Well, the prospect of a cyberpunk future is a lot more enticing if you associate yourself with the CEO of the antagonistic Evilcorp Inc., instead of the impoverished masses.

Then there's also the hubris that rich fucks read every cautionary tale with. "Surely the powerful technology and the power it will give me wont corrupt me, I've read the cautionary tales about how power corrupts so I'll know what to do to avoid that! Also I'm built different."

"Breaking: scientist invents the Torment Nexus from the cautionary scifi tale Don't Invent the Torment Nexus"

personally the genre hits twice as hard for me now because of that

Transhumanism is a big theme in Cyberpunk, it just doesn't necessarily mean that Cyberpunk is correct about how common voluntary cybernetic augmentations, genetic engineering and the like are going to be.

Glasses/contact lenses, pacemakers, insulin pumps, cochlear implants, prosthetic limbs.

Some stuff does help us and isn't done purely for evil. It is the monkey murdering brain chips you gotta worry about. And maybe some of the listed stuff being taken over by monopolistic corporations like the glasses industry.

It's “a” step, not “the next” step. Evolution has no direction except “different”.

Good old slow and steady sensible destruction, like when I was a kid!!