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"The point sticks in your head: physics rules. Virtue does not triumph unless the physics allows it."
- Larry Niven
 |
| Microterm | ||
| A very small computer system. |
Probably a contraction of micro (or microcomputer) and terminal.
| "Now kids," he said quietly, "it's time for some serious fun." He whipped out his microterm. "School's off!"
I still drop a bit when I see that microterm--Geez, it's a beauty! It's a Zeilemann Nova 300, but we've spent so much time reworking it, it's practically custom from the motherboard up. Hi-baud, rammed, rammed, ported, with the wafer display folds down to about the size of a vid casette; I'd give an ear to have one like it. We'd used Georgie's old man's chipburner to tuck some special tricks in ROM and there wasn't a system in CityNet it couldn't talk to... Rayno folded up the microterm and tucked it back inside his jumper. |
| Technovelgy from Cyberpunk!,
by Bruce Bethke. Published by Amazing Stories in 1983 Additional resources -
|
The forward march of technology doesn't stop, not even in a short story:
I dropped a bit! Then I ballsed up enough to touch it. I flipped up the wafer display, ran my fingers over the touch pads, and I just wanted it so bad! "It's smart," Martin said. "Rammed, rammed, and ported."
Rayno was looking at the specs with that cold look in his eye. "My 300 is still faster," he said.
"It should be," Martin said. "You customized it half to death. But the 600 is nearly as fast, and it's stock, and it lists for $1400..."
Compare to the pocket phone from Assignment in Eternity (1953) by Robert Heinlein, the joymaker from The Age of the Pussyfoot (1966) by Frederik Pohl. the Newspad from 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) by Arthur C. Clarke and the briefcase console from Oath of Fealty (1981) by Pournelle and Niven.
"Say, I just got something in the other day, I bet you'd be really interested in." He took me over to the display case, pulled it out, and set it on the counter. "The latest word in microterms. The Zeilemann Starfire 600."
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Additional
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More Ideas
and Technology from Cyberpunk!
More Ideas
and Technology by Bruce Bethke
Tech news articles related to Cyberpunk!
Tech news articles related to works by Bruce Bethke
Microterm-related
news articles:
- Jetson Orin Nano Super 70 Just $249
| Is Agentic AI The Wrong Kind Of Smartness? |
| Jetson Orin Nano Super 70 Just $249 |
| Automatic Bot Traffic Is 38 Percent Of HTTP Requests |
| Neuroplatform Human Brain Organoid Bioprocessor Uses Less Electricity |
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'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.'
'Figments of his mind in one sense, of course, for he had shaped them...'
