First MONDO 2000 Editorial (1989) Annotated (2017)

cover photo by Morgan Russell

MONDO 2000 is here to cover the leading edge in hyperculture. We’ll bring you the latest in human/technological interactive mutational forms as they happen. (COULD PROBABLY RERUN SOME TECH ARTICLES FROM MONDO 2000 MAGAZINE HERE SINCE MOST OF THE THINGS THAT WERE GONNA HAPPEN IN FIVE YEARS ARE STILL GONNA HAPPEN… IN 5 YEARS)

We’re talking Cyber-Chautauqua: bringing cyberculture to the people! Artificial awareness modules. (THE GREAT THING ABOUT 1989 IS THAT YOU COULD JUST SAY STUFF THAT SOUNDS COOL… BECAUSE NOBODY KNEW ANYTHING ABOUT ANY OF THIS SORT OF SHIT)  Visual music. Vidscan Magazines. (SOME PROJECT OF ALLAN LUNDELL & TAYLOR BARCROFT ANNOUNCED IN THIS FIRST MONDO ISSUE… IT DIDN’T MAKE IT TO ISSUE #2 … IT’S MEMORIALIZED IN DEAD MEDIA NOW  Brain-boosting technologies. (WELL, HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL FOR THINGS LIKE TRANSCRANIAL MAGNETIC STIMULATION … I’D LIKE TO TRY IT!)…    William Gibson’s Cyberspace Matrix — fully realized! (SPEAKING OF BILL GIBSON, HIS ATTITUDE TOWARDS INTELLIGENCE INCREASE THROUGH DRUGS AND TECHNOLOGY IS THAT (PARAPHRASING) UNTIL HE SEES SOME IDIOT SUDDENLY WALKING AROUND BEING A GENIUS, HE’S NOT TOO INTERESTED… WHICH REMINDS ME OF LAWNMOWER MAN)

Our scouts are out there on the frontier sniffing the breeze (ACTUALLY, OUR SCOUTS WERE SNIFFING OTHER THINGS!) and guess what? All the old war horses are dead. (MCCAIN?) Eco-fundamentalism is out, conspiracy theory is demode, (NOW IT’S MORE A LA MODE) drugs are obsolete. (OH MAN. WE WERE JUST TRYING TO GET THE NARCS OFF OUR TRAIL) There’s a new whiff of apocalypticism across the land. (SAME OLD WHIFF) A general sense that we are living at a very special juncture in the evolution of the species. (21 C SO FAR MORE DEVO THAN EVO)

Back in the sixties, Carly Simon’s (WHO?) brother wrote a book called What to Do Until the Apocalypse Comes.

It was about going back to the land, growing tubers and soybeans, reading by oil lamps. Finite possibilities and small is beautiful. It was boring! (I’M STILL WITH THIS. IT WAS BORING. PLUS, ENVIRONMENTALLY, URBAN DENSITY IS BETTER FOR ENERGY DISTRIBUTION THAN THE BURBS AND THE STICKS. ON THE OTHER HAND, WHEN GREAT CHUNKS OF THE WORLD START SINKING UNDERWATER… CARLY SIMON’S (WHO?) BROTHERS’ BOOK MIGHT COME IN HANDY.

Yet the pagan innocence and idealism that was the sixties remains and continues to exert its fascination on today’s kids. (YESTERDAY’S KIDS. & THIS WAS JUST BEFORE WE HAD A “GENX” REVOLT WITHIN MONDO 2000… WHICH LED TO A DECISION NOT TO PUBLISH THE KEN KESEY INTERVIEW.) Look at old footage of Woodstock and you wonder: where have all those wide-eyed, ecstatic, orgasm-slurping kids gone? (THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION?) They’re all across the land, dormant like deeply buried perennials. (LITERALLY… LIKE IN A DR. WHO EPISODE) But their mutated nucleotides have given us a whole new generation of sharpies, mutants and superbrights and in them we must put our faith — and power. (NOW IN THEIR 40S, STILL LIVING WITH MOM & DAD AND PAYING THEIR STUDENT LOAN DEBTS.)

The Cybernet is in place. If fusion is real, we’ll find out about it fast. (EITHER NOT REAL OR WE’RE FINDING OUT SLOW) The old information elites are crumbling. (AS IT TURNS OUT, THEIR CRAPPY NEWS/MSM INSTITUTIONS ARE BETTER THAN NOTHING). The kids are at the controls. (ONE BIG ORANGE 71-YEAR-OLD INFANT IN A WEIRD WHIG, ACTUALLY)

This magazine is about what to do until the millennium comes. (GET KINDA FAMOUS. LOSE MONEY. HAVE A LOT OF FUN/SEX. RAVE TILL DAWN. DOWNLOAD FREE TUNES FROM NAPSTER)  We’re talking about Total Possibilities. (TRANSHUMANISTS STILL BELIEVE. I GIVE IT ABOUT A 2% CHANCE.) Radical assaults on the limits of biology, gravity and time. (SOME PEOPLE ARE STILL WORKING ON IT. I WON’T BE COMPLETELY CYNICAL) The end of Artificial Scarcity. (GUARANTEED INCOME SUDDENLY HAS BECOME A POPULAR THING. YOU COULDN’T TALK ABOUT IT IN TECHIE CIRCLES AS RECENTLY AS 5 YEARS AGO. HOWEVER, THE QUESTION OF WHETHER SCARCITY IS ACTUALLY ARTIFICIAL RUBS UP AGAINST THE POSSIBLE CLIMATE DISASTERS NOW PENDING) The dawn of a new humanism. (HIGHLY CONTESTABLE. SEEMS LIKE THERE’S A LOT OF ANTI-HUMANISM. AS CYBER-SARTRE MIGHT HAVE SAID, “HELL IS OTHER PEOPLE’S TWEETS”) Highjacking technology for personal empowerment, fun and games. (& FOR SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBERS, ELECTRIC GRIDS, CYBERWAR…. EVERYBODY IS PWNED BY … THE RUSSIAN MAFIA, THE NSA, VARIOUS HACKER GANGS, CHUCKY THE RESENTFUL 9 YEAR OLD NEXT DOOR) Flexing those synapses! (JUST LONG ENOUGH FOR A 140 CHARACTER PIECE OF “WISDOM) Stoking those neuropeptides! (NOOTROPICS SEEM TO BE GETTING A BIGGER MARKET SHARE NOW. MAY BE MORE EFFICACIOUS THAN THE NAYSAYERS… LESS THAT THE YAY-SAYERS)  Making Bliss States our normal waking consciousness. (BRAVE NEW WORLD. HEY, IF IT CAN GET PEOPLE TO CONSUME LESS CRAP, THIS MIGHT BE A WINNER) Becoming the Bionic Angel. (PRESUMABLY THE 6 MILLION DOLLAR MAN WOULD NOW COST 60 MILLION AND HAVE TO BLOW PETER THIEL FOR REPAIRS AND UPGRADES. )

But things are going to get weirder before they get better. (JUST WEIRDER) The Rupture before the Rapture (RUPTURE SEEMS LESS ATTRACTIVE THE CLOSER IT GETS), Social and economic dislocation that will make the Cracked 80′ s look like summer camp. (IT WAS MORE AMUSING TO THINK ABOUT THAN IT IS TO LIVE IN). So, in the words of the immortal Rudy Rucker, “Hang ten on the edge” because the 90’s are going to be quite a ride!  (RUDY RUCKER IS STILL IMMORTAL!)

1989

Queen Mu

R. U. Sirius

2017

R.U. Sirius