[bigger_cheese]

Another of his books Snow Crash, which is kind of precursor to Diamond Age had some pretty interesting predictions.

I read somewhere stuff like Second Life, Google Earth etc were directly inspired by Snow Crash.

There's some other themes in Snow Crash we are just starting to see as well:

-Government difficulties with taxation of digital goods and currency

-Companies competing to attract drivers/messengers etc (basically the uber/gig ecconomy)

-For profit surveillance and commercialization of intelligence data

[pavel_lishin]

> -Government difficulties with taxation of digital goods and currency

Cryptonomicon covers this, too. Arguably so does REAMDE.

[ninefoxgambit]

Snowcrash is probably the best example of a near future anarcho-capitalist society. Particulary showing it in a light which is far from utopian, perhaps more of a realistic devolution.