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You are Number Six
Cyberpunk E-zines - David Blair, Wax - Agrippa: Book of the Dead - Under Siege - Sin - Sound Photosynthesis - Snow Crash - Lethal Enforcer - Gray Areas
*WARNING* *WARNING* *WARNING* *WARNING*
This document may violate your local community standards on obscenity.
[Information is sexy, not sexual]
Consult your local religious or moral authorities for further instruction.
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"You are Number Six"
February 13, 1993
__________________________________________________________________________
| |
| Cyberlicious <tm> | Editor : Blade X | The Bamboo Gardens |
| PO Box 4510 | bladex@wixer.cactus.org | (512) 385-2941 |
| Austin, TX 78765 | Neo-Wobblie Node # 269 | WWIV : 46@5285 |
|__________________________________________________________________________|
|
|
INDEX | OUTDEX
|
Legal Disclaimer |
Back Issues | Apartmentopia -- a New Edge
Subscriptions | apartment complex
\
Ediborial Cyberpunk E-zines \ Q&A : Advice column by
Interview David Blair, Wax \ Blade X Lax, the
News Agrippa: Book of the Dead \ cyberpunk's cyberpunk.
\
Reviews Under Siege __\__________________________
Sin / |
Sound Photosynthesis / Either catch a wave or get |
Snow Crash / |
Lethal Enforcer / a grip, cuz it's only gonna |
Gray Areas / |
/ get buzzier. |
Next Issue : SXSW /___________________________________|
SOFTWARE LICENSING AGREEMENT
"Some people just don't get it"
DISCLAIMER
Scream Baby Global Headquarters are located in Austin, Texas, USA, and this
location shall be considered the site of jurisdiction for any criminal or
civil course of action(s) taken by or against the publisher, Cyberlicious
<tm>.
Any statement or statements -- either contained in Scream Baby and/or made by
the publisher -- that could possibly be interpreted as libelous, defamatory,
or slanderous, is actually *NOT* libel, defamation, or slander, but rather
fair commentary and free speech, protected by the First Amendment.
By continuing to read any more of this document, you, the home viewer, grant
implicit agreement to abide and comply with these regulations. And another
thing, any other regulations I may decide to implement in the future.
If you do not wish to abide by these restrictions, simply use your system's
method-of-choice for discarding documents and go do or read something else
instead. People tell me _Wired_ is pretty cool.
Contents are copyrighted, 1993, by the most powerful and litiginous nation on
the planet.
America, you wise guy.
__________________________________________________________________
/ \
/ Statement of Purpose : Gray Areas exists to examine the gray areas \
| of life. We hope to unite poeple involved in all sorts of \
| alternative lifestyles and deviant subcultures. We are everywhere! \
|_________________________________ \
\ -- Fall 1992 Gray Areas, page 5 |
\ [see review later in this issue] |
\____________________________________|
BABY GOT BACK ISSUES
There are so many easy and fun ways to get back issues of Scream Baby, there
is really no excuse for anyone not to have your very own copy.
FTP SITES ftp.eff.org /pub/journals
Also, The WEll is setting up an anonymous ftp site ANY DAY NOW, and all of the
digital Cyberlicious <tm>! products will eventually be found there, even the
stupid ones.
PRIVATE BBS SYSTEMS
Tejas BBS (512) 467-0663 14.4K modem, fast pick-up site
Bamboo Gardens North (512) 385-2941 2400 baud, 800+ textfiles
a.k.a. The Home for Wayward Information Junkies
STOP BY MY HOUSE
when I'm home and copy it DIRECTLY FROM MY COMPUTER SYSTEM. Bring your
own 5.25" disks, please. Bring me some food while you are at it.
________________________________________________________________
| |
| True Life Story: I buy Tom Maddox's novel, Halo, at Wal-mart |
| for 2.36 plus tax. I'm reading on the bus and look up. The |
| guy on my left is reading William S. Burrough's Naked Lunch. |
| Guy on my right is scanning up and down the pages of a world |
| atlas/almanac with lots of interesting facts on the average |
| rainfall of Eastern European countries. I'm in the middle, |
| reading Halo. |
|________________________________________________________________|
SUBSCRIPTIONS
If you look at back issues of Scream Baby, you will find that there are
several methods in order to get a subscription of Scream Baby. Choose the one
you like best. Or simply send me e-mail.
