Now writing a paper & researching the interaction between hackers, computing, and science fiction within the feedback loop of technology and science fiction. Science fiction does not predict the future, it shapes it. Technology inspires science fiction writers. Science fiction as a whole then creates an awareness and desire in society to improve the technological climate. A story may also inspire a technologist or hacker to pursue innovation. This improved technology inspires other writers and the feedback loop keeps turning. There also have been a few examples of ideas in science fiction stories documented to have inspired an actual improvement in computing technology.
Science fiction has produced many stories about computers, but unfortunately – before cyberpunk – only a few which imagined the personal computers and the internet. The talk will discuss the history of computing in science fiction, focusing on two of those exceptions – “A Logic Named Joe” (1946), and The Shockwave Rider (1975) and several key cyberpunk stories including Snow Crash, True Names, and Neuromancer. Cyberpunk stories usually feature a hacker as the hero/heroine who successfully battles an oppressive government and/or corporation, and is therefore very popular with hackers who can identify with the protagonist.
There has always been a close relationship between hackers and science fiction. There is an overlap between hacker culture, cyberpunk culture, and science fiction culture. Hackers are avid readers of science fiction. One of the first uses (unsanctioned) of the proto-internet, the ARPANET, was to discuss science fiction. Hackers use science fiction to inform their software design and inspire their computing innovations. The original definition of the word “hacker” is someone almost obsessively interested in technology and who finds unintended uses for devices to improve their function. In that way, hackers played a key role in the development of computing and as inspiration for science fiction writers.