We chose the following two interviews because they are interviews of the same person—Neal Stephenson, a sci-fi novelist whose books include Snowcrash and Cryptonomicon—in wildly different settings, which allow us then to see how different contexts can change our sense of a person, his character, characteristics, and interests. Both the interviews were published in online journals, but one labels itself “News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters,” and the other labels itself “reasononline: free minds and free markets.” The structure of the interviews is likewise quite different. One is more literary, first introducing us to the interviewee, then moving into a series of questions, each of which elicits a rather lengthy answer. The other has Stephenson, responding to a series of email questions and prompts from different people. Interestingly enough, both were conducted “primarily online” as Mike Goodwin, the reasononline interviewer, put it.

Here are the interviews:

Neal Stephenson’s Past, Present, and Future

Neal Stephenson Responds With Wit and Humor

Use these questions to help you discuss and think through how the interviews have been rhetorically shaped to have the effects they do:

• Does the fact that the interviews were conducted online and not face-to-face change how you read? Do the interviews feel less personal to you? Compare these two interviews to the interview of Steven Jobs that is linked in the next page of this online chapter: do you miss the visually tangible image of Jobs in his office overlooking the San Francisco Bay Area?
• Does Stephenson’s voice sound different in the two interviews? If so, describe the difference. If not, what does it sound like in both cases? What supports the similarity or difference?
• Do the two interviews make reference to the time and place of their publication in the same way?
• What is the overall effect of each interview? What can you learn about the audiences for these online journals from the way the interviews were conducted and presented?
• The reasononline journal bills itself as “more interesting than any other political mag,” so it sees itself as oriented toward politics. Is Slashdot more or less political in its orientation? What on each site encourages you to say what you do?
• Is the Slashdot piece an interview, really?
• In each interview, the person who put the interview together identifies Stephenson as one of them, as walking, talking, and thinking like the audience for the online journal: as a “troll” in one case and as affiliated with “libertarians” in the other. In either or both interviews, can you find evidence of Stephenson embracing those identities? Can you find evidence of him distancing himself from those identities?
• How might the visual presentations on each interview online affect how you read? How might the visual presentations shape your attitude toward Stephenson?