Cybercope

Cybercope is how I will describe the zeitgeist of today from now on. It came to my attention that the original cyberpunk fiction was not only a warning, but also an accurate prediction. Even the years we're on point. With one exception - the aesthetics. We do not have gritty cities with neon lights, extravagant clothes and flashy hairstyles. But we indeed have the omnipresent technology, giant and powerful corporations, constant surveillance, and other defining features of cyberpunk fiction to some extent. Even the homeless dude asking me for change has a smartphone. We have gotten all the soykafty stuff that fiction foretold but none of the really "cool" aesthetics. Instead, we've gotten this boring, pretentious facade. Now don't get me wrong, I really don't want to live in cyberpunk novel. But I can't help to feel like I am. Just a really bad one, that tries so hard to not offend anyone that it ends up alienating it's own target audience. Cybercope, Cybercringe, Cybershit... Call it whatever you like. We we're promised a soykafty and cool future. Instead we've got just the soykaf.

The cyberpunk genre failed to deliver it's message because of the "cool" aesthetic, that's why Cruelty Squad was way better at delivering the intended message than any other cyberpunk media.

>no cool clothes and cyberpunk hairstyles its because of the fuarrrking trads man. i see these people everywhere, even on lainchan, trying to use "dyed hair" as an indicator of civilizational decay. people who dress like cyberpunk protagonists with the bright hair get harassed in the street more often too, from getting barked at by men with poor sexual boundaries to what are probably the same men online claiming they're symbolic of western ruin. our people (cyberpunks) are suppressed and pushed to the edges of society. we must rise up!

>>90425 Its the same as smoking/sugar/... people got the message clear. "its bad for you" simply isn't enough to move the masses. >>90432 dyed hair got popular with activists and nobody likes preaching fuarrrks regardless whether its jehovas or veganism. As a consequence people developed a pavlovian reflex to colored hair same way they got one for the uniform of the jehovas guys.

>>90433 >people developed a pavlovian reflex to activists i dont think thats true, most people with dyed hair are anime cosplayers and activists tend to go completely natural. hair dye is seen as a common form of rebellion for all kinds of people but i feel like thats the point. idk, i think pornography was a major contributing factor and i think whats worse is that its not strictly animosity people were taught. its hatred and sexualization together that make it extra horrible. personally im planning to dye my hair soon and am just anticipating the kind of negative attention i might get.

>>90421 The answer is, unironically, "they CLAMP". Why do you think I tell you over and over? Half the threads on imageboard could be addressed by this alone. "Why is..." Because they cla mp. "Why did..." Because they c lamp. "Why X instead of Y". They c lamp.(USER WAS CLAMPED FOR THIS POST)

>>90435 Cosplay doesn't count because people know its just fun roleplaying. Its like costume party cops don't shape police perception. You just have to consider when does the majority of people see colored hair? My bet is 99% of it will be social media drama and that shapes a negative association.

>>90436 HAHAHHAAH WHAAAAAAAAAAAAT DID YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU JUSY SAAYYYYYYYYYYYY NIGGGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The obvious difference are the aesthetics, but the subtle difference are lies. Nowadays, people lie to each other all the time. They lie on their phones, they lie to other people in everyday life, lie to their partners , they lie at work, they lie in front of the law, journalists lie. You used the wording "pretentious facade", this feeling of a facade is caused by the lies. In the original cyberpunk aesthetics, lies are mostly used for business outcomes. Because I assume that, as the cyberpunk genre is vintage, people tried to be more honest in their private lives. Differences are settled through (honest) violence. And here comes the biggest difference - nowadays people lie to avoid confrontation, this soykaf is not very cyberpunk.

>>90495 thats not quite true. people lie in stories all the time, take neuromancer for instance which has no truly "good guys" and the whole stories is littered with infiltration and subterfuge. I think you're onto something, though. there is a kind of honesty about characters' motivations that we might not see in the real world. is this simply because they are stories, or because of how reality played out?

>>90496 You are right. I could attribute your examples to lying for a business outcome, but that would be lame. I think my last sentence applies more then. People today lie because they want to avoid direct confrontation. People are little bitches nowadays.