__________________________________
/ \
/ Too Much Coffee Man Says: \
/ "It's a Fine Line Between \
/ Sayings That Make Sense." \
/ \
/ -- Too Much Coffeeman #2, back cover \
/______________________________________________\
EDIBORIAL : CYBERPUNK E-ZINES
I have stumbled across several references lately to the "numerous" cyberpunk
electronic publications available on the Net.
Huh?
My scorecard reads 2 e-zines, 2 FAQs, and 3 mailing lists that provide
information on the New Edge intersection of art, science, and pop culture.
So someone must be using a different definition of cyberpunk.
I say that cyberpunk is a conversation, not a thing. You can't go to the
store and buy a six pack of Shiner Bock, some Cheetos, and then say, oh yeah,
let me have 2 ounces of cyberpunk.
It is not an object, not a commodity. Time magazine is a commodity. An
article in Time magazine is an object. But neither is cyberpunk.
I'm not a cyberpunk. You're not a cyberpunk. We *can't* be, since identity
is a thing as well, and I've already said cyberpunk is not a thing.
Cyberpunk is a relationship between the individual and society, the individual
and technology. There are several axioms (of which Gareth Brandywn's The
Cyberpunk Manifesto is the best) but cyberpunk is not clearly delimited.
Nor should it.
So the cyberpunk meme has been appropriated and is now represented in movies,
literature, music, fashion, television, you name a vehicle for culture and I
can name a cyberpunk representation.
So the thought of a housewife in New Jersey flipping through a copy of Time
while waiting for her hairdresser to be ready and stumbling across the
cyberpunk article doesn't upset me like nearly everyone else on alt.cyberpunk
and
Mainstream people aren't stupid idiots, but potential converts.
Is there a cyberpunk movement? Yes, but it's a bowel movement.
But back to the topic of the numerous "cyberpunk" e-zines that are allegedly
available in the Matrix. After looking around, I conclude that they must be
referring to the PHAC cloud of cyberpunk. They must mean Phrack, Narc,
Cracked!, and the various computer underground publications that discuss
carding, phreaking, computer access, as being "cyberpunk".
Well....sorta, but not really.
Take out a sheet of paper and draw a large billowous cloud.
Oops, let's wait for people who need to find paper and something to write
with.
<pauses 30 seconds>
Ok, now that you've drawn that cloud, label it cyberpunk. Now draw smaller
clouds around the cyberpunk cloud. Label these clouds things like magazines,
books, art, film, music, CU, home electronics, DIY, etc. etc. etc.
Notice that the Computer Underground is only one cloud among dozens and to
call it "cyberpunk" is to disenfranchise and discount all the other clouds.
CU is definitely *part* of the cyberpunk conversation, but it is not the whole
cloud. While the mediastinum thoracic cavity is part of the human body, no
one would ever claim that the mediastinum thoracic cavity *was* the human
body.
So don't do it!
[Note: an excercise left for the home viewer is to
create crystalized rain drops falling from these
clouds, and label them such things as bOING-bOING,
Blade Runner, Beyond Cyberpunk stack, etc. This will
help further clarify the distinction]
I don't attempt to create a complete map, since that is the purpose of the
FutureCulture FAQ. Consider me a tour guide.
________________ [Also note my bias towards the cultural manifestations
\ of c-punk, rather than the technological]
Fringeware \
Leri-L \
FutureCulture \ AGRIPPA -- BOOK OF THE DEAD
\ NOT RELEASED TO THE NET
Scream Baby \
Cult of the Dead Cow \ "The book is an art object with weight, smell,
\ texture, and the charm and weakness of paper,
alt.cyberpunk.faq \ ink, cloth, and composite plastics"
FutureCulture FAQ \
\ -- press release as
Info Junkies Anonymous \ reported in Project X
____________________________\ Issue 23.
Agrippa is a large over-sized book, too large and bulky to read on the bus.
