Crash Snow is a science fiction novel by American author Neal Stephenson, published in 1992. Like many other Stephenson novels covering history, linguistics, anthropology, archeology, religion, computer science, politics, cryptography, memetics and philosophy.
Stephenson explains the novel title in his 1999 essay "In the Beginning... The Command Line" as a term for certain software failure modes on early Apple Macintosh computers. Stephenson writes about the Macintosh that "When the computer gets stuck and writes gibbering into a bitmap, the result is something that looks vaguely like static on a faulty television - 'snow crash'". Stephenson also mentions that Julian Jaynes 'The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind' is one of the main influences on Snow Crash.
This book presents the Sumerian language as a firmware programming language for the brainstem, which should serve as a BIOS for the human brain. According to the characters in the book, the goddess Asherah is the personification of a linguistic virus, similar to a computer virus. God Enki created a counter program which he called nam-shub that caused all humans to speak different languages ​​as protection against Asherah (reinterpretation of the ancient Near Eastern Tower of the Tower of Babel).
Snow Crash was nominated for both the British Science Fiction Award in 1993, and the Arthur C. Clarke Award in 1994.
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The story opened in Los Angeles in the 21st century, an unspecified number of years after the collapse of the economy around the world. Los Angeles is no longer part of the United States, because the United States federal government has given up most of its power and territory to private organizations and employers. Franchising, individual sovereignty, and private vehicles are in charge of the landscape. Mercenaries compete for national defense contracts while private security guards maintain peace in the construction of gated housing. Highway companies compete to pull drivers into their streets and all deliveries via courier. The remains of governments retain authority only in isolated compounds where they transact tedious jobs which, in general, are irrelevant to the dynamic society around them.
Much of the territory handed over by the government has been carved into sovereign pockets, each run by its own business franchise (such as "Mr. Lee's Greater Hong Kong" or a corporate American Mafia) or various housing burbclaves. - an enclave in the suburbs inspired by communities controlled by California's legalized sovereignty by the Stir-Davis General Interest Act.
This arrangement resembles anarcho-capitalism, a theme Stephenson took to the next novel The Diamond Age . As described in the novel and short story "The Great Simoleon Caper" (1995), hyperinflation has weakened the value of the US dollar to the extent that trillions of dollars - Ed Meeses - is virtually ignored and the quadrillion dollar record - Gipper - is a standard 'small' bill. Hyperinflation encourages people to use electronic currencies that are exchanged in encrypted online transactions and therefore can not be imposed. For physical transactions, they use alternate, non-hyperinflating currencies such as yen or "Kongbucks" (official currency of Mr. Lee's Greater Hong Kong). Hyperinflation also has a negative impact on most of the world (with some exceptions like Japan), resulting in a wave of desperate refugees from Asia who cross the Pacific with a rickety ship hoping to arrive in North America.
The Metaverse , the phrase coined by Stephenson as the successor of the Internet, is Stephenson's vision of how a virtual reality-based Internet may evolve in the near future. Resembling a massive multiplayer online game (MMO), Metaverse is populated by controlled user avatars as well as system daemons. While there are public access Metaverse terminals in Reality, using them brings a social stigma between the residents of Metaverse, in part because of poor visual representation of themselves as low-quality avatars. Status in Metaverse is a function of two things: access to limited environments such as Black Sun, exclusive Metaverse clubs, and technical acumen, often expressed by the sophistication of one's avatar.
Maps Snow Crash
Plot summary
Hiro Protagonist is the driver of delivery of hackers and pizza for Mafia. He met Y.T. (short for Yours Truly), a young skateboarder Kourier (courier), during failed attempts to make timely deliveries. Y.T. completed the delivery on their behalf and they established partnerships, gathered intel and sold it to CIC, a non-profit organization that evolved from CIA mergers with the Library of Congress. In Metaverse, Hiro was offered a datafile named Snow Crash by a man named Raven who hinted that it was a form of narcotics. Hiro's friend and fellow hacker, Da5id, saw a bitmap image contained in the file that caused the computer to crash and Da5id suffered brain damage in the real world. Hiro met his ex-girlfriend Juanita Marquez, who gave him a database containing a large amount of research, putting connections between viruses, ancient Sumerian culture, and the legend of the Tower of Babel. Juanita advised her to be careful and disappear.
Uncle Enzo's Mafia boss began to take interest in his father at Y.T. Impressed by his attitude and initiative, he arranges to meet him and offer his freelance job. Hiro's investigation and intelligence gathering Y.T. began to coincide, with the connection between the neuro-linguistic virus, a religious organization known as Pearly Gates of Rev. Wayne and a major media personality named L. Bob Rife began to appear. Juanita's research shows that the ancient Sumerian language allows the brain to function 'programmed' using audio stimuli along with DNA-converting viruses. The Sumerian culture is organized around these programs (known as me ) run by priests for the people. Enki, a legendary figure, developed a counter-virus (known as nam-shub of Enki ) which, when sent to stop the Sumerian language, was processed by the brain and led to another development, less literal language, gave birth to the Babylonian myth. L. Bob Rife has collected Sumerian artifacts and developed Snow Crash medicine to make the public vulnerable to new forms of me that he will control. The physical form of the virus is distributed in the form of addictive drugs and in Reverend Wayne's church through infected blood. There is also a digital version where hackers are very vulnerable because they are accustomed to processing information in binary form.
