The kids are building cyberdecks ⋆˚✮˖°⋆｡🖥️˖ ࣪ ⊹⋆.˚
Inspired by William Gibson's 1984 novel "Neuromancer," cyberdecks have made their into the mainstream, signaling a shift towards personalized tech.
When Annike Tan cracks open her small, gold purse, her phone, wallet, keys or lip-gloss are no where to be found. Rather, there’s a “cyberdeck.”
A cyberdeck, in simple terms, is a small, handmade, portable computer-like device. The bones of it consist of a single-board computer, usually a Raspberry Pi, a keyboard, a screen, a memory device, a power source and some cords to connect it all together.
They are made to the users discretion, so anything can be downloaded onto it, drilled into it, glued onto it, displayed on it, anything. And, it can look like anything you want.
Tan, for example, said she is “always anticipating the end of the world,” so she downloaded offline Wikipedia, family photos and her favorite songs onto her mermaid-themed cyberdeck, complete with plants and gold accents.
Since making her first cyberdeck video under her Tik Tok moniker @ubeboobey in March, Tan, 22, has amassed millions of views on her videos with people yearning to build their own pint-sized device. Her most viewed video, posted on March 11, has over 8.2 million views and over 854,000 likes, and counting.
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Besides the hardware, the rest is cobbled together with things cobbled together from thrift stores and your dad’s old Blackberry keyboard, all tied together in an unconventional case like pizza boxes.
“It kind of it reminds you of a better time or simpler time,” said Tan. “It’s like the charm of old tech that was so, kind of, optimistic.”
Cyberdecks are hardly a new concept. It’s history is rich, and looking at Google Trends cyberdecks saw small peaks in 2021 through 2023, but it’s now off the charts.
Younger generations are frustrated with techs over-integration, instead they want control, personalization and simplicity, with a cyberdeck offering just that.
What is a cyberdeck?
The concept of a cyberdeck was first introduced to the mainstream with William Gibson’s 1984 cyberpunk novel Neuromancer.
In the novel, a cyberdeck, or cyberspace deck as Gibson calls it, is used for tapping into the characters brain using “trodes”, or electrodes, on their foreheads to project their “disembodied consciousness into the consensual hallucination that was the matrix” or “cyberspace.”
The first mention of the deck is within the first few pages and it is referenced throughout, being used as a key plot device for characters to travel through cyberspace — put very simply.
This makes the concept of a cyberdeck over 40 years old.
But, and I might ruffle some feathers with this, cyberdecks aren’t real, or at least what it was originally intended to be, as written by Gibson, aren’t. It can’t be.
The concept has been taken into the material by cyberpunk super fans, which is why the moderator of r/cyberdeck refuses himself to define what it actually is.
The cyberdeck subreddit, r/cyberDeck, has been active for around 14 years, with u/Talulabelle serving as moderator for around seven. Talulabelle has chosen to remain anonymous for internet purposes (They’re an internet OG. They almost got doxed on 8Chan. I’ll let it slide).
“For me it’s a sort of industrial design, sort of art installation,” said Talulabelle.
To him, the hardware is futile: it’s the look. It doesn’t even need to work. It’s more of an exploration of the cyberpunk genre.
“I don’t want to see a bunch of the same thing, and so I’ve gone way out of my way to not define a cyberdeck as as a custom laptop, or as a wearable, or as a machine with, you know, a VR headset, or any of those things,” said Talulabelle.
To him, if you think it fits the aesthetic of what a cyberdeck is, then it is.
He sees hundreds of cyberdecks a day, a lot he doesn’t like and a lot he does, but his opinion doesn’t matter and he knows that, saying; “I’m really just here to keep the porn bots at bay.”
“I don’t want to see a bunch of the same thing, and so I’ve gone way out of my way to not define a cyberdeck as as a custom laptop, or as a wearable, or as a machine with, you know, a VR headset, or any of those things. “ -Talulabelle, moderator of r/cyberDeck
Personalized tech in the age of mass produced devices
With roots in cyberpunk, emphasis on the punk part, a cyberdeck is diversion from the tech-norm. If you needed a cyberdeck, a company would have already mass-produced one, and they have, it’s called a desktop. What sets it apart is the personalization aspect.
In creating a cyberdeck, there’s more to think about: what you want it to look like, what you want to download onto it, how do you want it to run, etc. It rejects the mindlessness we all have when it comes to our devices and becomes a personal experience.
“You’re going against something the structures that uphold everyday society,” said Tan “(A cyberdeck) makes you think critically about your relationship with technology and what you want out of a tech device.”
Maddy Brown, 29, a math PhD candidate at University of Washington who goes by @wnbadata on TikTok, has coding platforms downloaded to it to run WNBA stats. But, most of the time she uses her Mac to code and then sends it to her cyberdeck “for the vibes.”
“You’re going against something the structures that uphold everyday society. (A cyberdeck) makes you think critically about your relationship with technology and what you want out of a tech device.” -Annike Tan, @ubeboobey on Tik Tok
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“What resonates with me more is just like the like having more customizability, or like having something that looks cool,” said Brown.
And, that’s what it’s all about. Creating tech people can control their interactions with, rather than letting their device control their interactions with the world.
“People are gravitating more towards like, simpler devices of the “simpler times,’” said Ling Lu. “I think they’re just tired of like this hyper optimization of our digital lives.”
Lu, 28, a creative technologist and artist based in New York who goes by @lingbuilds on Instagram, is currently building a bowling pin shaped “Cyberduck” using her 3D printer, with plans to make it into an audio journal.
A cyberdeck was appealing to Lu because she wanted more single-purpose tech tailored to one specific need, rather than a jack-of-all-trades-type device.
“As companies have become better at making products that are very efficient and can do a million things at once,” said Lu. “People aren’t adapting to it super well, with, like screen time feeling and like the algo is just sucking you in.”
A cyberdeck isn’t the most useful thing in the world, in fact, you’ll probably spend more time building it than using it. But, with its unlimited capabilities, it forces us to be the ones to go outside the box and remember we are the ones that make tech special with our interactions with it.
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My cyberdeck list also includes a high amount of MP3’s. Incase of apocalyptic events.
I've followed r/cyberdeck for a bit but I love how tiktok has grabbed onto all sorts of different and more "feminine" ones than I'd seen on there. It's a nice change.