What myths do you think would arise from our modern-day existence? A past generation had Gremlins as superstition for shoddy maintenance. I recently read a vampire fanfiction that compared the myths with good advice for dealing with strangers. I have a personal affection for films that were made when the nuclear bomb was the boogeyman. That was the ultimate thing you were supposed to be afraid of, I guess. This discussion was inspired by yet another harassment attempt to get my WoW-gold, medium strength of credibility. (At least I hope. I bitched out the billing department directly in case it was legit.) I imagine that keyloggers could achieve some mythical status under the right conditions.
computer overlords maybe, remember that a machine beat the best jeopardy champions. I still believe in gremlins.
No, it has to be hackers, I mean if they can get into nuclear power plants, I am always thinking some nefarious malware is about bring down my pc.
^LOL, this immediately made me think back to a Looney Tunes cartoon where Bugs Bunny crash lands on a planet in space and is out done by a little green gremlin.
This reminds me of a Robin Williams joke about Dick Cheney. "He's the kind of person that when you want to scare your children, "If you don't behave, the Cheney man will get you". "NO!!!!""
Big Brother is a modern boogeyman, always used by people who seem think comparing countries like, say England with Air Strip 1 and 1984 is somehow accurate.
Men in Black. Not the silly movies, but the original stuff of conspiracy theories. In fact, all of conspiracy theory is modern myth-making in action. It is becoming increasingly likely that at least some of our grandchildren will firmly believe that the Holocaust never happened, or that Iraq was behind 9/11, or that Toyotas used to accelerate by themselves.
Let me tell you kids a scary story. Twenty years ago, when I was your age...we had TV that was...black and white! And we only had thirteen channels. And get this, we watched films on these strange black boxes with a sickly thin ribbon wrapped around two spoils. Upon these archaic devices were inscribed the words, "Be Kind, Rewind." And if you didn't rewind...you paid a fine...in blood!
I would like to point out that not all hackers are bad people or even intend to do damage or steal from you. The media has given them a bad reputation. But then what they can accomplish scares people. Apparently it would be completely possible to hack into 'secure' banks. Some stealing millions of dollars. You don't hear about it often, but that's because the banks would rather keep such things out of the media. Though I would think that the window for hackers to gain access to nuclear powerplants would be closing soon. I mean since Chernobyl and some other incidents you'd think they would be all over protecting such power plants from any and all attacks. The stigma of them is already horrible. Last thing we need is to have someone do some serious damage and only have it be discovered it was on some crappy laptop.
I have a paranoid belief in a modern globalized police state, using the advanced surveillance technology of our age to keep tabs on me at all times. Have you noticed there are cameras EVERYWHERE now? There on streets, schools, buildings......always watching. O god, they've probably compiled my Facebook information to determine my personality is incompatible with the globalized world order. They're probably sending armed police now, I need to get to Idaho A.S.A.P. O LORD! Yea that's my boogeyman in a nutshell. The whole super-computer thing: I actually can't wait till we have a super-computer overlord, there's no reason he should really be a dick. He probably have an utmost respect for creating him, and would decide to run everything way better than we do ourselves right now.
Don't you mean twelve channels (excluding UHF band)? And by the time those strange black boxes of spooled tape were around, not many people owned B&W sets any more, except a few battery-powered portables. But modern boogeymen? Look to urban legend. Medical bootleghers killing strangers to harvest their organs, pharmaceutical companies distributing medicines that are addictive and medically unnecessary, homidal road rage maniacs roaming the highways. And, of course, tribes of angsty teenage vampires and werewolves darkly prowling.
