CY8ERPUNKS

Prior art · ZINE

Zines & magazines

Era 0 · 1948–1974

Ground

cybernetics meets the counterculture

  1. 1974

    Semiotext(e) founded

    (Sylvère Lotringer, Columbia). Imports French theory (Baudrillard, Deleuze, Foucault) into the American avant-garde. Later publishes Semiotext(e) SF (1989).

  2. c. 1974

    Métal Hurlant

    Launched (Dec 1974 per Wikipedia; Jan 1975 as a Les Humanoïdes Associés title). The visual imagination of the genre is French, not American. US edition: Heavy Metal (1977).

Era 1 · 1975–1982

Proto-cyberpunk

the term exists before the label

  1. 1977

    V. Vale, Search & Destroy

    (punk zine, SF, 1977–79). Precursor to (1980 onward).

  2. 1978

    Omni magazine launches

    (Oct 1978; Kathy Keeton and Bob Guccione, Penthouse). Glossy, futurist, science + SF + pseudoscience side by side. Published Gibson's "Johnny Mnemonic" (1981) and "Burning Chrome" (1982). Also an early H.R. Giger showcase. Omni is what "a forward-facing tech magazine" looked like in 1978 — study it closely.

  3. 1979

    Church of the SubGenius founded

    (Ivan Stang, Philo Drummond, Dr. X; first pamphlet Dallas 1979). Parody religion as collage-art pranksterism, "Bob" Dobbs, Direct ancestor of the 80s zine aesthetic and of Wired's weirder register. Also: Book of the SubGenius (1983).

  4. 1980

    RE/Search

    Begins publication (V. Vale, Andrea Juno).

  5. 1981

    Processed World

    Situationist anti-work zine about office technology and the "temp" economy. The labor critique of the cyber future.

  6. 1982

    Interzone

    (UK SF magazine, 1982–) — where the British wing of the genre published.

  7. 1982

    Factsheet Five

    Launched (1982, Mike Gunderloy) — the zine-review network. The discovery layer of the pre-web underground.

Era 2 · 1983–1986

The term & the wave

  1. 1983

    Bruce Sterling starts Cheap Truth

    (1983–1986, 18 one-page issues, written as ). Un-copyrighted, explicitly encourages "xerox pirates" to circulate it. This is the single best model for a CY8ERPUNKS zine — cheap, viral, deliberately uncopyrighted, pure polemic. (Source: Wikipedia / Tachyon Publications.)

  2. 1983

    RE/Search #6/7: Industrial Culture Handbook

    (V. Vale & Andrea Juno). Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire, SPK, Mark Pauline/Survival Research Labs, Monte Cazazza. The body-horror + machine aesthetic. Wildly influential on the visual register.

  3. 1984

    High Frontiers

    Launched (R.U. Sirius / Ken Goffman, co-editor Morgan Russell). Psychedelics + science + human potential. Becomes ** (1988), then Mondo 2000 (1989).

  4. 1984

    Emigre

    Magazine launched (Rudy VanderLans, Zuzana Licko; Berkeley, 1984–2005). Licko built fonts on the new Macintosh; the magazine is the visual record of the desktop-publishing revolution. Held in MoMA's collection. Essential for CY8ERPUNKS' type and layout decisions.

  5. 1985

    The WELL founded

    (April 1985, Stewart Brand & Larry Brilliant, Sausalito). Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link. — literate, argumentative, countercultural, community-owned-adjacent. Its whole culture descends from the Whole Earth Catalog.

  6. 1985

    Hakim Bey (Peter Lamborn Wilson) writes the T.A.Z. essays

    (written 1981–1988; published as T.A.Z.: The Temporary Autonomous Zone in 1991, Autonomedia). — enclaves outside state control, and the idea that the internet is one. Essential for the political theory of CY8ERPUNKS.

  7. 1986

    Omni e-magazine on CompuServe

    (1986) — an early magazine-goes-online move worth citing for CY8ERPUNKS' own channel strategy.

Era 3 · 1987–1991

Cyberculture & cryptography

  1. 1988

    Extropy: The Journal of Transhumanist Thought

    First published (Max More, Tom Morrow). — dynamic optimism, self-transformation, uploaded minds, indefinite lifespans. The right-libertarian transhumanist line that later feeds LessWrong/rationalism and much of the current AI-accelerationist scene. CY8ERPUNKS needs a position on this.

  2. 1989

    Mondo 2000

    Name adopted (from Reality Hackers; ran 1989–1998, Berkeley). Editors R.U. Sirius and (Alison Bailey Kennedy); Jude Milhon (St. Jude) as editor; art director Bart Nagel — a pioneer of Photoshop collage, gave the magazine its surrealist look. The definitive cyberculture magazine and the direct predecessor of Wired. Covered VR, smart drugs, cyberpunk, body modification, nanotech — anarchic, satirical, utopian and paranoid at once. (Sources: Wired retrospective, Wikipedia, anarchivism.org, rip.so.)

Era 4 · 1992–1996

Cypherpunks, Wired, the Declaration

  1. 1993

    Wired 1.01, January 1993

    Founded by ; early backing from Charlie Jackson and Nicholas Negroponte (MIT Media Lab, who wrote the back-page column for six years). Cover: Bruce Sterling. First issue covered military simulations, Japanese otaku (Karl Taro Greenfeld), and listed contributors' email addresses. Distributed free at CES 1993. (Sources: Wired's own oral history, Wikipedia.)

  2. 1993

    Time cover story on cyberpunk

    Design by Mondo 2000's (per Wired's retrospective). Cyberculture goes mainstream in a single year.

  3. 1993

    CTheory

    Begins (1993, Arthur & Marilouise Kroker, online journal). Theory goes online-native.

  4. 1994

    HotWired

    (1994) — the magazine becomes a website; its sub-zine ** (1995) is one of the first great web-native voices.