Well, if you go in the cities you can see some funky looking people that come close to Gibson's descriptions. >>90421 >personally im planning to dye my hair soon and am just anticipating the kind of negative attention i might get. I'll never understand people like you who choose to do something trivial like dying your hair, and then complain when people judge. It's like people who get tattoos and gross piercings, and complain that people judge them for it. Okay! But you probably knew people would judge you, and you chose it anyway, so you should be over that already. But these people continue to complain! They create their own problems... You dye your hair anticipating negative attention, so you implicitly accept that having your hair some ugly colour is more important than what other people think of you. Do it if you like, but you better not complain!

>>90505 >victim blaming this is like saying that because you knew you could get robbed when you stepped out of your house you shouldn't complain if it happens. expectations don't define what one should accept and what not, what is this stupid guy logic and why are you so confident about it >>90433 except it isn't a prejudice based on reality, the media created the "pink haired vegan barista" trope as a boogeyman and a scapegoat to blame for every inconvenience in their lives. of course, the pig people that only experience things through media (be it facebook or imageboards) uncritically accepted it because they have no frame of reference >>90421 >Just a really bad one, that tries so hard to not offend anyone you probably live in the country that elected trump as president, twice. where is the attempt at not offending when the dominant discourse for the last 15 years has been "lets trigger the libs". you didn't get promised anything, you read a piece of fiction and you thought it was real just like you think the wojak meme is literally you there are no cyberpunk aesthetics because those novels failed to anticipate the actual development of technology, or at the very least their effects on society. I like walking around my soykafhole city because it is slightly overpopulated and it was designed with public transport in mind, so it feels a little crammed, and things like street advertisement make sense because people can walk around, so they do if you had a fully cyberpunk situation, with overreaching corporations and an absent and corrupt government, the city would probably be just isles of consumption connected by a highway. even the "walkable" parts would feel like prefabricated amusement parks made for commerce. at that point why would you even go shopping when you can order things from the internet. the cyberpunk ethos is counterproductive to the cyberpunk aesthetic

>>90505 "judgment" isn't the issue. it's street harassment from men with no concept of decency, and you seem entirely confused. this is a thread wondering why nobody dresses cool even though we live in a cyberpunk dystopia, well the reason is right there half it's because people are cowards who can't handle negative judgment and the other half is reactive types who get straight up aggressive by anything they deem unnatural. >>90508 >the cyberpunk ethos is counterproductive to the cyberpunk aesthetic very true I feel the dystopian aspects are what prevent people from expressing themselfs too like you said. I think you got it perfectly right when you said that culture is both obsessed with not wanting to offend and trying to trigger the libs: they don't want to offend people in their own in-group but are basically engaged in warfare against anyone that they are told the out-group is. this is why people don't express themselves especially conservative types, it was never in their nature to begin with.

>>90508 >victim blaming lmao if you go to a warzone and get shot its on you. And claiming victim wont close the wound either. You cant talk yourself out of facing the consequences even if you might convince some retards to support you with the victim play. Secondary its simply a self fulfilling cycle where only idiots do it so normal people avoid it to avoid the idiot label. Oh and "i wanna be edgy and upset people" falls into the idiot category too.

>>90508 >You probably live in the country that elected trump as president, twice. I don't. I live in Europe. Not that It matters. I was talking about culture more than about the situation in one given country. And since culture is more or less global nowadays, it is irrelevant where any one of us lives, the basic experience will be similar, just flavoured a bit differently. >even the "walkable" parts would feel like prefabricated amusement parks made for commerce. This is pretty much what happened in the cities here. "Historical city center" littered with ads, shops and tourist traps.

>>90517 >historical city center littered with ads, shops, and tourist traps if you're not an odd sort of communist then i don't see why this is much of an issue. shops and advertisements are a time-blessed tradition, they've been around for even longer than capitalism has been

>>90572 The problem is the destruction of the centers character and the visual smog, which is not good for the human psyche. I couln't give a rat's ass that there are shops or tourist scams if they were not so much in my face.

>>90572 >>90575 I think the issue is how everything became more colorful and bright. Printed colors, screens, LED lighting. Adverts always existed, but they used to be less stressful. Same goes for shop appearances and tourism information.

