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Note 1273.9 "Johnny Mnemonic" 9 of 9
REGENT::BROOMHEAD "Don't panic -- yet." 61 lines 19-MAY-1995 11:42
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We Digital employees ought to know more than that:
From: NAME: Howard Sholkin @AKO
FUNC: PCBU Americas
TEL: 244-7802 <SHOLKIN.HOWARD AT A1 at PCBUOA at
AKO>
To: See Below
Digital is going Hollywood next week with two major events. First, there will
be a world premier of the movie "Johnny Mnemonic" Wednesday evening, May 17 in
Beverly Hills. At this time, I will attend along with John O'Leary, VP, western
region Systems Business Unit, and Rita Foley, VP, western Accounts Business
Unit. This is an exclusive event attended by the star of "Johnny Mnemonic",
Keanu Reeves, and many other celebrities.
Second, on Thursday, May 18 at 10 a.m., there will be a news conference at
TriStar Pictures in Culver City. It is being held to announce an internet
contest related to the movie as well as multiple divisions of Sony promoting it
through a CD videogame, soundtrack, and merchandise. At this event, 10 Digital
PCs and one Prioris server will be showcased running the multimedia games, a
virtual reality exhibit, and PCs connected to the internet game.
The Sony news release for the May 18 event says, "this is a first for networked
online entertainment, drawing on Sony New Technologies' vision for producing
compelling programming for the Internet..." Entertainment, high-tech, magazine,
dailies, and TV reporters have been invited to the news conference.
The internet server, provided as a loaner, is in San Francisco and it's a
Digital Internet AlphaServer 1000 four/200 that was announced last March. The
contest, which includes a Digital logo at the very beginning and a few questions
about Digital, will run May 18 through at least June 22. The grand prize winner
will receive a Digital Venturis 5100 PC.
The multimedia games, virtual reality, and the internet contest will be a part
of Digital PC's booth at PC Expo in New York, June 20-22.
"Johnny Mnemonic" represents a breakthrough in movie production because it is
the first feature film to rely entirely on PCs to produce sophisticated computer
graphics images. The movie is based on William Gibson's short story. Gibson,
who coined the term cyberspace, said of the imagery, "it's an absolutely
terrific visualization of something I've only ever seen on the inside of my own
forehead." High powered DECpc XLs were used with Autodesk software to create
the cyberspace imagery.
Frank Foster, VP, Sony Pictures Imageworks is a strong supporter of Digital and
Autodesk. He pushed to use Digital PCs instead of workstations such as Silicon
Graphics for this project. The capability to upgrade the PCs from Intel to
Alpha processors is very important to him. I expect to have an approved story
about Digital and Sony for the news conference. Frank is a leader of Siggraph,
the major computer graphics association.
Next week is significant for a few reasons: Digital gains visibility in the
emerging use of PCs in movie and television productions, we solidify our
relationship with Sony, and we put Digital's name out front where it belongs as
a pioneer of Internet applications and systems.
NOTE: Any people planning to attend the May 18 news conference must contact me
in advance so that you will be admitted without a problem.
To Distribution List:
[deleted]
|
| From: XSTACY::VBORMC::"[email protected]" "MAIL-11 Daemon"
14-JUN-1995 23:35:20.83
To: [email protected]
CC:
Subj: Event-Scene 17-The Day Cyberpunk Died
_____________________________________________________________________
CTHEORY THEORY, TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE VOL 18, NO 1-2
Event-Scene 17 95/06/14 Editors: Arthur and Marilouise Kroker
_____________________________________________________________________
Johnny Mnemonic: The Day Cyberpunk Died
=======================================
~Arthur and Marilouise Kroker~
Johnny Mnemonic, the movie, is the day when cyberpunk died.
Its failure is interesting less for aesthetic reasons - acting,
screenplay, cinematography, special effects - than for what it says
about the hyper-modern mind and its taste for shifting cultural
signs. Killed by sheer cultural acceleration, by the fact that 80s
cyberpunk metaphors don't really work anymore in the virtual 90s,
the popular failure of Johnny Mnemonic testifies to the end of the
charismatic phase of digital reality, and the beginning of the iron
law of technological normalization. In the age of _Neuromancer_ we
could still believe for one charismatic moment that the body could
deep-dish its way past screenal telemetry into galactic flows of
data, that Molly could vamp her way to mind fusion, that Case could
jump out of his flesh and byte-fry his way to Freeside, that somehow
we could become data, and it would be good.
