Gorp.com Launches Three-Week Discussion of the Future of Outdoor Recreation

Posted on August 6, 1999

"I think the Greenhouse Effect is the central problem our civilization has right now," said techno-guru Bruce Sterling, addressing a national conference of industrial designers in Chicago on July 17. "We don't face the problem, but we sure as hell have it." Mr. Sterling, a well-known science fiction writer and journalist, will be investigating this and other questions about the future of the outdoors in a three-week online forum at GORP.com, a website for outdoor recreation, from August 9-31.

Sterling will turn his attention to the immediate future of the outdoor experience: what will it be like for us, outdoors, in a decade or two? How will the Internet affect travel and outdoor recreation? Will planetary and technological changes open up new realms of exploration and activities? What's Sterling's take on the outdoors and its future?

"'Nature' is over," says Sterling. "The twentieth century did it in. There's not a liter of seawater anywhere without its share of PCB and DDT. An altered climate will reshuffle the ecological deck for every creature that breathes. You can't escape industrialism and hide from the sky. It's over. From now on, 'Nature' is under surveillance and on life-support. Face up to it."