Cyberpunk Tech 9: Cyberarm

You got to watch this amazing movie! He can pick up a screw with this arm! It has enough feedback for the user to drink from a glass bottle without breaking it.

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Via bookofjoe

Older news showing todays technological advances as predicted by the Cyberpunk Writers:

Snitch-Chip today its for pupils, tomorrow for the wage-slave

The ARCH Blog informs us about a projekt in a british secondary school where pupils have RFID chips in their uniform that transmits rather sensitive data:

The chip connects with teachers’ computers to show a photograph of the pupil, data about academic performance and whether he or she is in the correct classroom.

Well, next time you start your Cyberpunk 2020 game with the PCs flipping burgers somewhere, you know how to make them rebel… why wouldn’t they be chipped, too?

“Mr. Anderson, we noticed that your average toilet time is 0.4% higher then the average for male employees. This reduces your productivity and costs the company a lot of money. See to it that you come to terms with this problem!”

Its stunning what you would be able to learn about the person chipped.

With this amount of spying, its easy to rationalise why someone would feel punk enough to grab a gun and become an outlaw…

Handprothese mit Gefühl

Auf dem Weg zum Cyberarm macht die Wissenschaft Fortschritte. Wie Spiegel Online meldet, können jetzt zwei Menschen mit der Handprothese etwas fühlen:

US-Forscher haben bei Mitchell und einem 54-jährigen die Nerven so umoperiert, dass die Empfindungen der verlorenen Hände auf der Brusthaut spürbar wurden.

Dafür lass ich mir die Hand noch nicht abhacken – ich warte mindestens bis die Cyberfinger einzeln erhältlich sind…

Cyberware: iSpy

Im Blutschwerter-Forum fand ich diese fantastische Idee, um den zunehmenden Überwachungswahn in einem Dark-Future Rollenspiel wie Cyberpunk 2020 vernünftig unterbringen zu können. Raben-AAS hat auch sonst eine große Leistung mit der Aktualisierung der Spielwelt erbracht, die man in dem Thread nachlesen kann.

*iSpy: Das Keé ist ein extrem populärer, aus dem Alltag kaum wegzudenkender Gegenstand der Unterhaltungselektronik. Es handelt sich dabei um eine Art Verbindung aus Cyclops Display (vor dem Auge getragener, durchsichtiger Flüssigkristall-Bildschirm, in den Infos eingeblendet werden), V-Connect (Anschlusstelle für ggf. unter der Haut implantierter Interface-Systeme), Handy und MP3-Player (mit Earset). Keés sind stylish, in verschiedenen Designs erhältlich und trotz ihrer immensen technischen Leistungen absolut bezahlbar (oder kostenlos), da sie von den Unternehmen gesponsored werden. Continue reading “Cyberware: iSpy”

Cyberpunk Tech 8

The MIT developed an exosceleton that attaches to your legs and helps you carry an backpack. More here. (Via boing-boing)

The Humble Smartlink Revisited

The Humble Smartlink Revisited

[This article deals with the benefits and problems of directly plugging a gun into your nervous system – what probably every cyberpunk PC everywhere does all the time.]

Author: Chris Lupton.
Taken without permission from his site at (now dead). It pains me to violate his copyright, but the article is just to good to let it be forgotten. I’m sorry Chris and hope you approve what I do here.

The History of and Information about Smartguns

Origins
Operation
Advanced Systems

Origins

The first smartgun systems were developed independently by the US and German militaries in the 1990s. By 2001, smartguns had been adopted by several corporations and were beginning to appear on the street. The US military created the Milspec Smartgun Standard (MSS1) in 2003, after disastrous compatibility problems amongst the smartguns used in central America caused embarrassing problems and several fatalities. Today, almost every smartsystem in the world conforms to this standard. To ignore it means ignoring the large profits to be made selling smartlinks to the US military. In 2013 an improved standard (MSS2) was released, though it has yet to be universally adopted. The army considered it too expensive for its benefits and has yet to make compliance a requirement in weapons trials.The MSS1 standard was essentially very simple. It defined the data protocol between the smartgun and the neuralware smartlink, in terms of required and optional information/functions. This meant that one smartgun link mounted in a neuralware processor or smartgoggles could interpret the data from any smartlinked weapon. Continue reading “The Humble Smartlink Revisited”

Cyberpunk Tech 7

human brain / computer interfaceIn my little series of Cybepunk tech allready available today: The brain-computer interface. The very core of every cyberpunk book – the ability to plug yourself into the matrix.

Well, today you can use it to surf Second Life. Second life is NOT the virtual reality I imagined reading Neuromancer, but some like it there:

All a user has to do to control his/her avatar is imagine performing various movements. The activity monitored by the headpiece is read and plotted by an electroencephalogram, which relays it to a computer running a brain wave analysis algorithm that interprets the imagined movements. A keyboard emulator then translates the data into signals which can be used to control the movements of the user’s on-screen avatar in real-time.

As usual, boing-boing has the details (including a link to a video)

Genetic Hallmark for Cyberpunk 2020

This is the tech Deckert used in Bladerunner to identify the snake…

Hallmark (10,000eb and up)

Also from SLA Industires, Hallmarks are incorporated into a subject’s gene structure and manifest as distinctive tattoos, birthmarks, logos, or other markings on the skin. They are functionally identical to a DNA tattoo, but Hallmarks manifest on the subject’s descendants, rather than on the subject himself. Implanting Hallmarks is an extremely difficult and expensive process (30+, requiring Expert: Genetics to even attempt it). Hallmarks are used to indicate lineage (in the case of genetically optimized corporate families) or place of manufacture (for bioengineered animals). HC=1D6/2, SC=MA.

DNA Tattoos for Cyberpunk 2020

DNA Tattoos (1000eb and up)

From SLA Industries, the DNA tattoo is a design which has been permanently incorporated into the body’s skin structure. Like a normal tattoo, it becomes a permanent feature of the skin; unlike a normal tattoo, it will regrow if damaged. Extensive or major wounds which cause heavy scarring will distort the tattoos, but simple cuts, scrapes, or burns will not affect the design. Plastic surgery may be able to repair serious damage with a Difficult Med Tech roll. These tattoos require genetic modification and, like Exotic Skinchanges, have a small chance of causing skin cancer (5%). HC=2, SC=M.