Now _Neuromancer_ hit just when hi-tech was in its charismatic state
of innocent grace, still a crazy fusion of computer visionaries and
outlaw businessmen and hacker writers coming in for a moment from
the back alleys of the digital frontier to check out the daytime
scene with all the T-shirts in the software labs. Like all cultural
movements before it, tech charisma lasts for only one brief, shining
instant, and then it fades away into the grim sociology of
rationalized technology or, failing which, it quickly disappears
from life. The lessons of the 90s have been multiple and they've
been harsh: not the least of which is that data will find a way, and
it's way is not necessarily about becoming human. While the charisma
of tech will never be retrieved again, its memory lingers on the
horizon like a beautiful beckoning dream, all the more seductive for
its absence.
And Johnny Mnemonic? The movie suffers the very worst fate of all:
it's been normalized, rationalized, chopped down to image-consumer
size, drained of its charisma and recuperated as a museum-piece of
lost cybernetic possibilities. Perhaps that's why the film provokes
such intense resentment among the cyber-crowd. Its presence is a
bitter reminder of the decline of cyberpunk into the present state
of hyper-rational (hyper-marketplace) technology. And cyberpunk? It
will remain a permanent part of the American literary landscape as a
simulation of sci-fi transgression, but only in the doubled form of
the transgresion that confirms. That's Johnny Mnemonic: the
difference that recuperates: a cinematic tombstone for the cyberpunk
that was its own creation.
_____________________________________________________________________
Arthur and Marilouise Kroker are co-editors of CTHEORY. "Johnny
Mnemonic: The Day Cyberpunk Died" is from their forthcoming book
titled, _Hacking the Future_, New York: St. Martin's Press,1996.
_____________________________________________________________________
* CTHEORY is an international review of theory, technology
* and culture. Sponsored by the Canadian Journal of
* Political and Social Theory, articles and key book reviews
* in contemporary discourse are published weekly as well as
* theorisations of major "event-scenes" in the mediascape.
* CTHEORY includes interactive discussions among its subscribers.
*
* CTHEORY is published with the assistance of the Dean of Arts
* and Science and the Department of Political Science, Concordia
* University, Montreal, Canada.
*
* Editors: Arthur and Marilouise Kroker
*
* Editorial Board: Kathy Acker, Jean Baudrillard, Bruce Sterling,
* David Cook, Berkeley Kaite, William Leiss, Geert Lovink, Eileen
* Manion, Hans Mohr, Alberto Perez-Gomez, Stephen Pfohl, Andrew
* Ross, Kim Sawchuk, Deena Weinstein, Michael Weinstein, Andrew
* Wernick & Gail Valaskakis.
*
* Editorial Assistant: Michael Boyle
* Artists in Residence: STELARC (Australia), Art in Ruins (UK),
* Mark Lewis (Canada), subReal (Romania),
* Critical Art Ensemble (USA)
* World Wide Web Editor: Carl Steadman
* CD-ROM/Multi-Media Editor: Steve Gibson
*
* CTHEORY includes:
*
* 1. Electronic reviews of key books in contemporary theory,
* posted weekly (REVIEWS:)
*
* 2. Electronic articles on theory, technology and culture posted monthly
* (ARTICLES:)
*
* 3. Event-scenes in politics, culture and the mediascape (EVENTS:)
*
* 4. Electronic (virtual reality) theory salon: interactive and
* unmoderated (CTALK)
*
* World Wide Web address:
* http://english-server.hss.cmu.edu/ctheory/ctheory.html
*
* The disk (DOS/Mac) version of CTHEORY may be ordered directly
* from: CJPST, Concordia University, 1455 de Maisonneuve, O.,
* Montreal, Canada, H3G 1M8. Institutional orders may be placed
* through UMI, Ann Arbor, Michigan.
*
* Indexed in: International Political Science Abstracts/Documentation
* politique international; Sociological Abstract Inc.; Advance
* Bibliography of Contents: Political Science and Government;
* Canadian Periodical Index; Film and Literature Index.
_____________________________________________________________________
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