[FRIAM] The case for universal basic income UBI

[Steve Smith]

I also consumed DA on tape/CD and appreciated the reader as well, but a
decade after it was written.   I read it (on paper) when it came out,
mostly following up his Snow Crash which I did not discover until just
as Diamond Age came out.   I was previously introduced to him via his
eco-thriller Zodiac (the first of the genre for me) not long before
that.   His work since then has been epic and in some ways amazing but I
don't feel it really matches those early works...   I believe he
followed on Cormac McCarthy's heels as SFI's "writer in residence" but
apparently has not really been "in residence" in the usual sense? 

Regarding DaveW's implication/assertion about the story providing a good
post-abundance image to consider I heartily agree.   I was also moved
(re Jon's comment) by the way the human-in-the loop 'ractor
(under-employed actor working inter-actives in a gig economy) bonded
with her "client" in a completely anonymous context.  Stephenson did
some amazing forecasting of many of the implications of ubiquitous
networking.   His nanotech prophecies are still a few decades away I
suspect but he is such a master of 'casting utopian/dystopian tensions
that I *want* to believe much of what he put out there for us.
> I remember listening to "Diamond Age" as a book on tape while driving up the
> California 1, it was 10 or 12 tapes and the woman who read it did an amazing
> job. What a wonderful book. There have been a few books in my life that I
> feel have found me like the illustrated primer found Nell, a book that
> connects with you before it advises you to start running and not look back.
>
>
>
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