Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by nomel 54 days ago
Merriam-Webster dictionary:

Cyber: Of, relating to, or involving computers or computer networks (such as the Internet)

This is what I've always understood the word to mean, and how I've always seen it used, for decades.

3 comments

Cybernetics is actually about feedback control systems. The original meaning has been distorted because the general public doesn't have the background to distinguish different kinds of magic. The Sperry autopilot was a cybernetic system, as were electro-mechanical gun computers.
Sure, but that hasn't been the common use for "cyber-" for the past ~46 years, which is about ~2x longer than the time between when the term "cybernetics" was coined and the "cyber" was taken from it in 1980.
When I was like 12, I remember my fellow horny youths (or it could have been anyone, I guess!) in AOL chatrooms constantly asking each other "wanna ciber?"
That would be "cyber" as a verb, not "cyber" as a noun. Would anyone have understood what you meant back then if you'd said "I was in a cyber just now" instead of "I was cybering just now"?
a/s/l?
...right, forgot it had that meaning too...
> Cyber: Of, relating to, or involving computers or computer networks (such as the Internet)

You left out the part of speech for that entry, which is "adjective"; as in "the cyber marketplace", not "the cyber".