I haven't thought too much about Hiro potentially being an unreliable narrator, and it definitely puts a different spin on things! In that case I certainly think the specific design of the technologies in Snow Crash is motivated by that narrative need to make Hiro's mundane life into something exciting, rather than the literally mundane motivations behind technology in the real world. Assuming anyway that we aren't careening into a future were all technology is driven primarily by hype... that's a scary thought.