Hacker Cinema
Disclosure
1994 · Film · 128 min
Directed by Barry Levinson
A computer specialist is sued for sexual harassment by a former lover turned boss who initiated the act forcefully, which threatens both his career and his personal life.
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18 comments on Hacker News
The 1990s depiction of a filesystems in movies like Hacker or Disclosure was just weird. Then you had products like Microsoft Bob.
I love corporate/financial/technology/mathematics thriller film genres but they seems to be a very small niche. Good ones are especially rare. My favourite is "Michael Clayton" (2007), and "Margin Call" (2011) is my second favourite. "Sneakers" (1992) is old but pretty good. "Disclosure" (1994) is also old but quite watchable. Dare I mention "Pi" (1998)?
Someone here mentioned the TV series "Billions" which is my guilty pleasure. The stories are so absurd but the great cast manages to carry it off successfully. The only criticism I would make is that, although the show is ostensibly about a hedge fund manager, it seems to contain almost zero actual finance or game theory stuff. The only occasion, that I can recall, when finance enters the plot in a semi-serious way is the episode "Short Squeeze", which was one of my favourite episodes.
I have a few old SGI Irix systems (Indy's) as well as SGI Solaris (V100's).
Systems are no charge (only pay shipping and handling ACT NOW!!) from the NYC or Philly area. (Some systems are near Philadelphia.)
Also some SGI Monitors.
Now these systems would probably come without the hard drives (but they easy to get).
Now what I need to know is is there a way to get the data off the hard drives hooking up to a Mac. (I have no time to google and figure this out although I could so if anyone has some tips or links separate from wanting the system(s) let me know).
I am not ready to dispose of these immediately (I'd as I'd to retrieve from storage where they currently located). One of the V100's (might be a higher model actually I don't even remember) ran for over 10 years straight w/o a reboot (when colo de-racked).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SGI_Indy
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_Fire
To get these you need to be a 'goodfella' meaning a hacker who will put them to good use (student ok; business ok just let me know up front you think they are cool).
The Indy's were fwiw in this 1994 Michael Douglas movie:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disclosure_(1994_film)
(I don't mean the ones I have I mean it was cool they were in that movie as in many other movies as others have pointed out).
As I recall I have at least 2 of each model and maybe more.
Anyone remembers the film Disclosure from 1994 with Demi Moore and Michael Douglas?
Disclosure (1993), otherwise not much of a sci-fi movie, had a nice VR scene too: https://youtu.be/qk3PK3W_wvo?t=16
I think I see what you mean, it's just that to me the language of orcs, elves, or other fantasy concepts is necessarily any more relatable or compelling than the language of code, technology, and corporations in a modern (or futuristic) world.
My opinion as a programmer is obviously biased here, but I salivate at the thought of a cool story about coders. Have you seen Halt and Catch Fire? They managed to capture bits and pieces of computer history in a very compelling way. There was no lack of programming and techy language, but also no lack of conflict, drama, and difficult human choices. It was compelling in a totally different way than the setting and characters of something like LotR. Maybe I am overly optimistic, but I just don't see why that same feeling can't be captured in a written work rather than a TV show.
What about the myriad of existing works of science fiction that feature tech concepts heavily in their narratives? It might be futuristic technology, but I think the overall feeling of "techy language" would be similar. Or speculative fiction like Prey by Michael Crichton, or even something like Disclosure by the same, which from what I can remember is set at a hardware company?
I think the situation here is worse too because the CEO used Netflix's publishing of the documentary Disclosure, which directly calls out the harm of jokes such as Chappelle's, as part of the defense that the company itself isn't anti-trans, which feels a bit too much like the hypocrisy of saying "we posted a documentary about the horrible harm that blackface does so we are 'allowed' to post our own blackface stuff". It doesn't work that way.
OK, total aside — this post is pretty conspiratorial and has been flagged anyway — but there’s a link buried within a link that’s fascinating:
https://www.weforum.org/events/sustainable-development-impact-summit-2020/about/3d-world
The World Economic Forum created a 3D environment for their 2020 summit. I’m curious how effective it was, but I kind of love it.
Reminds me a lot of the kind of stuff people would make on SGI machines back in the 90s. Or the environment from the film “Disclosure”. Or the 3D IRIX interface from Jurassic Park.
Anyway, it’s interesting thing to consider as a way of presenting information. Both a “palace of the mind” / Second Life type presentation.
