The term cyberspace first came to prominence when it appeared in Neuromancer, a 1984 novel by science fic-tion writer William Gibson. The word is a combination of “cyber” (meaning related to computers) and “space.” As another SF writer, Bruce Sterling, wrote in The Hacker Crackdown (1993), cyberspace is “the place between the phones. The indefinite place out there, where the two of you, human beings, actually meet and communicate.”
While the elite telegraphers of the 19th century and later telephone users first experienced the sense of disem-bodied electronic communication, it took the development of widespread computer terminals, personal computers, and connecting networks to create a sense of an ongoing place in which people meet and interact. The first “vil-lages” in cyberspace came into being during the 1970s as research networks (ARPA), and the Usenet newsgroups of UNIX users began to carry messages and news post-ings. During the 1980s, many more settlements began to light up the map of cyberspace, ranging from cities (large online services such as The Source, BIX, and CompuServe) to thousands of villages (tiny bulletin board systems run-ning on personal computers). (See online services and bulletin board systems.)
Wherever human beings build communities, they shape culture. The cyber culture that grew up in cyberspace has featured many diverse strands. Hackers (not originally a pejorative term) had their distinctive hangouts and lingo. Bulletin board cultures varied from the hacker hardcore to user groups that tried to assist beginners. On the nascent Internet multiplayer game worlds called MUDs (Multi-User Dungeons) and Muses used words to create richly detailed fantasy cyberspaces. Together with chat rooms and con-ferencing systems, they fostered virtual communities that, like physical communities, express a full range of human behavior (see blogs and blogging, conferencing sys-tems, chat, social networking, texting and instant messaging, and virtual community).
While cyber culture shares the characteristics of other human cultures, it also has unique characteristics that are dictated by the nature of the online, virtual medium. Since the online user reveals only what he or she chooses to reveal, identities can be fluid: playful or deceptive. While people are not physically vulnerable in cyberspace, they are certainly emotionally vulnerable. (Virtual eroticism, or “cyber sex” has even led to virtual rapes.) The issue of pro-tecting privacy becomes important because sensitive per-sonal information is constantly being exposed in order to carry on commerce (see identity in the online world and privacy in the digital age.)
The Future of Cyberspace
By the end of the 1990s, the face of cyberspace was no longer that of text screens but that of the World Wide Web with its graphical pages. Multiplayer games now often fea-ture graphics and even real-time voice communication is possible. With ubiquitous digital cameras, the boundary between cyberspace and physical space has become fluid, with people able to enter into each other’s physical envi-ronments in realistic ways. Meanwhile, the development of virtual reality techniques has made computer-generated worlds much more vivid and realistic (see virtual real-ity). As more people are linked continually to the network by broadband and wireless connections, cyberspace may eventually disappear as a separate reality, having merged with physical space.
While the elite telegraphers of the 19th century and later telephone users first experienced the sense of disem-bodied electronic communication, it took the development of widespread computer terminals, personal computers, and connecting networks to create a sense of an ongoing place in which people meet and interact. The first “vil-lages” in cyberspace came into being during the 1970s as research networks (ARPA), and the Usenet newsgroups of UNIX users began to carry messages and news post-ings. During the 1980s, many more settlements began to light up the map of cyberspace, ranging from cities (large online services such as The Source, BIX, and CompuServe) to thousands of villages (tiny bulletin board systems run-ning on personal computers). (See online services and bulletin board systems.)
Wherever human beings build communities, they shape culture. The cyber culture that grew up in cyberspace has featured many diverse strands. Hackers (not originally a pejorative term) had their distinctive hangouts and lingo. Bulletin board cultures varied from the hacker hardcore to user groups that tried to assist beginners. On the nascent Internet multiplayer game worlds called MUDs (Multi-User Dungeons) and Muses used words to create richly detailed fantasy cyberspaces. Together with chat rooms and con-ferencing systems, they fostered virtual communities that, like physical communities, express a full range of human behavior (see blogs and blogging, conferencing sys-tems, chat, social networking, texting and instant messaging, and virtual community).
While cyber culture shares the characteristics of other human cultures, it also has unique characteristics that are dictated by the nature of the online, virtual medium. Since the online user reveals only what he or she chooses to reveal, identities can be fluid: playful or deceptive. While people are not physically vulnerable in cyberspace, they are certainly emotionally vulnerable. (Virtual eroticism, or “cyber sex” has even led to virtual rapes.) The issue of pro-tecting privacy becomes important because sensitive per-sonal information is constantly being exposed in order to carry on commerce (see identity in the online world and privacy in the digital age.)
The Future of Cyberspace
By the end of the 1990s, the face of cyberspace was no longer that of text screens but that of the World Wide Web with its graphical pages. Multiplayer games now often fea-ture graphics and even real-time voice communication is possible. With ubiquitous digital cameras, the boundary between cyberspace and physical space has become fluid, with people able to enter into each other’s physical envi-ronments in realistic ways. Meanwhile, the development of virtual reality techniques has made computer-generated worlds much more vivid and realistic (see virtual real-ity). As more people are linked continually to the network by broadband and wireless connections, cyberspace may eventually disappear as a separate reality, having merged with physical space.
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