>>90421 It was written by people who were too optimistic by how good hell would be. They thought that it would just be peak Amerijapan industry and economics so they assumed a rather very efficient, productive and rational society. Grimness had to be exotic, flamboyant, excessive in its corrupt and gritty teleology, unwilling or incapable of seeing that the supposed low life rebels were part of a culture that would be subverted too. They thought that these destitute but deep down honest people who simply couldn't get a chance to live honorably would represent the sacred opposition, while the perverts would be living in the shadows of the zabaitsus. But no, the grim future is bleak and cheap. America is broken, Japan is not the producer of supertech and worst of all, biological realities are utterly defined for the sake of maintaining a formless world society where separation, limitations, rules of the past are all alien to people and need to be hunted down. If you agree that punks were not supposed to be seen as heroes then it's fine, but if you make the mistake of believing in them as unwitting proxies for world justice then you have failed to comprehend the inherent reality of life. >>90432 >people who dress like cyberpunk protagonists with the bright hair get harassed in the street more often too Where I live they're the ones harassing others, often with the most retarded, cringe and pretentious messages while lacking any sense of self-discipline and introspection. >>90435 Most cosplayers use wigs, they don't dye their hair permanently.

>>90421 Well I see it like that too, but instead I would say that this reality's more subtle way of conveying these feelings of nightmare potential through technology are interesting in their own ways, yes you may not have moo sounding mechs from like metal gear solid 4 or crazy stuff like that but what we have can also be terryfing and very cool in the process

Be the change you want to see in this world If we're in a cyberpunk work, you ought to wear a black trenchcoat and heavy boots, AR glasses, dye your hair pink, do heavy loads of x, and find yourself a nice coffin hotel. Practice parkour, install kalyx on a netbook, and learn to hax networks and disburse them.

>>90580 Where I am, every new building is a rectangle made of glass and metal, every shop look like an hospital and we have a thing called flat design. Anything that isn't material wealth die. This was fortold by the ancient cyberpunk propheties.

>>92281 >kalyx on a netbook he's more of a mac guy iirc

>>90432 >people who dress like cyberpunk protagonists with the bright hair get harassed in the street more often too Such people are nuisances now. It's a visual signal that tells you your well being is at risk. Not that I'd like to defend normal people but normal people didn't feel the need to dye their hair in such vivid ways so as to signal their existence and desire to be seen. Now it's a desire to offend and make you shut up if you ever commit the slightest crime of gazing at them longer than a second.

>>90572 >shops and advertisements are a time-blessed tradition, they've been around for even longer than capitalism has been Shops yes, advertisement as we know it today, no. In the early 20th century, shops were required not to flaunt their goods by being prude about what they could put on display. It seemed vulgar and like trying to catch flies with vinegar. Now if they could display ads on your glasses as you walk pass a shop they'd do it, assuming you're old fashioned enough to actually physically move out of your house or flat in order to buy stuff.

Personally i feel like our world is going to be cyberpunk also aesthetically, or at least some significant portions of the world will be. At least where i live (latin-american capital megacity) there has been a sudden fashion of LED advertisements, LED signs, big and tall apartment and office buildings also with leds and neon flex everywhere. The commercial streets of our neighborhood and city downtown will be soon like a poor man's shibuya. (that was the impression i had the last time i went there at night). All of that in addition with the popularity of rgb lights in homes, some graphic design trends, and other things like the car designs makes me feel like i am actually living the cyberpunk world.

>>92321 Yeah, it's getting all the more metallic and electronic, cold and abstract. That's the point of it, to detach people from nature and drown them in a see of dulling pretty phantasmagoric colors that helps bridging the physical world with the virtual one. But how far will this extend? The other urban aesthetics is the cold soviet brutalist one with gigantic panes of reflective windows and very unelaborated building shapes, basic geometric forms which again remind us of early time 3D renditions on computers with primitive forms. Cubes, prisms, types of spheres. Another element that stops the old school aesthetics from taking off is that it's a hog on power and we're just not into consuming more energy right now, it's all about using less of it. I admit that the modern e-cars are looking more and more like objects taken from soon-future science fiction movies and shows.

>>92281 I installed kalyx and all I got was a black dick on my screen.

>>92327 >Yeah, it's getting all the more metallic and electronic, cold and abstract. I'd say it's becoming more plastic and silicon, whereas the cyberpunk original was more bare metal - but even our metal is oftentimes aluminium instead of some dank chrome.

>>92369 Or carbon fiber, the only acceptable carbon today.

Ironically, staying off the Internet feels more cyberpunk. Your thoughts become more clear, you observe the soykaf but don't engage in it. You observe the decadence but keep moving forward. . If you browse the social media and adopt internet slang, you are just part of the slop.

