Internet Apocalypse

One of the most famous and celebrated sci-fi authors celebrates his 80th birthday this week! Well, unfortunately, he is dead already, he died in 1982. However Mr. Philip K Dick was responsible for a massive body of science fiction that has permeated society in the form of classic novels that will live on for the rest of time, which in turn gave rise to some of the best movies ever to be made.Everyone knows the book "Do androids dream of electric sheep?" which inspired the film by Ridley Scott "Blade Runner". This is, by the way, one of my favourite films of all time. This film was released just a few months after his death. I think it is a tragedy that he never got to see it before he died.But what about the author himself? Well to be honest, until I had started to research this post, I knew little about him. Unfortunately for the budding writer in me, it seems that Philip K Dick joins the long list of visionary masters that I aspire to who suffered from serious mental health problems and heavy drug use. Dick claimed that he wrote many of his works while high on amphetamines and LSD and later on in his life suffered from what sounds to me like paranoid schizophrenia. He would be plagued with flashes of visions into ancient Rome and as these got longer and more intense, Dick decided that this could well me a past life or that perhaps he was leading two lives at the same time. Interestingly, he also had a recurring dream that he was looking for a story entitled "The Empire Never Ended" in a magazine. He convinced himself that if he ever found the magazine in his dream that it might send him mad.

In tribute to Phillip K Dick, I've pulled my finger out and made a start on "The

 Man In The High Castle", one of his most celebrated works that I, for some reason, have never gotten round to reading I'll no doubt post about it here once I've finished it.

To find out more about Philip K Dick:

BoingBoing.net have a radio tribute to him archived on this page
The Philip K Dick tribute blog (amazing name) Total Dickhead

Films

I've listed the films of his that i really enjoyed in no particular order. I guess in the order of most awesome as voted for by me (I'm typing them as they pop into my mind). There are 9 films that I am aware of in total but these four are the ones that I have seen, remembered and enjoyed.

Blade Runner

Directed by Ridley Scott. Film Noir about a dark and not so distant future where a private detective hunts down rogue androids, while questioning his own humanity. "Do androids dream of electric sheep"

A Scanner Darkly

A strange method of filming live action scenes then animating over the top of them was used in this movie. It explores an alternate reality where a small group of friends live with their addiction to the psychoactive drug "Substance D". "A scanner darkly"

Total Recall

Truly, one of the most awesome Arnie movies of all time! This was released in the cinema in 1990 apparently (I thought it was older than that!) This film is about a man who thinks he has paid for memories of adventures to be implanted in into his mind. He quickly begins to discover that he has gotten more than he bargained for. "We can remember it for you wholesale"

Minority Report

Adapted into a blockbuster movie and directed by Stephen Spielberg,

 Minority Report is set in a future where murders are kept to an all time low by a police force that relies on the pre-cognitive abilities of three young psychics. The main protagonist is a cop, accused of a murder he has yet to commit and pursued by the very police force he used to serve. "Minority Report"

Down the darkest alley of mankind’s possible futures, there is no apocalypse, no great war, no invading swarms of hostile alien forces... there is only Capitalism!

Jennifer Government by Max Barry is set in Australia in a future where the corporations finally control the earth. The capitalist USA now controls most of Europe, Australia and half of Asia. The book follows several characters as they live their lives in super-corporate America.

 The main story follows Jennifer Government, a government agent who is investigating a string of killings linked to a new $2000 pair of Nike trainers that have just gone on sale world-wide. At the same time you follow John Nike, a Marketing executive who has arranged the killings of a set of Nike customers in order to raise the profile and street-cred of the new shoes.

The book is non stop action from the word go. It is full of black humour, mostly rising from the super-capitalist world by which the characters are constantly being thwarted and screwed over. There's just the right amount of violence and black comedy to make this one of those books you can't put down. I'd recommend it for anyone who sees themselves as anti capitalist. Fans of Bill Hicks would most likely dig this book too.

Also: There is a free online browser game called Nation States which is inspired by and based in the Jennifer Government world.

Yesterday, the share prices for the Halifax (my building society) fell to an all time low, or something like that. Lloyds TSB bought them out, making them stronger and apparently saving them from the one terrifying event that all banks fear, as depicted so perfectly in Mary Poppins - a Run on the Bank. Which started me thinking... if there was a run on the bank, what fantastic repercussions could we expect? Undoubtedly our society would crumble and descend into anarchy, right? How far could this go?

Week 1: Ground Zero

HBOS - The Halifax and the Bank of Scotland share values drop to an all time low of 51%. Thousands of British shareholders see their share values drop from £10 to £1.85. Shocking. Apart from the odd suicide and a few unhappy savers, nothing too exciting happens. The cogs, however, are well and truly in motion.