Yellow, aged pages with ink whose chemical composition changes when exposed to
sunlight so that some writing&images disappear and new ones appear.
Words&images Agrippa has a secret space within it's pages that holds a
computer disk. A computer disk holding a program which replicates a William
Gibson poem....once.....before erasing and eradicating itself. A poem which
speaks of loss, the process of reintegration, and completion.
_______________________PAIR-O-DOCS_________________________
| | |
| To isolate a small section | Nothing happens in |
| and claim representation | cyberspace because there |
| of the whole is why the | are no things here. |
| world is in the trouble | |
| that it is today. | Only representations.|
|____________________________|______________________________|
Agrippa, Book of the Dead,
not released to the Net,
December 9, 1992.
SUPPOSED I ASKED DAVID BLAIR, CREATOR OF _WAX_, TO CONSENT TO AN E-MAIL
INTERVIEW WHERE WE WOULD SWAP QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS BACK AND FORTH, BUT THEN I
GOT LAZY, AND NEVER RESPONDED PAST HIS ANSWER TO MY QUESTION, YOU'D STILL CALL
IT AN INTERVIEW, RIGHT?
SB : Scream Baby
DB : David Blair
SB: Accounts that I have read about Wax act as if you suddenly popped out of
no where to create this masterpiece. As if once there was a void, and
then there was Wax. Tell me a little about what you did before Wax.
What is your intellectual and educational background?
DB: Well, I'm a 1956, and didn't get started on WAX until '85, so I have
posted to generation x under false pretenses, though of the driver's
license kind.
My education is a comp lit sort of thing, but I guess what I took most
seriously at the time was a failed attempt at guided reading, meant to
help illuminate the huge dark valleys in Gravity's Rainbow. After that I
left for NY, and, like most video people I know who started at that time,
worked as an autodidact for a long time... there being very few ways to
find out about video back then (not so long ago... 1979 into the mid-
80's).
I did about 6 shorts (Charlemagne Ptomaine, etc), before WAX,a beginner
attempting videoart (couldn't get anything into festivals), then started
the long tape, which actually began when I tried to cut a 15 minute tape
down to 3 minutes. In between there were 2 trailers (for WAX).
________________________________________________________________
| |
| "The planet completely vanished, leaving it's weather behind" |
| -- Wax |
|________________________________________________________________|
REVIEW-A-RAMA
UNDER SIEGE
Take My Pies Out of The Oven
My roommate Mehrdad is a connosseiur of B-action-adventure-films. I mean,
he's seem them *ALL*. An information diet consisting of Chuck Norris, Claude
Van Damme, and Steven Siegal.
[So when he asked if I wanted to go see the latest
Steven Siegal vehicle (now on videotape), I said
no, not really.
In his best film ever, Steven Siegal is a former Navy SEAL who gets promoted
to *cook* after slugging his superior officer because of "inferior
intelligence at the airport" during the raid on Panama. There is a small
suggestion that he was intentionally given bad information by CIA operatives
in order to have him killed.
[Lucky for the viewer, Steven gets to
keep all his cool spy stuff!]
In Under Siege, we get to witness the extreme personal violence of Steven
Siegal in hand-to-hand combat. Armed with the K-factor of SEAL training, he
guns down villains, crashes I-beams through chests, rips out Adam's apples,
gouges out eyeballs, stabs knives into armpits, throats, chests, and
delivers killing blows with a single chop.
[He is the good guy.]
Opposing Siegal is Tommy Lee Jones, who has commandeered the USS Missouri and
is attempting to steal Tomahawk missiles, (including 8 "specials", military
jargon for nuclear-tipped warheads).
In stark contrast, the violence represented by Tommy Lee Jones is very
abstract : the threat of a detonation of a nuclear-tipped missile over
Honolulu, Hawaii; the enemy "command center" a collection of screens, computer
images, and virtual realities.
