![]() ![]() In the same year Steven Lisberger’s Tron explored Computer space as a new spatial dimension, imagining what lied “beyond the screen”. Ridley Scotts Blade Runner was released in 1982 and set the tone for a dark and gritty Cyberpunk future where the line between real and artificial was blurred. The hopeful utopias of the 60s and 70s, where technology had propelled societies beyond basic needs, were replaced by dystopias, based on a deep-rooted cynicism against technology and capitalism. Meanwhile, science fiction expanded from outward-looking space operas ( Star Trek, Space: 1999, Buck Rogers, Battlestar Galactica and others) to explore inward-looking, earth-bound futures narratives. The wave of love and flower power came, broke, and vanished and was replaced by a darker and angrier culture of punk, rap +hip hop and early electronic / Techno. Instead, it became clear that the current technological progress was polluting cities and the environment. We went to the moon but didn’t colonize it. We had nuclear power but didn’t drive nuclear powered flying cars. Computers became affordable but our homes didn’t evolve into Jetsons-like computer-aided boredom. ![]() The 1980s were a reality-check for the technology-utopia-optimism of the sixties and seventies. ![]()
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