"Snow Crashing Into The Metaverse" from Imaginary Worlds
Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford
Pushkin Industries
4.7 • 6.4K Ratings
🗓️ 3 January 2023
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week, we’re sharing an episode of Imaginary Worlds. For the last 30 years, the real world has been catching up to Neal Stephenson’s vision of the future in his 1992 novel Snow Crash, which influenced the creators of Google Earth, Second Life, Oculus Rift and more. Now the centerpiece of the novel, a virtual world called The Metaverse, may become a daily part of our lives thanks to Facebook (renamed Meta) and other big tech companies. In this episode of Imaginary Worlds, host Eric Molinsky explores whether it’s a good idea to use a satirical cyberpunk novel from decades ago as a blueprint for the future.You can hear more episodes of Imaginary Worlds at https://www.imaginaryworldspodcast.org
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Pushkin |
| 0:11.0 | Those of you who know your memes, |
| 0:13.0 | may recall the what about the science fiction author |
| 0:16.0 | who writes a cautionary tale about something called |
| 0:19.0 | the torment nexus. |
| 0:21.0 | Only to have a tech company finding only inspiration in that tale, |
| 0:25.0 | and announcing that long last we have created the torment nexus |
| 0:29.0 | from the classic sci-fi novel don't create the torment nexus. |
| 0:33.0 | We won't be creating the torment nexus this week, |
| 0:36.0 | but we will be exploring the metaverse. |
| 0:38.0 | Corsary tales will return soon, |
| 0:40.0 | but this week I couldn't be prouder to hand the microphone |
| 0:44.0 | to Eric Mellinsky. |
| 0:45.0 | Eric is the host of Imaginary Worlds, |
| 0:47.0 | a wonderful podcast about the Imaginary Worlds we create in our art, |
| 0:51.0 | why we dispend our disbelief in them, |
| 0:53.0 | and what they can teach us about ourselves. |
| 0:56.0 | If you don't subscribe, please do. |
| 0:59.0 | I am a loyal listener, and I love the Imaginary Worlds podcast. |
| 1:02.0 | In the episode you're about to hear, |
| 1:04.0 | Eric tries to figure out what happens when one of the funniest, |
| 1:08.0 | freshest pieces of 1990's science fiction, |
... |
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