The Bad Guys launch a missile in one scene, and tracks it's progress as a
little blip on the computer screen. It hits; Tommie Lee Jones goes "boom!"
Next shot immediately goes to the Naval Admiral Command Center, who start
discussing why they would blow up a satellite relay station. We never see any
physical evidence of the damage.
Towards the end of the film, the viewer is transported into the I-camera!
This is a genre of slasher films where you follow the action from the
perspective of the killer. In this case, watching from the fins of the nuclear
missile as if it were *you* hurtling towards the coastline of Hawaii.
[These are the Bad Guys]
I mean, it's perfectly *okay* for the military and Pentagon to have control
and access over nuclear missile technology. But who knows what would happen
if political undesirables gained access. We must defend against this evil
threat!
[Here's a little Cyberlicious hint: build less bombs. Shh...]
Let's hop back to the beginning of the film, where the bad guys gain entry to
the ship by masquerading as caterers and entertainers for a surprise birthday
party for the captain. Tommy Lee Jones is the band leader and dresses exactly
like John Shirley. Black leather jacket, tye died t-shirt, dark sunglasses.
[Sound familiar?]
[Sound cyberpunk?]
SIN magazine
The Cyberart Gallery
The next time you're in your favorite alternative magazine/book store, look in
the music section for a zine called "SIN Magazine". It has a stylish and
ghoulish graffitti b-boy on the cover with a gun aimed at his temple. Pick it
up and look at the last two pages, which is called The Cyberart Gallery and
contains 8 pictures of groovy computer-generated art. From what I remembered,
Sin magazine covers underground punk/rap/hip hop sub culture scene, with an
emphasis on visual information.
Sound Photosynthesis Catalog [free upon request]
P.O. Box 2111
Mill Valley CA 94942-2111
415-383-6712
Sound Photosynthesis sells audio and visual cassettes of speeches, lectures,
conferences, story tellings, etc. From what I can decipher, 1500+ titles
cover major themes of consciousness, Buddhism, psychedelics, philosophy, UFOs,
and related explorations of reality.
Big-names-that-I-recognize include Robert Anson Wilson, Timothy Leary, Stephen
Gaskin, William S. Burroughs, Terence McKenna, the Dalai Lama, Richard
Feynman, Colin Andrews, Helen Caldicott, Fritjof Capra, Noam Chomsky, Ram
Dass, Rudy Rucker and do I need to go on? There is a *lot* of candy in
this store that demands your personal investigation.
While there is some variation, prices are $9 per audio tape and $35 for video.
On the back of one of the single-page inserts sent is a promise that the
complete New Edge 1993 : "Mind at Large" catalog is coming soon. Until then,
be satisfied with the 8 pages of hand-outs with densely printed
text.
Snow Crash
by Neal Stephenson
ISBN 0-553-35192-3 (Tradeback, $10)
All I gotta say is Juicy!
Unless you were already aware of pooning, the Infocalpyse, Burbclaves, bimbo
boxes, Kouriers, Rat Things, CostraNostra Pizza franchise, that Americans
excel at only two things : writing software and delivering pizza in less than
30 minutes, freeways designed around your personality type (i.e. one for those
who have to get there *NOW* and one for those who like to enjoy the scenery),
hopped up skateboards with smart wheels and explosive charges, dendatas, the
Black Sun, biological-software viruses that are especially deadly for hackers,
the Metaverse, Liquid Knuckles, the Tower of Babel, Sumerian mythology,
gargoyles, Central Intelligence Corporation, Clint & Barbie's off-the-shelf
avatar sets, General Jim's Defense System, Short Range Chemical Restraint
Projectors (loogie guns), and the Deliverator
Fast, funny, and furious. Oh look, I'm a fucking blurb writer now!
I say we genericize the word snow crash to describe anyone who goes through
Info-Shock Overload. So the next time Andy Hawks posts to the Future Culture
mailing list some derivative of "fuck it, I can't take it anymore, I gotta
take a break, gotta get away from it all" we can just say...oh dude...Andy's
snow crashed again.
