 Cyberpunk, Encyclopedia Style... |
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 Jul 3 2004, 02:29 AM
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#1
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Moving Target  Group: Members Posts: 577 Joined: 12-June 04 Member No.: 6,398  |
Hmm. I was doing some idle surfing and stumbled upon a definition of "Cyberpunk" according to the WordIQ website. I was actually surprised that there was a reference to Shadowrun in it, and when I actually read it, I was doubly surprised. Here's the relevant quotation...
And here's the part it referenced.
Now, has Gibson's constant whining about how FASA stole "his" ideas really reached the point where it's being added to online encyclopedias? Am I the only one who finds that incredibly sad, not only because his whining about it has reached that level, but because online encyclopedias go around slandering (defunct) gaming companies? |
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Jul 3 2004, 02:37 AM
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#2
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 409 Joined: 9-March 04 Member No.: 6,140 |
A lot of the terms used in Shadowrun are indeed direct ripoffs of Gibson. SINs, for instance, have the same name in Gibons book Count Zero.
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Jul 3 2004, 02:46 AM
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#3
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 596 Joined: 18-February 03 Member No.: 4,112 |
Also, "street samurai" and "razorboys/girls" were used as terms in Neuromancer.
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Jul 3 2004, 03:10 AM
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#4
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Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,901 Joined: 19-June 03 Member No.: 4,775 |
1. It's only slander if it's spoken. In print, it's libel.
2. It's only libel if it's not true. |
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Jul 3 2004, 03:10 AM
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#5
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 577 Joined: 12-June 04 Member No.: 6,398 |
missing the point, phrase. see the first two responses.
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Jul 3 2004, 03:18 AM
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#6
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Dragon Group: Members Posts: 4,138 Joined: 10-June 03 From: Tennessee Member No.: 4,706 |
Their wording could certainly use some work, reguardless of facts.
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Jul 3 2004, 03:29 AM
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#7
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Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,362 Joined: 3-October 03 From: Poway, San Diego County, CA, USA Member No.: 5,676 |
Actually, I think slander is still the verb used if it's printed.
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Jul 3 2004, 06:03 AM
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#8
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 403 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Kill Em All Member No.: 2,018 |
Correct, you do not "libel" someone, you commit an act of Libel against them. It is a noun, not a verb. Thank you. Back to something that matters now. Flame War is Over, nothing to see.
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Jul 3 2004, 06:12 AM
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#9
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Target Group: Members Posts: 58 Joined: 30-April 02 From: Taiwan, Kaohsiung UB chapter Member No.: 2,665 |
Pity Tolkien isn't around to bitch about having his ideas BLATANTLY ripped off and tossed in with Cyberpunk. We'd have a grand old yelling match then.
Seriously, IMHO Shadowrun is IT's OWN genre. It has a heavy Mayan influence that I don't think anyone else has touched on yet. Also, yes, I think the wording could definitely use some adjustment, specially since I doubt the writer knows too much about the origins of Shadowrun and it's basic premise. People tend to see the Fantasy/Punk mix and get blinded by that. I know I did when I first saw SR too. |
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Jul 3 2004, 06:18 AM
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#10
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Target Group: Members Posts: 6 Joined: 23-June 03 Member No.: 4,797 |
What are you implying by putting "his" in quotation marks? William Gibson did INVENT the Cyberpunk genre, and Shadowrun has many very clear and obvious names and ideas taken from his works. And it's not like Gibson is out there actively deriding Shadowrun at every turn either. However, he has a right to his opinion, especially when the game is as heavily based on his works as it is.
And I agree with Arethusa, it's only slander/libel if it isn't true. If it is true, it's called reporting. |
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Jul 3 2004, 06:27 AM
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#11
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 269 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 752 |
people gibson stole from:
thomas pynchon raymond chandler people FASA stole from other than gibson/tolkien Robocop people (Cobra Assault Cannon, privately owned police, cyberzombies) Charles De Lint's novel "Svaha" (japanese imperialism in cali, native american nations) |
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Jul 3 2004, 07:14 AM
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#12
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Prime Runner Group: Retired Admins Posts: 3,929 Joined: 26-February 02 From: .ca Member No.: 51 |
Because Gibson, obviously, had no influences - literary or otherwise - that helped shape his stories into what they are. Invent? Hardly. Produce some of the most influential works for? Absolutely. |
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Jul 3 2004, 07:17 AM
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#13
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Traumatizing players since 1992 Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 3,282 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Las Vegas, NV Member No.: 220 |
Bold mine
Nitpcik, Robocop was NOT a cyberzombie as it's presented in SR, he just has very, very low essence. Incidentally I read the book Robocop and it went into more detail about what they did to him. (For the curious, that wasn't really his jaw, it was there to make him look more human, and to be a tribute to the human that was inside. The jaw was armored to all hell, he could get shot in the face and still be fine.) |
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Jul 3 2004, 08:22 AM
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#14
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Target Group: Members Posts: 6 Joined: 23-June 03 Member No.: 4,797 |
I didn't say that William Gibson had no influences, or even that Shadowrun shouldn't have used what it did. I'm merely pointing out that Gibsons work DID influence Shadowrun, and I know it wasn't the sole influence, but it was rather large one.