Hiro heads north to the Raft, a large collection of boats containing Eurasian refugees, approaching the American coast. Rife has used Raft as a mechanism to indoctrinate and infect thousands of viruses and import them to America. Y.T. arrested and taken to Rife on the Raft, who intend to use him as a hostage, knowing his relationship with Uncle Enzo. With the help of the Mafia, Hiro manages to break into the raft and restore the Enki's
Technology characteristics
Various technologies are used in this fictional world, and help define it. Among others are:
Rat Things
Rat Things, also known as semi-autonomous guard units, is a private cybernetic defense guard found in and around Hong Kong's Lee's Greater. Engineered from pit bull binoculars with surgery coupled with cybernetic components, Rat Things is named with a long and flexible tail.
Rat Things was created by Mr. Ng, from Ng Security Industries, who was severely handicapped after a helicopter crash in Vietnam. Like Mouse, Mr. Ng is also a cyborg.
Rat Things remembers their previous lives as dogs. They can also communicate with other Rat Things by "barking" at Metaverse. Although their minds are largely controlled by their implants, they can sometimes act independently of their program. While in Metaverse and not on guard duty, Rat Things runs on endless beaches, plays on the waves, eats steak growing on trees, and Frisbees is bathed in floating blood, waiting to be caught.
Like other technologies at Snow Crash , Rat Things is powered by a nuclear isotope battery, which requires extensive cooling due to the amount of waste heat generated. The Rat Things are passively cooled by a heat sink system that is only effective when Rat Thing runs fast enough to move ambient air across the fins. To prevent rapid overheating when stationary, they must remain in their cage (dog house effectively), where they are constantly sprayed by refrigerant jets. By running, Rat Things is able to penetrate the sound barrier (about 768 mph at sea level), although this is usually not permitted by Mr. "good neighbor" policy. Lee Hong Kong is bigger for noise reasons. Because they have to move at high speed or actively cool down in their cages, Rat Things is rarely seen by the human eye and few people know what it looks like.
Smartwheels
The fictional type wheels are used prominently on skateboards and sophisticated motorcycles. They consist of a small segment of contact surface mounted on a telescoping finger, allowing the wheel to take the form of cracks, curbs, and bumps. They mentioned mentioning in The Diamond Age as used in wheelchairs belonging to minor characters.
Reason
The reason is the railgun in a rotary cannon configuration that burns down uranium flechettes. It is fitted to a large wheeled ammunition box and equipped with a harness for the convenience of the user, nuclear battery, and water-cooled heat exchanger. The weapon, made by Ng, is still in beta testing, and has been in software accidents during combat, resulting in the death of its users. Hiro can then apply firmware updates, and use them until the ammunition supplies run out. It bears, written on the signboard of his name, Latin phrase Ultima Ratio Regum , "the last argument of kings".
Metaverse
The Metaverse is a collective virtual shared space, created by the convergence of real physical reality and persistent virtual space, including the sum of all virtual worlds, augmented reality, and the internet. The word metaverse combines the prefix "meta" (meaning "outside") with "the universe" and is usually used to describe the concept of internet future iteration, consisting of persistent, sharing, 3D virtual space related to the world virtual perceived.
Stephenson's Metaverse emerged to its users as an urban environment, developed along a one-hundred-meter-long road, which stretches 65536 km (2 16 km) without nature, black, perfectly round planet. Virtual real estate is owned by the Global Multimedia Protocol Group, a fictitious part of the real Computing Machinery Association, and is available for purchase and building developed there.
Metaverse users gain access through a private terminal projecting a high-quality virtual reality view to user-worn sunglasses, or from a low-quality public terminal at the booth (with a penalty displaying rough black and white appearance). Stephenson also describes sub-cultures of people who choose to stay connected continuously with Metaverse using portable terminals, goggles and other equipment; they were given sobriquet "gargoyles" because of their strange appearance. Metaverse users experience it from the point of view of the first person.
In Metaverse, individual users appear as avatars of any form, with the only high limit, "to prevent people from walking about a mile high". Transport in Metaverse is limited to analog reality by foot or vehicle, such as a monorail that runs the entire length of Street, stops at 256 Express Port , is located uniformly at intervals of 256Ã, km, and Local Ports , one kilometer apart.
Literary meaning and criticism
Snow Crash founded Stephenson as a major science fiction writer in the 1990s. This book appears on the magazine's Time list of the 100 best-selling English novels of all time written since 1923.