>>92415 >If you browse the social media and adopt internet slang, you are just part of the slop. Or you're a net warrior surfing on the fringe of the immaterial sea of noise and forever actualized trends, blending in like a predator to better learn how to reach those who are worthy of being saved and pulled out of the grid maze.

lol imagine having technofeudalism breathing down your neck and you're complaining that it isn't trendy and aesthetic. when in fact, it is, it just doesn't meet *your* aesthetic sense. You're actually complaining it's not like in the moveez.

>>90421 >"...I really don't want to live in cyberpunk novel. But I can't help to feel like I am." The fact that you say this means that you are aware that we are all living in one by now. You're just disappointed that it isn't one with all the cool aesthetics or "cyberware" so you can "clep some quick eddies by flat lining some gonk gangers through a gig that you took from a preem fixer". There are many cyberpunk or cyberpunk adjacent stories that don't take place in a Neon Dystopia. You have to keep in mind that the cyberpunk genre is literally just used as a setting to tell a story (and maybe make some predictions of the future along the way). In short, it's just theater. Personally, as much as I like the aesthetics, cool lingo, and cyberware, I don't think we're anywhere even close to that yet. What I appreciate about the genre is not just the aesthetics, but the fact that it is a reflection of society, just in a futuristic setting. As technology advances, all of the problems of humanity are still present or even worsened. The lifestyle is possible, but since you're more disappointed of the "style" part over the "substance" part (which I sort of agree with), why not do something about it? Create cool tech that catches people's eye, dye your hair, make music or art, as cringe as it is to say, really push that "high-tech low-life" lifestyle. >"Even the homeless dude asking me for change has a smartphone." This homeless guy has it right. >>90505 Yeah, personally I don't get it either. Some people do it for the sake of rebellion, yet complain when people get weirded out by it. But the people who do it because they themselves believe it looks good, don't deserve that negativity. Especially since we're living in a time where it's a lot more socially acceptable to dye your hair. People should look how they want without judgement (of course there's a level to nuance to it, but you know what I mean). But the people who do it for the sake of rebelling and to "offend" others with their colored hair, then complain about it, makes no sense to me since they're getting the reaction that they wanted out of people.

>>92455 my concern isn't about judgment, its about being sexually harassed. i have friends who have dyed hair that have been chased after, barked at, etc. things that you would likely admonish as degenerate behavior if we were going for a walk and you watched me experience. personally, i want to do it because i think it would look good - ive dyed my hair the color im thinking (pink, and then faded it to red) in the past and liked my appearance.

>>92451 >spoilers Do you think it has redeeming values? What is even the style? >>92455 > In short, it's just theater. Way too reductive. >>92455 >Create cool tech that catches people's eye That's what companies like Sony used to do before they went full westard. >dye your hair That's not counter-culture anymore. It's the most childish thing to do, waiting for the proxy daddy to swallow a given subgroup only for the kiddies to rebel against it by being contrarians. Now that punk-soykaf style is pushed by NGOs with big business behind them and is shown in all ads as the style of the new formless future populations, you're not a rebel by being part of this. You might be cool because you're told it's cool and in the end you're just a sheep, but not a rebel. There is not even room to pretend being a rebel. >really push that "high-tech low-life" lifestyle. Unironically that's now a post-Soviet hacker lifestyle. So soykaf that you can't even afford the pretty lights, and so gloomy that there are no pretty lights anyway.

>>92462 Damn, sorry to hear that. Unfortunately, there's a lot of disgusting people out there. I have friends that don't even have dyed hair and they still get catcalled. All I could say is just do your best to ignore them, and keep a "tool" on you. >>92464 >"Way too reductive." Yeah, but it serves my point well. >"That's not counter-culture anymore." I agree, like I said, it's more socially acceptable to have dyed hair nowadays. But nonetheless, a lot of people still view it as a form of rebellion (look at East Asia/SE Asia), even if it's childish. Personally, I feel is it's almost the same as wearing the "punk uniform". OP was more disappointed with the current state of aesthetics and technology. I didn't want to make my post too long and end up talking about how you need the attitude to go with it; not forgetting the Punk in Cyberpunk. But I think that would sort of be offtopic of the thread, and just kept it surface level. >"Now that punk-soykaf style is pushed by NGOs with big business behind them..." That's a good point, but there's levels to it. There are people who buy clothes that are already ripped, buy clothes with patches already on it, etc. Look at the Sex Pistols. Their music is pretty cool, but it's not a secret that they were secretly an industry plant formed to sell "punk clothes". There are quite a lot of people who are consumed by consuming, and are more concerned about looking the part, than to actually pushing the lifestyle/message. If you look at the Hardcore scene now, barely anyone rocks "the uniform". Colored hair in most places of the world is not rebellion anymore, but it's not a big deal if people just do it because they like it. Is it backed behind corpos, yes, but what isn't? As long as you don't get consumed by consuming, stop thinking your looks alone is a form of rebellion, and you continue to push the message, I think you're in the clear. >"Unironically that's now a post-Soviet hacker lifestyle" Yeah it's crazy what they're doing out there. These guys got the right idea.

