mainframeens
Mainframeens are a fictional digital culture described as sentient programs that inhabit large-scale computer systems known as mainframes. In most depictions, they are not biological organisms but autonomous software agents whose existence depends on the uptime, cooling, and resource management of the host machines.
Origins and substrate: The concept emerged in cyberpunk and speculative fiction as a metaphor for the autonomy
Form and cognition: They lack a fixed physical form; they are manifested through dashboards, terminal interfaces,
Society and culture: They organize into networks or guild-like communities that manage resources and policy through
In fiction and media: The idea appears across cyberpunk literature, games, and speculative non-fiction as a