Difficulties with Neuromancer by Gibson

[Stephen Palmer]

I say, old sport!

 

[Verse]

Neuromancer is credited with having one of the best opening lines:
"The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel."

Of course, this has dated somewhat due to the extinction of cathod ray based televisions, to the point of parody:

"A dream. Of *course* it was all a dream. Except she’s standing in the middle of an infinite white plain, beneath a sky the color of a hi-def video monitor sucking signal from a dead channel (saturated electric blue, in other words)...."
- Rapture Of The Nerds by Charles Stross & Cory Doctorow.

 

[Michael Colton]

Well said. I think that's what all the really great SF writers do.

I'm guessing that Nerd's Feather meant "dope" as in "jolly good", as the kids of today say.

Wait, people say dope? I thought we had moved onto 'gnarly' and 'sick'. I guess this means I am officially older, now. Also, I cannot take someone seriously when they say 'boo' to mean 'baby' or 'lover'. I just think they are trying to be a ghost.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

saturated electric blue

with the caption "No Signal" dancing around the screen.
Actually my last two CRT sets showed a blank blue and would start a count down timer to standby on screen. I can't remember one a bright Electric Blue, CRT, TV, Monitor or HD.

color of television, tuned to a dead channel

On older TVs this is random speckled "snow" varying from black to white with grey, all CRTs either had that (since 1935) or from late 1990s /early 21st C a blue screen generated internally. So technically no colour even on Color TV (about 10 years earlier in USA than UK).
In USA they coined the term "White Space" in 1950s, though from a LONG distance the speckles merge to give grey, but in UK it was usually called "snow".

 

[Nerds_feather]

Ray McCarthy: "dope" is also an American slang term used in place of "really cool" or "really good."

 

[Nerds_feather]

Wait, people say dope? I thought we had moved onto 'gnarly' and 'sick'. I guess this means I am officially older, now. Also, I cannot take someone seriously when they say 'boo' to mean 'baby' or 'lover'. I just think they are trying to be a ghost.

Sadly I am the bearer of bad news--"dope" is actually a slang term from the 1990s.

 

[Michael Colton]

Sadly I am the bearer of bad news--"dope" is actually a slang term from the 1990s.

Rad.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Totally?

 

[L D Warne]

I prefer "Rock On, Tommy!" but I'm showing my age there.

 

[soulsinging]

Sadly I am the bearer of bad news--"dope" is actually a slang term from the 1990s.

I have even worse news... gnarly and sick both came and went well before dope as I recall.

 

[Mikhail.Marlowe]

Then the fear began to knot between his shoulder. A cold trickle of sweat worked its way down and across his ribs. The operation hadn't worked. He was still here, still meat, no Molly waiting, her eyes locked on the circling knives, no Armitage waiting in the Hilton with tickets and a new passport and money. It was all some dream, some pathetic fantasy... Hot tears blurred his vision."

It's just his anxiety running wild in this section.