> Isn't the premise of every one of his books "scientists fuck it up, leading to exciting circumstances"?
No, that's an inaccurate and uncharitable summarization of his literary career. Scientists fucking up covers some of his more popular works accurately, Jurassic Park more than the rest, but other stories have the scientists/doctors working hard to save lives, or otherwise behaving admirably. Sphere has the scientists accidentally acquire godlike powers, only to willingly relinquish those powers for the greater good.
In fact, in several of his novels, including Jurassic Park, I think there is stronger anti-corporate sentiment than there is anti-science sentiment. The book makes clear that the problems at Jurassic Park are caused by a corporation cutting corners to turn a profit on a complex system before pausing to understand what they were dealing with. In the novel, the park owner John Hammond is consumed by dinosaurs. For whatever reason the movie let him live, and otherwise tuned down the anti-corporate angle. In the book his idiocy and greed made him a villain, but the movie makes him seem like a cuddly victim. In the book the two heroes are paleontologists (scientists) who were not to blame for the disaster but nevertheless behaved heroically in their attempts to mitigate harm.
A similar theme is found in Airframe though, which covers the interactions between a crash site investigator trying to find a truth that's inconvienent to the airline (that the pilot was to blame.) It could have been about aircraft engineers or aerospace scientists fucking up... but it wasn't. Disclosure and Rising Sun are controversial for their own reasons, but both have prominent anti-corporate themes.
Then there are the novels that seem unrelated to the discussion at all, like Eaters of the Dead which was a retelling of Beowulf from the perspective of an Arab traveler from Baghdad.
I'm cautiously optimistic about using this for data visualizations in AR. I've messed around with genomic models using Hololense and have found that AR works better then VR in a lab or collaborative environment where there is benefit to seeing others while looking at the same augmented reality. I'm curious if this will be better for medical imaging and other biological sequence visualizations (then Holo lense). Better in this case would translate to more accurate tracking of my eyes, interaction with the built environment, and higher quality resolution. I still am yearning for a AR experience that let's me walk through my databases and interact a la Minority Report or my personal favorite movie-reference to VR "Disclosure" featuring Michael Douglas and Demi Moore https://youtu.be/dJcakDNtHDA
This concept reminds me of the VR scene from the 1994 movie, Disclosure:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJcakDNtHDA
Disclosure! Yeah, the one that became the movie with Demi Moore and Michael Douglas. A man is sexually harassed by his female boss.
The book is kind of about that, but also about technology. It was published in 1994 and I would say it was futuristic, if not a bit misguided.
Crichton envisioned a virtual reality tool where -- if you wanted to find a certain file on your computer -- you would run down the halls of a huge virtual library, opening virtual filing cabinets and picking through files by hand. I think this was supposed to make finding your digital files "easier"... but seems hilarious now.
Who knows, maybe some version of that will still come true. It's been a while since I read it, so I might be mis-remembering.
Almost all of his books had some futuristic technology involved, including Andromeda Strain, Jurassic Park, Timeline, etc.
Do you guys remember the Disclosure movie, I think 1995? It was the coolest SGI advertisement ever. I actually watched the movie again last year, and it's still cool! Exactly at that time we had both Macs and SGI workstations at the university and the Macs didn't even come close.
This reminds me of a quote from the movie DISCLOSURE (which is otherwise forgettable, outside of horror movie worthy kiss from Donald Sutherland)-
"Give a man a hundred million dollars and you make a frustrated billionaire."
Something that lets me scan a NoSQL database, like in the movie "Disclosure"
A clip for those who don't know: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFkyV7d5t8o
Interesting, so we're finally getting virtual reality helmets? I've been waiting since the early 1990s. They seemed to be right around the corner and were featured in several films like Lawnmower Man (1992), that Aerosmith video (Amazing, 1993), Disclosure (1994), Virtuosity (1995), Johnny Mnemonic (1995), Hackers (1995).
I suppose it makes sense, every technology seems to take about 20 years to reach the consumer market. I wonder if it has anything to do with patents lasting for 20 years.
Advice straight from the movie "Disclosure" (1994)
What's that line from the movie DISCLOSURE? "Give a man a hundred million dollars and you make a frustrated billionaire. "
Seriously, though...so what if having money doesn't satisfy you and leaves you wanting more? Why is it taken as a given that being satisfied is a good thing?