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"I think we're still on that topic, still trying to figure out what computers are, how they change us, why we use them."
- Neal Stephenson
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| Universal Card | ||
| A device that mimics every credit card and identification card you possess. |
In the world of Hyperion, hundreds of worlds are open via farcaster portals - a means of instantaneous transportation between worlds. There is no need to make sense of the financial systems in place in these worlds; they all accept the Universal Card.
Note: Be sure to see the Science Fiction in the News item about the Chameleon Card.
| If our society ever opted for Orwell's Big Brother approach, the instrument of choice for oppression would have to be the credit wake. In a totally noncash economy with only a vestigial barter black market, a person's activities could be tracked in real time by monitoring the credit wake of his or her universal card. There were strict laws protecting card privacy but laws had a bad habit of being ignored or abrogated when societal push came to totalitarian shove. |
| Technovelgy from Hyperion,
by Dan Simmons. Published by Doubleday in 1989 Additional resources -
|
In this society, there is almost no off-the-books cash or barter; every transaction is recorded. Surely, this is VISA taken to the logical extreme - and thanks to farcaster technology, it really is everywhere you want to be.
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Universal Card-related
news articles:
- Chameleon Card: Simmons' Universal Credit Card?
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'He came to as the ship went into free flight, arching in a high parabola over the plains...'
'The peculiar quality of this light, which gave it its great preeminence over all other penetrating rays...'
'The overworked leg motor would have to cool down before he could work on it...'
‘Where to, sport?’ the starter at cab relay asked.
This is nothing new for science fiction fans!
'Their only check on the growth and development of Vulcan 3 lay in two clues: the amount of rock thrown up to the surface... and the amount of the raw materials and tools and parts which the computer requested.'
'I guess there's nobody round this table who doesn't have a Crosswell [tapeworm] working for him in the small intestine.'