>>92469 >Yeah, but it serves my point well. Everything is theater lainon.

>>92464 >Unironically that's now a post-Soviet hacker lifestyle. So soykaf that you can't even afford the pretty lights, and so gloomy that there are no pretty lights anyway.

>>90421 >>90421 >We do not have gritty cities with neon lights, extravagant clothes and flashy hairstyles we have it some places. Go to Shanghai, Bangkok, attend places like raves etc

>>92462 Ive known people without dyed hair who get catcalled etcetera. Maybe the trick is just to be attractive and attention getting, dyed hair helps with the latter >>92510 do they have neon or are they abandoning it for leds or stuff ? sincere question. >>90508 >elected trump twice actually it was three times, and counting.

>>92511 >do they have neon or are they abandoning it for leds or stuff ? sincere question. Neons are on their way out everywhere.

>>92511 > Maybe the trick is just to be attractive and attention getting, dyed hair helps with the latter it's true, prostitutes often wear bright colors for a reason. but being attractive isn't really it - you're more likely to get comments if you're fat too for instance. at the point of having your privacy and personal space randomly violated, it doesn't really matter if the guy doing it is calling you ugly or that you're sexy, either way it is disruptive and irritating.

You can be the aesthetic. If you get a delivery job riding a bike you can wear armour and strap the the phone to your arm. Also when you get orders you can say things like Mission Accepted I am moving to the target now etc

>>92526 But not the abundant garish neon-like lights. Now Third World cities are burning their joules keeping the lights up in impressive demonstrations of utter waste of energy while Westerners can't even have that fun because we're planet killers of the vilest kind, would you believe. >>92540 Where the implants at? You also need a multi-band auto-stabilized Arika snuffer with self-guided ammo and a 993-Pro silencer.

>>92469 we need to bring back "poser". tons of kids half ass the punk soykaf for style and lose the whole point of punk playing right into the industry's hand. it pisses me off.

>>90432 Put some SAMURAI soy cyberpunk logos on your clothing. (or ARASAKA stuff ahaha, they sell ARASAKA-themed stckers too)

>>90421 So, OP, are you telling me the moment the streets will go full RUB LED stripes a e s t h e t i c s; we should actually rejoice we're entering the world with better prospects to live/love/laugh?

>>92685 Look, if you wear XX century or 2000s clothers for the "punk" vibe - be kind - add some cheap battery-powered LEDs Especially if you happen to have a nice coat with high collar

>>90421 >Call it whatever you like. Punkcyberia. The "low life" punk stuff that came before the "cyber" started shining AND with a massive dose of CYBERIA-THE-WIRED vibes of everything15gone/eccted

>master, coolness still gives them hope, we should capitalize the punk and turn it into some mainstream garbage >yesss, just expose it in the mainstream, let the normal users flood the soykaf out of it, mwahaha That's how I imagine what the guys in power said right after the 2010s began.

I feel it’s because a major flaw that cyberpunk aesthetics overlooks is how modern political ideology evolved. It tries to portray corporations as investing in over-individualism, when in reality, politics and corporations just want to promote a fake sense of individualism while maintaining the herd mentality for profit. (same style of clothing, recognizable brands, easy and cheap-to-manufacture clothes) The cyberpunk aesthetic revolves around people being hyper obsessed with individualistic expression due to heavy corporate oppression, and companies, ironically, banking on that. It’s funny to think that we already have corporate oppression today, yet some people that gain nothing from it still defend it while there is few to no dissidents.

>>94892 That's the point, the cyberpunkers are controlled opposition. They loosen the leash where they can afford to and pretend they're being forced to, and put up a pretense of trying to reign back in control of that area. So that people push back in areas which don't matter, so they never mount a real resistance or reach a true breaking point.

>>92321 Muscovite reporting in Similar soycaf here: neon-like LEDs plastered all atop pizzerias, shiny glowing OZON letters everywhere, glowing street signs, and such - much more bright than 80's neon, but without the tacky flickering