Category: science fiction

• True Blue: An Internet Public Art Project

  For the past two years, I’ve been working with award-winning designer Peter Nowell and illustrator Phoebe Morris on a secret project that is finally ready to share. Some of you may have read my short story True Blue when it came out on Kindle. It’s a tale of persecution and self-discovery set in a world…

• Speaking at SXSW: How Fictional Futures Influence Tech

  I’m speaking at SXSW this week on a panel with Kevin Bankston, Malka Older, and Tim Fernholz where we’re going to discuss how fictional futures influence tech: https://schedule.sxsw.com/2019/events/PP86251 “What does it mean when many of the richest and most powerful people on the planet—like Elon Musk, Larry Page, and Jeff Bezos—think how they think and…

• Using science fiction to understand the future of the web

  ZDNet just ran a lovely, profound, generous review of the Analog Series that is thought-provoking in its own right: https://www.zdnet.com/article/using-science-fiction-to-understand-the-future-of-the-web/ “Peper’s tomorrow is familiar yet utterly changed.” “We’re living in a world that’s increasingly connected, and in the same moment, increasingly divided. How do we square the circle of the technologies that are at the…

• Nick Harkaway on Algorithmic Futures, Literary Fractals, and Mimetic Immortality

  I interviewed Nick Harkaway for the Los Angeles Review of Books about how to make sense of the future, the power of speculative literature, and how he wrote his mind-bending novel, Gnomon: https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/an-interview-with-nick-harkaway-algorithmic-futures-literary-fractals-and-mimetic-immortality “Gnomon muscled its way into my head and it gets to people in a way that seems to be equivalent—that sense of something…

• A reading guide to building the future

  I wrote an essay for TechCrunch that explores the literary culture of Silicon Valley. It digs deep into the feedback loop between books and innovation and turns up weird gems along the way. Think of it as a reading guide to building the future: https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/16/the-best-fiction-for-building-a-startup/ “Every year, Bill Gates goes off-grid, leaves friends and family…

• Kim Stanley Robinson on the crisis of representation, the future of geopolitics, and the power of science fiction

  In my latest column for the Chicago Review of Books, I interview Kim Stanley Robinson about the big ideas in his new novel Red Moon: https://chireviewofbooks.com/2019/01/07/kim-stanley-robinsons-lunar-revolution/ Complement with Malka Older on using science fiction to explore where democracy is headed, how science empowers us by stripping away our delusions of power, and this podcast interview…

• Three Amazing Sci-Fi Writers Talk About the Future — of Tech, Politics, Privacy, Climate, and More

  “What do citizenship and borders mean — what should they mean — in a globally networked world? How can we protect the legitimacy of our political institutions in the face of rampant digital disinformation and manipulation? Is global corporate power threatening national sovereignty, and is that a good or a bad thing? If the modern system of nation-states that…

• Sci-Fi Future

  I went on Mary Kay Magistad’s Whose Century Is It? podcast to discuss Bandwidth, Borderless, how I imagine possible futures, and the social role of science fiction: http://whosecenturyisit.com/sci-fi-future Complement with Cory Doctorow on Bandwidth, the East Bay Express on Borderless, and what The Truman Show can teach us about the future of the internet. Get new…

• Today cranked up to 12

  Factor Daily interviewed me about writing near future speculative fiction and why, in an age of acceleration, contemplation is power: https://factordaily.com/bandwidth-eliot-peper/ Complement with this East Bay Express profile, this feature on how my books grapple with the impact of technology on geopolitics, and my creative process for Bandwidth. Get new posts delivered straight to your inbox: This…

• New Books in Science Fiction podcast interview

  I went on the New Books in Science Fiction podcast to talk about how tech influences geopolitics and the future extrapolated in my new novel, Borderless: https://newbooksnetwork.com/eliot-peper-borderless-47north/ Complement with TechCrunch on the themes explored in Bandwidth, this interview with the Chicago Review of Books on how feeds shape reality, and this Techdirt podcast on how to imagine plausible futures.…