Cyberpunk

By Cairo & Tokker

...

The snoozer went off at seven and I was out of my sleepsack, powered up, and on-line in nanos. That's as far as I got. Soon I booted and got - "CRACKERS/BUDDYBOO/8ER" on the tube I shut down fast. Damn! Rayno had been on line before me, like always, and that message meant somebody else had gotten into our Net - and that meant trouble by the busload! I couldn't do anything mor on term, so I zipped into my jumper, combed my hair, and went downstairs. Mom and Dad were at breakfast when I slid into the kitchen. "Good Morning, Mikey!" said Mom with a smile. "You were up so late last night I thought I wouldn't see you before you caught your bus." "Had a tough program to crack," I said. "Well," she said, "now you can sit down and have a decent breakfast." She turned around to pull some Sara Lees out of the microwave and plunk them down on the table. "If you'd do your schoolwork when you're supposed to you wouldn't have to stay up all night," growled Dad from behind his caffix and faxsheet. I sloshed some juice in a glass and poured it down, stuffed a Sara Lee into my mouth, and stood to go. "What?" asked Mom. "That's all the breakfast you're going to have?" "Haven't got time," I said. "I gotta get to school early to see if the program checks." Dad growled something more and Mom spoke to quiet him, but I didn't hear much 'cause I was out the door.

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William Gibson, Philip K. Dick, and Vernor Vinge are just some of the names we associate with the dubious word cyberpunk, and since its inception over 20 years ago, the term has come to stand for a great many things. Hackers, Crackers, Phreaks, and National Security all have aspects of this cultural enigma in common, but we're heeded by some to avoid definition. Cyberpunk is under re-design, and we want your input! What better place than a virtual community to develop and participate in a book that deals with the aspects of cyber-fiction that have made it into the real world? So, come and zip through the bandwidth and share in building our knowledge databases with us, as we start to trace and shape the essence of Cyberpunk in its most natural environment. Hey - you even get a free personalized badge with each membership!

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