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Bruce Sterling highlights the Austin Chronicle (http://blog.wired.com/sterling/2008/07/whoa-this-is-so.html) and brings to my attention this graphic

(http://blog.wired.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/07/25/books_feature1.jpg)

from an issue with lots of good stuff to read including cyberpunk (http://www.austinchronicle.com/gyrobase/Issue/story?oid=oid:648402) vs steampunk (http://www.austinchronicle.com/gyrobase/Issue/story?oid=oid:648404).

I really like that graphic, its unfortunate the typeface they chose for Steam Punk though, it seems rather inelegant, which is kinda the point of Steam punk. You know, classy-ing up modernesque technology with Victorian ascetic.

Also I worry that Steam Punk is getting overplayed, whereas Cyberpunk is getting underplayed.

Vs BRITISH
(http://shop.rexfeatures.com/image/Punk-Fashion-London-Britain-1983_495042.jpg)

I think they are all lacking in 'punk'. It's just semantics, I guess, but I still feel a little pendantic jolt when people slap 'punk' on the end of anything they want to sound cool, producing words like 'dieselpunk'. Originally, there had to be some sort of anti-authoritarian theme or it wasn't cyberpunk.

Clockpunk.

Steampunk with clocks and loads of cogs.

I thought it was clockworkpunk, irregardless. 'Steampunk' is a cooler moniker despite the origins then 'vaguely Victorian modernesque technology'

Brickpunk (http://moonfire.us/Brickpunk) but I'm biased. I've been working on a steampunk world for quite some time, including writing novels in it. I like it much better than cyberpunk, but I'm still exploring the genre.

Bruce Sterling co-wrote The Difference Engine, which essentially launched the genre nearly 20 years ago. He's been writing about the recent resurgence of the phenomena on his blog with the jaded eye of someone who has long since moved on from the idea.

I haven't read the book, but knowing Sterling and Gibson, I'm sure there's a certain degree of anti-authoritarianism involved.

Sterling more recently coined the term "atompunk" to describe a similar transformation of WWII-era technology, which is to me a far more exciting a concept.

I don't think there is anything wrong with moving from a genre. Some people get ideas, enjoy them, then move on. For others, they like to linger a bit longer to explore it. For me, I like the brass and grime that I see as steampunk. I also like the raw exploratory aspect of it, where most of the things you are checking out bite you, blow up in your face, or otherwise require a vast amount of technobabble to explain. Not so much the Victorian aspect it (one of my least favorite eras, actually). But, there is a certain amount of appeal.

Of course, I have a few die-hard cyberpunk friends. We get into grand discussions of the differences, but it really comes down to style. It is almost possible to do anything in anything, but its fun to find out what really fits together. You can make power armor and mecha in a Dungeons and Dragons game, but it doesn't fit most styles of that game. I just happen to do it a lot (Maze Mega Burst Space is what I blame for that).

There was an anime which was brickpunk and clockwork punk. There was a Japanese wood mecha that was defending against an American mecha and when they fired missles at it they discovered it was brick underneith. The Japanese ended up winning by coordinating all the parts and flipping the American into the ocean. I can't find it now, and I wish I remembered the name because it was awesome.

Well, that just added about three things I want to write about. :) I have a novel outline that uses the couple from my brickpunk story as part of the supporting characters. Having them fight wooden mecha would be just awesome. Now, if I could justify elves...

And if you find the name, I will be so happy. :D

I just watched that on youtube like the day before yesterday. :o
A Tale of Two Robots, from the Robot Carnival animated compilation.
Part one (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdOieEsk918), Part two (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdqhD5NAv9w&feature=related)

Also, I totally love steampunk and cyberpunk. I think I like the former a little bit more though.

...there's a rule that makes it mandatory to be anti-authoritarian?

Yeah, I thought that was one of the biggest premises of being cyberpunk. Money- or power-hungry corporations or government ruling a lower class with a massive social gap between.

There you have it. Yup, that's the one.

I knew this would resurface if I gave and adequate description.

Oh, the irony.




Also, WTF is "brickpunk"?

I was on the Kingdom of Loathing chat room and we were having a long discussion of steampunk as a genre. Partially because I'm writing stories in that genre lately. That and I was exploring the various ideas (Victorian verses just steam engines, etc). Someone there decided to be silly and said something about "steampunk was nothing compared to the power of brickpunk". So, that got us on a long conversation about what the hell would be brickpunk and how would it be different. It was a fun little discussion and I ended up writing a short story about it:

  http://moonfire.us/Brickpunk

I liked the couple in there, or at least how they turned out, though I needed to make a few changes here and there. No, I don't take it very seriously, but the idea of building robots out of brick was just a cool idea as was using bricks as ammo. And being obsessed of the type of claw used in said bricks (since the brickmakers I know actually seem to know these things).

