[longbowrocks]

Someone already suggested they could rewrite books like the Bible?

I felt the part about god was a little far-fetched. Could they fix that?

[Yerameyahu]

None of that is relevant to my statement about *clandestine* use. You keep bouncing between the security of paper, and the politics. One at a time, please. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Besides, SR 2070 is a setting *ruled* by the hackers. They're so much stronger than is 'realistic', so I don't think we have to worry about Mao not being available.

On the subject, still, of clandestine use, I'm saying the encryption and digital distribution mean that it's easier to get and hide information (whether it's attack plans, or Duck Soup). If you're searched, they first have to find the tiny data chip, or file on your commlink; then, they have to break the encryption. If you had the book, they'd just have to glance at it. Now, in SR 2070, we do know that encryption is flimsy, but there's the Strong option, and realistic encryption is stronger still.

[longbowrocks]

Besides, SR 2070 is a setting *ruled* by the hackers. They're so much stronger than is 'realistic', so I don't think we have to worry about Mao not being available.

Have you seen what some of those guys can do?
Then again, in a world where top level security can be built or torn down in a few seconds by a good roll, I guess the tide is in favor of hackers.