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An Aura of Familiarity: Visions from the Coming Age of Networked Matter
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In 2013, our Technology Horizons Program commissioned six leading science fiction writers—Cory Doctorow (@doctorow), Rudy Rucker (@rudytheelder), Warren Ellis (@warrenellis), Madeline Ashby (@MadelineAshby), Ramez Naam (@ramez), and Bruce Sterling (@bruces)—and artist Daniel Martin Diaz to create short stories tied to our research on the coming Age of Networked Matter (#networkedmatter). We asked our collaborators to envision a world where humans have unprecedented control of matter at all scales, and to share with us a glimpse of daily life in that world. It was a process meant to make the future tangible.
In 2013, our Technology Horizons Program commissioned six leading science fiction writers—Cory Doctorow (@doctorow), Rudy Rucker (@rudytheelder), Warren Ellis (@warrenellis), Madeline Ashby (@MadelineAshby), Ramez Naam (@ramez), and Bruce Sterling (@bruces)—and artist Daniel Martin Diaz to create short stories tied to our research on the coming Age of Networked Matter (#networkedmatter). We asked our collaborators to envision a world where humans have unprecedented control of matter at all scales, and to share with us a glimpse of daily life in that world. It was a process meant to make the future tangible.
122 pages, ebook
First published August 1, 2013
About the author
Institute for the Future
4 books1 followerThe Institute for the Future (IFTF) is a Palo Alto, California, US–based not-for-profit think tank. It was established, in 1968, as a spin-off from the RAND Corporation to help organizations plan for the long-term future, a subject known as futures studies.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
August 10, 2013
I hadn't heard of the Institute for the Future until I found out about the short anthology they put out recently, called An Aura of Familiarity: Visions from the Coming Age of Networked Matter. The point of it is to explore, in science fiction, the possibilities of a human future that is even more hyper-connected than it is today. I'm delighted by the idea of such an institute existing at all, and the fact that they are calling on creative types to offer their perspectives.
This is a lovely-looking book, even in digital format; the pictures throughout, contributed by Daniel Martin Diaz, are fascinating - I'd love prints of them.
Rudy Rucker starts the anthology with "Apricot Lane." In this version of the networked future, every single item you buy has the ability to speak to your brain - and not just to advertise themselves, but telling you anything they feel like. Not only does this vision of connecting suggest hyperconnection with your belongings (and others'), but the lack of privacy suggested is also staggering. It's a clever concept, and a horrendous one; I didn't love the narrative itself though.
"Lich House," by Warren Ellis, is horrifying in a different way: here, someone has managed to get into a house that ought to be impregnable, and attack the occupant. The 'getting in' has involved essentially killing the house, and most of the narrative is actually taken up with the dying of the house, in rather gruesome detail. So, it's a clever idea - and again a clever vision of connection - but don't read it for the narrative; it's a vignette not a story.
Ramez Naam's "Water" focuses particularly on the commodification of water, although other consumables are also networked and able to advertise directly to your brain (you can turn the ads off, but that costs a lot more). The opening of the story is, again, horrifying - showing how someone might massage the ads you receive to their benefit (this is of course not so far removed from your internet experience today). But the majority of the story is actually about how this networking might be manipulated for economic gain. This is the most interesting story of the first half of the anthology.
Madeline Ashby, the only woman in the anthology, contributes "Social Services" - and, again, showing a theme, this is an intensely creepy story. The networked matter is important to the story but not vital. The point, instead, is in how people manipulate one another and the consequences of that.
"From Beyond the Coming Age of Networked Matter," by Bruce Sterling - one of the early lights of cyberpunk - takes the idea of networking matter to an extreme and vaguely Lovecraftian end. Disappointingly, it's the least interesting story.
The final story is from Cory Doctorow. "By His Things will You Know Him" just pips "Water" as my favourite. It's a close, deliberately claustrophobic story: a man whose estranged father, a hoarder, has recently died - and he has to deal with his effects. The funeral director introduces him to a new programme that will catalogue everything using clever new intelligent devices. Doctorow cleverly entwines the story of grief and the story of obsession; the idea of 'networked matter' is fundamental to the narrative but does not dominate, as in some of the others here. It's a wonderful story that could easily appear in a different setting and still make sense.
This is a lovely-looking book, even in digital format; the pictures throughout, contributed by Daniel Martin Diaz, are fascinating - I'd love prints of them.
Rudy Rucker starts the anthology with "Apricot Lane." In this version of the networked future, every single item you buy has the ability to speak to your brain - and not just to advertise themselves, but telling you anything they feel like. Not only does this vision of connecting suggest hyperconnection with your belongings (and others'), but the lack of privacy suggested is also staggering. It's a clever concept, and a horrendous one; I didn't love the narrative itself though.
"Lich House," by Warren Ellis, is horrifying in a different way: here, someone has managed to get into a house that ought to be impregnable, and attack the occupant. The 'getting in' has involved essentially killing the house, and most of the narrative is actually taken up with the dying of the house, in rather gruesome detail. So, it's a clever idea - and again a clever vision of connection - but don't read it for the narrative; it's a vignette not a story.
