William Gibson “Burning Chrome” Science Fiction
William Gibson’s short story paints a picture of cyberpunk gangsters. Bobby Quine, Automatic Jack, and Rikki Wildside are caught up in a scalene love triangle, with no one’s affections genuinely returned. Chrome is messed up on synthetic pituitary hormones, but she is the head of an evil empire that makes a fortune on drugs and prostitution. In this technological future, people can look as they choose, making frequent visits to the “surgical boutique.” This story comes out of the cyberpunk roleplaying game world that appeals to adolescents. Although it is set in the future, several staples of presentday adolescent culture remain: Rikki wears “faded camouflage fatigues” that are kept in “nylon bags” with her “makeup [and] a bright red pair of cowboy boots”; and, despite the popularity of electronic eyeballs, the story’s characters still hide behind sunglasses. Amusingly, this ultramodern tale of the future is modeled on a genre that was popular in the 1940s: detective fiction. Gibson’s prose mimics that of Mickey Spillane, author of the Mike Hammer novels and Mike Danger cartoons. Tough guys, hardboiled observations, and euphemistic references to violence and sex characterize the genre. Gibson tells his story in a complex series of flashbacks, cutting in cinematic fashion between the love story involving Bobby, Jack, and Rikki and the cyber invasion of Chrome’s empire. Gibson employs foreshadowing as well. Even I. Schwarz “Looking for Community on the Internet” Persuasion and Arguement
Evan I. Schwartz tries to mediate the differences between “Internet enthusiasts” and readers who know little about cyberspace. In what is essentially a research paper on the topic, Schwartz tries to discover what people gain from Internet communities and whether online interactions can replace or reinforce community in “real space and time.” Schwartz writes for “the numberless millions of actual Internet users” who are caught...