True Names
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| Author | Vernor Vinge |
|---|---|
| Country | USA |
| Language | English |
| Series | Binary Star #5, ed. James R. Frenkel |
| Genre |
Science Fiction Cyberpunk |
| Published | 1981 (Dell Publishing) |
| Media type | Novella |
| ISBN | |
True Names is a 1981 science fiction novella by Vernor Vinge, considered a seminal work of the cyberpunk genre. It is one of the earliest stories to present a fully fleshed-out concept of cyberspace, which would later be central to cyberpunk. The story also contains elements of transhumanism, anarchism, and even hints about The Singularity.
True Names first brought Vinge to prominence as a science fiction writer. It also inspired many real-life hackers and computer scientists; a 2001 book about the novella, True Names: And the Opening of the Cyberspace Frontier, included essays by Danny Hillis, Marvin Minsky, Mark Pesce, Richard Stallman and others. It was awarded the Prometheus Hall of Fame Award in 2007.
The story follows the progress of a group of computer hackers (called "warlocks" in the story) who are early adopters of a new full-immersion virtual reality technology, called the "Other Plane". Warlocks penetrate computers around the world for personal profit or curiosity. Forming a cabal, they must keep their true identities—their "True Names"—secret even to each other and to the "Great Adversary", the United States government, as those who know a warlock's True Name can force him to work on their behalf, or even cause a "True Death" by killing the warlock in real life.
The protagonist is a warlock known as "Mr. Slippery" in the Other Plane. The government learns Mr. Slippery's True Name—Roger Pollack, a holonovelist in Arcata, California—and forces him to investigate the Mailman, a mysterious new warlock which it suspects of conducting a large-scale subversion of databases and networks. The Mailman has been recruiting others, such as the warlock DON.MAC, by promising great power in the real world, and claims to be responsible for a recent revolution in Venezuela. Because he never appears in the Other Plane, preferring non real-time communication, Mr. Slippery and fellow warlock Erythrina begin to suspect that the Mailman may be an extraterrestrial invader, subverting global databases to gradually conquer the Earth while causing True Deaths of the warlocks he recruits.
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Wikipedia