Ramez Naam's "Water" focuses particularly on the commodification of water, although other consumables are also networked and able to advertise directly to your brain (you can turn the ads off, but that costs a lot more). The opening of the story is, again, horrifying - showing how someone might massage the ads you receive to their benefit (this is of course not so far removed from your internet experience today). But the majority of the story is actually about how this networking might be manipulated for economic gain. This is the most interesting story of the first half of the anthology.
Madeline Ashby, the only woman in the anthology, contributes "Social Services" - and, again, showing a theme, this is an intensely creepy story. The networked matter is important to the story but not vital. The point, instead, is in how people manipulate one another and the consequences of that.
"From Beyond the Coming Age of Networked Matter," by Bruce Sterling - one of the early lights of cyberpunk - takes the idea of networking matter to an extreme and vaguely Lovecraftian end. Disappointingly, it's the least interesting story.
The final story is from Cory Doctorow. "By His Things will You Know Him" just pips "Water" as my favourite. It's a close, deliberately claustrophobic story: a man whose estranged father, a hoarder, has recently died - and he has to deal with his effects. The funeral director introduces him to a new programme that will catalogue everything using clever new intelligent devices. Doctorow cleverly entwines the story of grief and the story of obsession; the idea of 'networked matter' is fundamental to the narrative but does not dominate, as in some of the others here. It's a wonderful story that could easily appear in a different setting and still make sense.
April 6, 2014
Absolutely a horror story. A future social worker, among her many house calls to check up on abused and at-risk children, is sent out to a creepy house in an abandoned luxury development. What she encounters there may be far beyond what her training has prepared her for. Don't read this if you're planning on going into social work!
Merged review:
A vison of a near future where advertising is beamed straight into our brains (unless, of course, you're in the lucky 1% who can afford the ad-free software), and the stock market is controlled by AIs. A plot to take down the stock of one company allows a competitor to grab the opportunity. It was OK, but I didn't really feel that the ideas were new, and the story felt a bit shoehorned-in, in service to the concept.
Merged review:
A vison of a near future where advertising is beamed straight into our brains (unless, of course, you're in the lucky 1% who can afford the ad-free software), and the stock market is controlled by AIs. A plot to take down the stock of one company allows a competitor to grab the opportunity. It was OK, but I didn't really feel that the ideas were new, and the story felt a bit shoehorned-in, in service to the concept.
May 23, 2018
A potential dystopian future of IoT.
A great short story by one of my favorite authors. Very much like an episode of Black Mirror.
A great short story by one of my favorite authors. Very much like an episode of Black Mirror.
January 19, 2019
Excellent short story offering a chilling vision of the future where every product and every object is smart and can connect directly with people's brains.
December 6, 2016
A future not so far. A subversive woman. A story of vengenace.
You can call it as you wish, I have a simple adjective for this short story: perfect.
Ok, I'm not an expert of sci-fi novels (although -after I had this juicy sample- I'm surely going to read all Naam's novels, and maybe some more), but this one had something that caught my interest from the very beginning. Maybe its dystopian element, not so far from what we already experience.
What if media had more influence in our daily life? Even more then they already have? If some person could influence you in everyday choises, even personal ones, without let you know? It's so creepy and too damn probable.
You can call it as you wish, I have a simple adjective for this short story: perfect.
Ok, I'm not an expert of sci-fi novels (although -after I had this juicy sample- I'm surely going to read all Naam's novels, and maybe some more), but this one had something that caught my interest from the very beginning. Maybe its dystopian element, not so far from what we already experience.
What if media had more influence in our daily life? Even more then they already have? If some person could influence you in everyday choises, even personal ones, without let you know? It's so creepy and too damn probable.
August 2, 2016
This got good towards the end as Sterling explored the Lovecraftian elements, but all the name-checking of tech culture makes the story read a little adolescent.
Merged review:
A neat idea for a short story, but the reason that events are happening and the characters they're happening too are so vague that it's hard to feel this is anything more than a curio in Ellis' extensive bibliography.
Merged review:
A neat idea for a short story, but the reason that events are happening and the characters they're happening too are so vague that it's hard to feel this is anything more than a curio in Ellis' extensive bibliography.
March 7, 2019
Nice little collection. Sterling's Lovecraft pastiche was my favorite, because I'm a total sucker for technobabble like "they were particle-animated down to Wolfram cellular computrons". Ellis' was a close second runner-up. The capitalism-is-evil stories were a bit meh. Anyway, for the price (free) you just can't go wrong.
June 7, 2014
What starts as a scene from Cryptonomicon quickly devolves into a Lovecraftian trip infused with the spirit of Gibson. Also bees.
Merged review:
A rumination on the failure modes of networked systems, and how things may die in the future, framed as a short crime tale.
Merged review:
A rumination on the failure modes of networked systems, and how things may die in the future, framed as a short crime tale.
August 7, 2013
great short story about ad-supported implants. great ideas
November 4, 2015
A bit too creepy for me.
Merged review:
Read title story.
Merged review:
Read title story.
December 18, 2016
Creepy story with some great concepts about the near future, but not fleshed out enough to really grab me. Should have been a bit longer to draw out the suspense.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews