I was enjoying a fabulous read, Neal Stephenson’s novel Snow Crash. The book was written back in 1992, but it emphasized virtual reality and collaboration in a way that sounds modern still now.
What was fun (and made me write this spoiling post), is that it is easy to spot MySQL usage patterns in science fiction:
- Metaverse – the virtual reality internet, has its counterparts already in our current non-fictional world. “Second Life” is a nice [MySQL powered] platform for virtual life and creativity, and it is now in state of early Metaverse evolution.
- Central Intelligence Corporation (created after the merger of Library of Congress and CIA, as they were duplicating each other anyway) operates huge resources of user-provided content, like Flickr, YouTube or Wikipedia [MySQL powered again]. Though it had somewhat better interfaces and APIs, I guess that is what Web 5.0 is about ;-)
I really liked the idea how asynchronous replication and lack of locking effects virtual reality worlds – even these effects were taken into account by the author. Add neurolinguistics, civilization history, brilliant satire, and you really get the best geek fiction. Thumbs up for the book. The Diamond Age seems to be the next read.
domas mituzas 