Lethal Enforcer
(arcade video game -- $.50 to start and .25 to continue play)
You are a police officer in this simulation shooting gallery. More-than-less
real-time video imagery shows different shoot-em-up crisis scenes involving
bad guys : at a bank, city streets, train station, airport, etc. Bam! Bam!
The criminals toss out insulting phrases like, "You'll never take me alive,
copper". You get called Pig a lot too. Bam! Bam! Each bad guy who gets hit
makes this really loud groaning noise. Bam! Bam! You lose a life for each
innocent by-stander and police officer that you shoot. [I still nail the
Japanese tourist on the train who pops up with the camera, *every* time.] uh
oh, Super Big Bad Guy at the end of each scenario : Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam!
Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam!
Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam!
Now, suppose that you're the manufacturer of a video game that displays
realistic images where you (essentially) shoots everything that moves. Rather
than appreciating the aesthetics of Neo-Violence and the technical prowess and
advances made by your designers, many groups will actually be *concerned* or
even *upset*. People might complain that it not only desensitizes children to
the horrors of violence, but actually *encourages* kids to commit violence in
real life.
How do you deflect this criticism?
You paint the guns BRIGHT PINK and BABY BLUE and make them look like TOY GUNS.
This cracks me up.
Gray Areas
P.O. Box 808
Broomall, PA 19008-0808
($4.50 cover price per issue)
grayarea@well.sf.ca.us
Gray Areas has potential to become a *tremendous* magazine, but it's pretty
cool as it is right now. Standing in a foundation of Deadhead/tapehead
culture, Gray Areas pokes around at the common links and problems between home
taping, software piracy, censorship, and pornography. News, essays, comics,
interviews, and lots and lots of reviews of books, films, catalogs, zines,
live video, audio tapes, and software.
This premiere issue features a long interview with John Perry Barlow about
copyright, Grateful Dead, computer piracy, and the Electronic Frontier
Foundation. An interview with Kay Parker, a former porn queen turned
spiritual counselor. An interview with Zen Tricksters, a (sorta) Grateful
Dead cover band. A list of all known legitmate and illegitimate Grateful Dead
video recordings.
Not many people know about my irrational and spiteful hatred of deadheads.
I can't stand them, especially those too young to have been alive during the
60s who have been duped into mining the 60s as a source of escaping from the
90s. Grrrrrrrrrr
So for me to say that a zine saturated with so much deadheadednossity is
worth investigating......I hear my friends saying whoooaaaaa already.
Final factor: Gray Areas is woefully lacking in the computer scene k-factor.
An opportunity exists here for one of you to jump in print and become their
computer columnist/reviewer. Or feed them information, at least.
SXSW THEME ISSUE
Next issue : SXSW special theme issue. Every year Austin hosts the South By
Southwest Music Showcase. One pays $30 for a wristband that allows entrance
into book-ooze of clubs to watch book-ooze of bands playing hour long sets.
Each year is greeted with the same bitchy whiny chorus of the tickets costing
too much, there aren't enough cool bands, that it lasts too long, runs too
late, that Disney is behind this evil scheme to corrupt the purity of the
music festival (???), that the music industry slimebuckets get special
treatment over the fans, etc. etc.
Start your own damn music festival, then, cuz I'm going and bringing the
news direct! tape-delayed! to the Scream Baby masses. Last year I pumped out
20K of text on my own about Helmet, L-7, music, fashion, culture, approval,
institutional racism, and, as they say, a whole lot more. Another contributor
wrote over 20K on his experience of SXSW as a record executive. Pretty
fucking cool.
Read all about it in the next issue of Scream Baby, end of March.
Scream Baby is the victim of a virus! It has attached itself to the end of
this issue and just won't let go. I can't shake it. None of the anti-viral
forces have been able to help me. Even "taking responsibility" and "getting
back in touch with my inner child" has failed. So here it is. Why, this
material is so shameful, so degrading, so not worth your time, that perhaps
you should just stop reading now.
OUTDEX
APARTMENTOPIA
The purpose of this project is the creation of a New Edge apartment complex,
wired with the highest technological devices and designed so that one never
has to leave home.....ever.