Week 2: Run On The Bank

On Tuesday 25th September 2008, due to some misguided financial advice from a friend at her local bridge club, Sixty five Year-Old Emily Higgins walks into her local branch of the Halifax building society in Chichester and asks that they transfer all her savings and pensions to her newly opened HSBC savings account. The young teller, James Woodcock, a fine arts graduate of 25 years, informs her that because of a technical issue with their internet connection, they would be unable to do that until the following week. Having no grasp of modern technology or what the internet even is, Miss Higgins panics and kicks up a fuss, loudly declaring that the building society will not give her access to her funds. Within just a few minutes, already worried account holders begin to demand their money be drawn out of their accounts, either in cash, or wired elsewhere. The clamour turns into panic as the painfully slow customer service of the Building society staff exacerbates the situation. Among the growing rabble of angry customers, Dave Watson - Reporter for the Chichester local newspaper makes the call to his editor that would change life as we know it.

Week 3: Financial Apocalypse

several of the panicking Halifax patrons post tweets online about their ordeal in the Chichester branch. Many more post phone camera footage onto YouTube of the riot that ensued in the branch and the resulting armed police presence sent to quash them. Dave Watson’s story, however, is sold to Meridian television and broadcast across the nation that evening. Thousands of people turn up at the Halifax branches the following morning in dismay and those that can, withdraw or transfer all their savings. The inevitable knock on effect and rioting occurs in every major city in the UK. No Bank is safe as people stupidly horde cash which is rapidly declining in value. Jails overflow and the BBC news website reports scenes of brutal Police crackdowns all over the country. By the end of the week, the economy "crashes". The cities descend into anarchy; riots, protests and looting are rife. The police battle to restore order against the populace, their lines of riot shields reflecting the fires that are raging in the husks of looted electronics stores and supermarkets.

Week 24: The Future

The cities across England are all smouldering husks. The inhabitants of which pick their way through the broken buildings, seeking out food and water to add to their caches. Several gangs have taken refuge in shopping centres and the larger supermarkets, defending their stores of food with fierce and deadly aggression. The police and fire brigade have broken down, unable to cope with the strain. The brave men and women who managed to hold a resistance against the massive tide of looters and rioters have elected to save their own families and flee to more rural areas. Martial law has been declared across the nation and a thin force of British soldiers Police what little is left and enforce curfew. What is left of the emergency medical services use their dwindling supplies to treat the wounded in small makeshift emergency medical HQ's. Dave Watson, reporter for the Chichester Local Newspaper, shivers alone in a dark abandoned flat, his mind crazed through regret and remorse as he sees the outcome of his sensationalist news report.

Week 48: The New Curse

Driven mad through grief, remorse and hunger, Dave Watson - Reporter for the Chichester Local Newspaper- steps barefoot into an abandoned street. His filthy black fingernails scratch at a sore on his back, his gums bleed and his matted hair is thinning through mal-nutrition. He casts his glazed and vacant stare slowly from one end of the street to the other, looking for movement. There is none. No one will go near Dave Watsons street. Dave Watsons street is a cursed and fearful place. 

Matter is the first of Iain Bank’s books I’ve read, not counting the Wasp Factory that I read quite a few years ago. I think he writes his science fiction under a slightly altered pseudo name as his fiction is published under the name Ian Banks. I checked and it IS the same author, but never mind I digress.

Matter is a novel that is part of a group of stories called “The Culture Novels”. They are all set in the same universe, a universe far in advance of present day where mankind has long since colonised new worlds, discovered new technology, abolished money and of course, has come into contact with various species of aliens. “What’s New?” you might ask, “this sounds very familiar, very similar to almost every other sci-fi book I have ever read” and of course, to a small degree, you’d probably be right.

What sets this book apart from your card board cut-out sci-fi is not just how rich the detail of the world is, and it is described perfectly as you journey through the story, really allowing the reader to immerse themselves within it. Sometimes it takes more than just a good descriptive narrative to really bring a reader into the story. So many times I’ve tried to immerse myself in a world that, for all the adjectives its author can throw at me, just does not take my interest. What really brought ‘Matter’ to life for me was the design on the many different civilisations you will come into contact with while reading the story. Banks has created a universe where humans and aliens of various levels of technology, from feudal civilisations that have only just discovered gunpowder weaponry, to The Culture, a highly advanced super race of humans that live their lives completely without consequence, their technology granting them the ability to not only completely control every part of their own physiology, but actually transcend their bodies altogether. The ideas behind the civilisations themselves, the ships they travel in, the worlds they inhabit and the way they communicate with each other, every facet is, at least to me, unique and refreshing. It is so difficult to find a story so truly original in a genre that is so full of copies & clichés as science fiction seems to be. I haven’t been exposed to anything as fresh as this since the DUNE novels.