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Jul 3 2004, 10:45 AM
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#15
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Runner Group: Members Posts: 3,314 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Lisbon, Cidade do Pecado Member No.: 185 |
Actually what you said was:
Which isn't entirely true. The writings and shorts by Philip K. Dick, Bruce Bethke and Bruce Sterling all predate Gibson's Neuromancer, though that (and the Mirrorshades anthology) is often considered the seminal work in the genre. In fact the term "Cyberpunk" was coined by Bethke and not Gibson, so you could argue that was the biggest rip-off came from there. Which is also nonsense because the extrapolating and fusing emerging elements of mainstream culture is what cyberpunk was all about and Gibson does it just like everyone else. For the record Gibson only ever spoke of Shadowrun twice to my recollection and in both cases it was in response to specific questions. What he was pissed at was the introduction of "pure" fantasy elements (Tolkien-style) which he believed were out of place in the genre and not in keeping with cyberpunk's hard sci-fi roots. Since the fusion of those elements with traditional cyberpunk is one of the main things drawing us fans to Shadowrun, IMHO it pretty much makes Mr. Gibson's perspective irrelevant. |
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Jul 3 2004, 10:57 AM
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#16
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 498 Joined: 31-May 02 From: All the way in the Back to the Left. Member No.: 2,800 |
grumble grumble grumble
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Jul 3 2004, 12:31 PM
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#17
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Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,451 Joined: 21-April 03 From: Austin, TX Member No.: 4,488 |
I just don't like Gibson's writing style. It always seemed to me like "This happened. Three sentences about how it happened. New paragraph, this happened. Three more sentences about how that happened." I forced myself through Neuromancer, but I doubt I'll read anything else he's written.
You know, it's sad that cyberpunk for the most part is dead in fiction when the real world is getting so close to it. We're advancing in leaps and bounds with cybernetic implants and the questions the genre brought up are becoming more and more relevent (humanity vs. machine, etc), governments are using technology and twisting laws to become more intrusive in our lives, etc. Seriously, name me one decent real cyberpunk novel that's come out in the past 5 years. I can't think of any personally. The Abstruse One |
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Jul 3 2004, 12:42 PM
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#18
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Runner Group: Members Posts: 2,901 Joined: 19-June 03 Member No.: 4,775 |
If you want to find good cyberpunk done contemporarily, you'll have to look to anime. Ghost in the Shell set a standard that Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex has surpassed in quite simply astounding ways, and Innocence looks pretty good too.
In terms of literature, I've seen nothing recently, I'll admit, unless you (and a few people seem to) count Pattern Recognition. I'll admit I haven't read it, but I did read through the first few chapters in the bookstore and liked what I saw. |
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Jul 3 2004, 01:23 PM
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#19
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Shooting Target Group: Members Posts: 1,685 Joined: 17-August 02 Member No.: 3,123 |
What'd he steal from Raymond Chandler? |
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Jul 3 2004, 01:25 PM
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#20
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 269 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 752 |
Ghost in the Shell had me wanting to do a full body cyborg campaign of CP2020 for the longest time, it would be tough working on that high a scale but that post-human angst thing is pretty damn cool.
i'm reading Pattern Recognition and i like it thus far, i just hope he doesn't do one of his standard plots where all these characters slowly get together in the end and then there's a big explosion or something, it's getting old. |
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Jul 3 2004, 01:45 PM
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#21
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Moving Target Group: Members Posts: 269 Joined: 26-February 02 Member No.: 752 |
a lot stylistically but that's a matter of opinion. specifics are easier to agree on like the slow acting poison from The Big Sleep was turned into the "incentive" slow acting toxin used by Case's employeer in Neuromancer. gibson borrows from chandler as much as paul auster does but there's not as much cross-genre criticism (and it's online forums like these that make such over-specialization possible). |
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Jul 3 2004, 02:24 PM
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#22
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Shooting Target Group: Members Posts: 1,685 Joined: 17-August 02 Member No.: 3,123 |
I thought the poison in the Big Sleep was just poison. It killed him in a couple minutes and wasn't really special.
Anyway, I'll be calling Raymond Chandler the father of cyberpunk now. He's certainly a whole lot more interesting than Gibson :) |
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Jul 3 2004, 04:35 PM
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#23
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Ain Soph Aur Group: Dumpshocked Posts: 3,477 Joined: 26-February 02 From: Montreal, Canada Member No.: 600 |
I read Pattern Recognition a few weeks after it came out. It has nothing to do with cyberpunk. Nothing. I still liked it very much, and Gibson remains a talented man, but it's not cyberpunk in any way.
I do think that aside for a few animes and SR, cyberpunk is a more or less dead genre as far as mainstream goes. Perdido Street Station is steampunk, and that's as close as it gets. The Carlucci stories are the most recent cyberpunk litterature that I've found. But IMO, the author just isn't that good, and I found it pretty weak. Except for Destroying Angel. That was kind of cool. |
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Jul 3 2004, 06:37 PM
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#24
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Target Group: Members Posts: 6 Joined: 23-June 03 Member No.: 4,797 |
Which was my point. And despite how many people contributed to the creation of the genre, Gibson is still considered (by most) to be the "Father of Cyberpunk". |
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Jul 3 2004, 06:43 PM
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#25
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Running Target Group: Members Posts: 1,213 Joined: 10-March 02 From: Back from the abyss. Member No.: 2,316 |
Who is Gibson?
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Lo-Fi Version | Time is now: 23rd April 2024 - 03:29 PM |
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