EDIT: Technically, the 3 little pigs could also be considered brickpunk. There are a few others if you do a google search for "brickpunk".

This is possibly the most hilarious thing I have ever read.

Last week Sterling dropped eamespunk (http://blog.wired.com/sterling/2008/07/design-observer.html) as a possible more palatable *punk for a design critic. It's quickly taken off (http://nevolution.typepad.com/theories/2008/07/the-eamespunk-m.html) on it's own mini *punk theme.

I started thinking more about brickpunk too. At first I thought, well, babylonians had bricks.. but I guess brick style is really associated with the industrial revolution. Which makes it something of a subset of steampunk. Perhaps an alternative-alternative-victorian history, in which metal is far more rare and intricately packed mud leads to mechanistic marvels.

And then I thought "punkpunk" which is either an alternate mechanical history of alternate mechanical histories, or is an alternate history of DIY punk culture in which Anarchy comes to 1970s U.K. (as well as New York and other environs) in the form of basement-made robots and AIs.

According to Wikipedia, bricks were used clear back in 7,500 B.C so its a fairly wide-open time frame. In my fantasy world, they are just entering the industrial revolution so that is where I focus most of my stuff. Of course, in that world the couple from my story are considered country bumpkins because they don't use proper iron and steam to power their stuff. :)

I think it's funny that the "punk" aspect is being over looked in all of these _____punks. The setting, environments, and technology were always secondary to the original stories, but they were so cool that they lived on when the antiestablishmenttarionistic theme of the story had been forgotten.

Woot, first time I've gotten to use that word in a sentence. Hope I spelled it right.

The problem with that (the separation of the thematic elements from the technological environment) is that we end up with things like Will Smith's Wild Wild West, where we get a 50 foot mechanical steam powered spider in the old west, but no one cares.

I didn't read any of the posts in this thread.

The only thing I want to say:

STEAMPUNK FUCKING RULES   :gentleman:

I'm not too sure about Cyberpunk.

anyway... I wouldn't call Steampunk Steampunk.
People with Iros and revolvers don't make me fuzzy the Steampunk way...
Beautiful women in victorian clothing with revolvers do.
It should be called... Steam Fiction.  8)

Antidisestablishmenttharianistic.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgYhLIThTvk

maybe it's too long to be worth it, but there it is

Antidisestablishmenttharianistic,
not quite right, that means someone who is against the separation of church and state.

I agree. With cyberpunk, I think you get that anti-establishment vibe, but I never really got where the punk is in steampunk, and I only just learned through this thread that there are even more "*punks". The term just seems to be a backformation from cyberpunk, without heeding its roots, and to me it doesn't make much sense. So, I also agree with BaronCid that "steam fiction" would perhaps be a more fitting name, but on the other hand you gotta admit that that doesn't sound anywhere near as cool as "steampunk".

I chose to read the "*punk" is doing beyond the ordinary and pushing the limits. So, building a steam-powered mecha (Five Fists of Science, a great comic considered steampunk) is just as appropriate as somehow managing to recreating a TIE-fighter with LEGO (http://gizmodo.com/343178/steampunk-lego-tie-fighter-beats-the-crap-out-of-x+wing-shows-amazing-vision-of-star-wars-universe) while inspired by steampunk. For me, even cyberpunk was less about fighting against the corporations and goverment and more about pushing the limits of technology (cyber). That is why I wrote about the brick powered robot. :) That is basically pushing the limits.

History review:

Bruce Sterling and William Gibson were two of the founding fathers of cyberpunk. Their cyberpunk stories often involved anti-establishment themes, either as characters or as a general characterization of the corporate run world as a distopia.

The two of them wrote The Difference Engine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Difference_Engine), the progenitor of all things steampunk, which also had strong anti-establishment themes. Steampunk deserved its suffix in the beginning.

Bruce Sterling has gone on to coin several other *punk terms, in a slightly sarcastic fashion.

Part of what I think makes something *punk is DIY spirit, and an acknowledgment of the malleability of social convention. Simply claiming that things could have been/could be different is a radical position.

That said, greekpunk (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/31/science/31computer.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin) has room for expansion.

That's funny. I've long thought that the sciences we consider exclusive to our "advanced" and "enlightened" age are not as exclusive as we thought. Only that there was no passing on of technologies in the past. There's a story I've been developing for a while now that would take place around the ancient world where the rise and fall of these technologies would be plotted, only in my story the Chinese representative would be more mechanically inclined and the Greek was more focused on genetic manipulation resulting in centaurs, minotaurs, and mermaids.

I've got some drawings, one of them being a giant clockwork robot, that have been lost in the move. They'll turn up at which time I'll happily scan them in and share them with yawl.

That was funny. 20 minutes to get to the punchline, and you can't just fast forward to the punchline and get it. You absolutely have to at least listen to every minute of the blasted thing. But so worth it.