I think a lot of time when the Torment Nexus thing is brought up, people are getting the arrow of causality the wrong way around. It's not that necessarily that Bobby Techbro read "Don't Create the Torment Nexus" and was inspired to make one, even if that's what the marketing tries to sell it as.
No I think that's not giving scifi authors the proper respect as futurists. They looked at how things were going and thought "man, this might lead to a Torment Nexus" and then wrote a story about that.
@foone
Except if the author said that the service would be provided by the actual Mafia. Then the name is already taken so they must invent some new name like "Uber torments" or something.
@foone Really, though, the techbros probably did not read these novels, or even watch any films or TV series based on them, but rather have just heard if such plots having once existed in some book. These people aren't smart enough to actually read anything.
Though also, if people are naming their companies things like "Soylent" and "Palantir", they do seem to be somewhat influenced by fiction. And getting the wrong message.
@foone@blogdiva You mean, "Techbros will absolutely build this thing I'm warning you about, please make sure they don't because this is what will happen otherwise."
@JonnyT@blogdiva exactly. They're going "someday someone might make a Torment Nexus. Here's my ideas about what terrible shit would happen if someone made it".