Living Quarters : Each room comes fully stocked with a fully integrated
stereo/CD player/hypodermic needle injection unit/tape deck/HDTV/vcr/your-
choice-of-computer (Mac/IBM/Amiga)/dildo/telephone (with or without
picturephone option)/refrigerator stocked with colas/electric razor/laser
printer/lava lamp. A futon is provided, but residents will need to provide
their own linens and pillows. Obsolete windows have been replaced with
programmable wall panels. Stills from the movie _Blade Runner_ are a popular
choice. Attractive Mexican/Hispanic maids will not only clean your room but
also pretend to be your girlfriend in order to impress any geeky friends or
family members who might visit. [Note: non-heterosexual and/or fetish maids
available upon request]
Meal Program : The kitchen is amply stocked with Cheetos, soft drinks, coffee
(and any of it's derivative caffeine delivery systems), and Twinkies. A
patented meal replacement system permits residents one (but only one) time
released capsule a day to recieve all of their nutritional needs. Spacious,
well-lit, and most important of all, you don't have to clean up after
yourself.
Energy Supply : The roof contains an enormous parabolic dish that captures sun
and turns it into electrical power. During the night time, each solar cell
rotates and the whole dish turns, voila, like the Transformers, into a huge
radio satellite aimed at the stars, searching for signs of intelligent life.
Cryonic Life Extension Program : at *NO* additional costs to residents, each
one will be frozen in a cryonic chamber after death, and periodically revived,
in case I have to ask you where you placed a certain tool or if you've seen my
car keys.
Barn / Dance Hall : behind the complex is an agri-chemo-cultural research
complex, where the latest cutting edge research in genetics engineering,
hydroponics, and chemical/drug production is performed. Afterwards, the
facility is turned into a dance club with different partitions available for
raves, orchestras, and speed metal and/or slam dancing.
ADVICE COLUMN
by Blade X Lax
"The Cyberpunk's Cyberpunk"
Why hello all my little cyber-buddies. Here I am again to answer all your
questions, tell you what to think, set your warped little minds back on track,
and act like a smarmy overbearing, know-it-all-asshole. You know you like it.
Dear Mr. Lax :
Karma Sutra Sez that in order to look important, one should carry a
clipboard with you. In Snow Crash, however, Hiro Protaganist points
out that you can always spot the franchise managers since they are
the ones who carry the three inch binder notebook. How do I handle
this conflicting information? Should I carry a binder *and* a
clipboard? What do you suggest?
The decision over clipboard v. binder depends on the type of expected social
interaction. Clipboards are superior in face-to-face confrontations; binders
are best for rushing hurriedly past low level clerks or guards while hastily
flipping through pages looking for the appropriate reference.
As to designing a clipboard-binder I started once to reverse engineer a
combination notebook-clipboard-cellular phone-Unix PDA interface, but only
managed to get the Krazy Glue all over my hands and ripping off a lot of skin
in the process. And hey, if I couldn't get it to work, no sense in anyone
else trying.
If you are trying to project the proper authoritarian image in a public
situation, then nothing screams "management material" more than a .38 snub
nosed blue steeled revolver. Experiment for yourself. Local malls are
*excellent* laboratories.
Mr. Lax :
I want to start my own electronic publication, but don't really know
what I want to do, or really have any incentive to actually spend the
time to work on it. Any suggestions?
First off, son, great! I luv ya attitude. We need more people like you on
the Nets, but I sense a bit of confusion that maybe I can help clear up.
Don't forget that you don't actually want to *create* an e-zine, but that you
*want* to create an e-zine. This is a key distinction. You don't actually
have to do anything, just talk about stuff you'd like to do someday.
I think that when you learn this, you will find those nagging concerns about
incentive, work ethic, and compulsion to complete something will go away.
Also, don't forget that you need to *SLAG* *UNMERCILESSLY* those m0es who
actually make the mistake of actually creating something. No matter what it
is *YOU* can do better, if ya wanted. Remember that it's beneath you to
actually accomplish anything.
Now that's cyberpunk!
