this post was submitted on 31 Jan 2026
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Cyberpunk

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What is Cyberpunk?

Cyberpunk is a science-fiction sub-genre dealing with the integration of society and technology in dystopian settings. Often referred to as “low-life and high tech,” Cyberpunk stories deal with outsiders (punks) who fight against the oppressors in society (usually mega corporations that control everything) via technological means (cyber). If the punks aren’t actively fighting against a megacorp, they’re still dealing with living in a world completely dependent on high technology.

Cyberpunk characteristics include:

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Where would you draw the line between cyberpunk and post-cyberpunk? (Do you think post-cyberpunk exists?) (lemmy.zip)
submitted 3 months ago by Hammerjack@lemmy.zip to c/cyberpunk@lemmy.zip
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I have trouble understanding when a genre becomes "post-" so I'm curious what people here might think.

What cyberpunk work do you think moved us into post-cyberpunk? Is there one? Or is this "post-cyberpunk" stuff nonsense and it's all just cyberpunk?

I've heard an argument that Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash (1992) is post-cyberpunk because it's a satire of the cyberpunk genre, but I've heard the same thing said about Bruce Bethke's Headcrash (1995). And is satire of the original genre a requirement to move post- a genre?

I could see an argument that post-cyberpunk takes place in worlds that know what the modern-day internet looks like (with social media and disinformation) but I'm not sure if there's a cyberpunk work that really carries that flag. That is, I could see an argument for post-cyberpunk being a "refresh" of the 1980s cultural fears to fit our modern times, but I'm not sure if there's a work that ushered in this new genre. I've made the argument that Elysium updates cyberpunk with modern cultural fears, but I don't think it led to a wave of updated cyberpunk works (it was an outlier, not the progenitor of a new genre).

So what do you think? What requirements would you have for the cyberpunk genre to become post-cyberpunk? And does that cyberpunk work already exist?

(Note: for the picture in this post, I was trying to show the juxtaposition of "classic cyberpunk" vs "modern cyberpunk". I'm not arguing that Deus Ex is post-cyberpunk.)

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[–] FiniteBanjo@feddit.online 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I think post cyberpunk would be akin to magic, kind of like Warframe.

[–] Hammerjack@lemmy.zip 2 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

Do you mean cyberpunk with the inclusion of magic? Shadowrun has been around since 1989. I'm not saying cyberpunk and post-cyberpunk can't co-exist (we can still have cyberpunk works in a post-cyberpunk era) but I don't think adding fantasy elements moves it past cyberpunk.

But to take your example of Warframe... maybe post-cyberpunk would include space travel? I would argue most classic cyberpunk stories stay on Earth (or low-Earth orbit) so maybe exploring the stars would be expanding the cyberpunk setting?

[–] FiniteBanjo@feddit.online 2 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

So the point I'm trying to express is that "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" or in other words things can be portrayed so futuristic that the mechanisms behind what is happen seem completely impossible.

But yes, I suppose Space Travel could greatly expand the genre.