Basic synopsis: In the grim dark future, there is only commercialism. Published in 1992 and with the story set presumably some time in the early 2000’s, Snow Crash describes just about the day after tomorrow, when the US government has almost completely dissolved and the country is now ruled by private megacorporations. Everything is a business. Everything is a franchise. Everything – The suburb you live in, the police (with competing agencies vying to the the ones to bust perps on your block), the jail they put you in, and the Mafia now run a highly successful chain of pizza delivery restaurants – described above. Even the Federal government is reduced to a private corporation that maintains sovereignty only over the dirt what physical buildings it still has left are standing on. And the internet has evolved into the “Metaverse:” a full immersion, virtual reality environment accessed by wearing goggles connected to your computer.
Did you ever wonder where Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg got the name and concept of the Metaverse? It was this book.
The story follows Hiro Protagonist (who has deliberately legally changed his name to this just to be an ass), aforementioned part-time pizza Deliverator, hacker, and one of the founding programmers of the Metaverse protocol; Y.T., a young skateboard Kourrier girl; Raven, generally agreed to be the Baddest Motherfucker On The Planet who rides around in a motorcycle equipped with a sidecar that’s got a nuke in it, wired to a dead man’s switch. They all get involved in a plot by their world’s Rupert Murdoch/Ted Turner type who plans to use the titular Snow Crash virus in both the Metaverse and the physical world to literally program people’s minds and, of course, take over the world.
Along the way there are lengthy explorations of the Tower of Babel myth, the ancient Sumerian language, sword fights, Reason, and lots and lots of technical detail on how technology/the Metaverse/computing in general works.
It is a book. Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson.
Basic synopsis: In the grim dark future, there is only commercialism. Published in 1992 and with the story set presumably some time in the early 2000’s, Snow Crash describes just about the day after tomorrow, when the US government has almost completely dissolved and the country is now ruled by private megacorporations. Everything is a business. Everything is a franchise. Everything – The suburb you live in, the police (with competing agencies vying to the the ones to bust perps on your block), the jail they put you in, and the Mafia now run a highly successful chain of pizza delivery restaurants – described above. Even the Federal government is reduced to a private corporation that maintains sovereignty only over the dirt what physical buildings it still has left are standing on. And the internet has evolved into the “Metaverse:” a full immersion, virtual reality environment accessed by wearing goggles connected to your computer.
Did you ever wonder where Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg got the name and concept of the Metaverse? It was this book.
The story follows Hiro Protagonist (who has deliberately legally changed his name to this just to be an ass), aforementioned part-time pizza Deliverator, hacker, and one of the founding programmers of the Metaverse protocol; Y.T., a young skateboard Kourrier girl; Raven, generally agreed to be the Baddest Motherfucker On The Planet who rides around in a motorcycle equipped with a sidecar that’s got a nuke in it, wired to a dead man’s switch. They all get involved in a plot by their world’s Rupert Murdoch/Ted Turner type who plans to use the titular Snow Crash virus in both the Metaverse and the physical world to literally program people’s minds and, of course, take over the world.
Along the way there are lengthy explorations of the Tower of Babel myth, the ancient Sumerian language, sword fights, Reason, and lots and lots of technical detail on how technology/the Metaverse/computing in general works.