Some critics regard it as a cyberpunk parody and mention satirical humor or its absurdity.
In his book Form of Markers: 1967 to the End of History, Walter Benn Michaels considers the deeper theoretical implications of Stephenson's book. Comparing books with contemporary authors - Bret Easton Ellis fiction, Kathy Acker, Octavia Butler, and even Paul de Man and literary critic Richard Rorty - Michaels criticized the profound claims of Stephenson's book: "And yet, in Snow Crash < >, the human body is affected by "information" that they can not read, viruses, like icepick [in American Psycho], get the words inside you even if you have not read them. "Michaels specifically targets Stephenson's view that "language is code" rather than grouping letters and sounds for interpretation. Michaels further argues that the basic idea of ​​this language as code ("... a lot of Snow Crash plots depends on the difference between hackers and their computers, as it were - indeed, in the novels, just because - will be done to the hackers what computers will accept ") align Stephenson, along with the other authors mentioned, with a racially motivated cultural view: that culture is something that is transmitted and stored by blood (or the genetic code), and not by conviction and practice. According to critic Walter Benn Michaels:
The body infected by the virus does not become infected because it understands more viruses than uninfected bodies misunderstand the virus. So the world in which everything - from bitmap to blood - can be understood as "speech form" is also a world where nothing is actually understood, a world in which the act of speech Is cut off from what it means.
Racy's Reaching Our Country using Snow Crash as an example of modern culture that "states what loss [Rorty] calls" national hope "... problem with Snow Crash does not mean it's not true-after all, it's a story-but it's not inspiring. "This lack of inspiration is offset by something else Snow Crash and other works as it offers: "These books produce their readers a 'state of the soul' called Rorty 'knowledge,' which he describes as 'preference for knowledge of hope' (37)"; the preference for this knowledge "contributes [s] to a more fundamental failure to appreciate the value of inspiration - and hence literature - itself."
Influences on the World Wide Web and computing
While the virtual environment 1986 Habitat applied the Sanskrit avatar to online virtual agency before Stephenson, the success of Snow Crash popularized the term to the extent that avatars are now terms accepted for this concept in computer games and on the World Wide Web.
Many cyberspace programs, including NASA World Wind and Google Earth, are similar to "Earth" software developed by Central Intelligence Corporation at Snow Crash. One of the founders of Google Earth claimed that Google Earth was modeled after Snow Crash , while other co-founders said it was inspired by Powers of Ten . Stephenson himself has commented on the legacy of the aesthetics of the "Earth" gods of his program in his novel Reamde, where his protagonist, a game designer, stole the technique from Google Earth:
The T'Rain opener screen is really a rip-off of what you see when you boot Google Earth. Richard does not feel guilty about this, because he has heard that Google Earth, in turn, is based on the idea of ​​some old science fiction novels.
Software developer Michael Abrash is inspired by Snow Crash's Metaverse and its networked 3D world. He left Microsoft for Id Software to write something in that direction, the result was Quake. Stories for 3DO Immercenary games are also heavily influenced by Snow Crash. The live video adaptation of Snow Crash was being developed in 1996, but never released.
Former Microsoft Chief Technology Officer J Allard and former Xbox Live Development Manager Boyd Multerer claimed to have been deeply inspired in the development of Xbox Live by Snow Crash and it is a mandatory reading for the Xbox development team.
Possibility of film or television adaptation
The novel was chosen soon after its publication and subsequent success, though to date it has never progressed beyond pre-production. American-American science fiction director Vincenzo Natali has specifically commented on the two-hour feature film adaptation as being less suited to its shape; as far as this novel is "tonally in all places", he feels that the mini-series will be a more suitable format for the material.
In late 1996, it was announced that writer-director Jeffrey Nachmanoff would adapt the novel to The Kennedy/Marshall Company and Touchstone Pictures. Marco Brambilla is bound to direct the movie.
In June 2012, it was announced that British director Joe Cornish, after his debut film 2011 Attack the Block , has been signed as director of the future film adaptation for Paramount Studios. In 2013, Stephenson described the Cornish manuscript as "extraordinary", but also warned that there is no guarantee that a movie will be made. In July 2016, producer Frank Marshall said that filming could begin in 2017.
In August 2017, Amazon Studios announced that they co-produced an hour-long science fiction television program based on Snow Crash with Paramount. The television show will be an executive produced by Cornish and Frank Marshall Kennedy/Marshall Company.
See also
- Distributed republic, the form of government used by Stephenson in this and other works
- Neurotology
- Videodrome (1983)
- Neuromancer (1984)
- "BLIT" (1988)
References
Further reading
-
Handrahan, Matthew (2015). "Important Reading: Snow Crash ". Book Club (column). SciFiNow . 104 : 84-87 . Retrieved November 27, 2017 . Ã,
External links
- Snow Crash list titles on the Internet Internet Speculative Fiction
- Neal Stephenson's website
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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