What life will be like in 2008, written 40 years ago.
Pretty cool stuff, and yet another proof that futurologists are up there with Tarot Readers, astrologists, and market analysts.
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This is pretty close -
We're way behind schedule on transportatio though. I gotta say, I think they were pretty ambitious in their predictions. Not that we don't have the technology to pull off some of the feats discussed, but it would mean a complete over-haul of all transportation - nationwide. Heck, most the highways that were around in 1968 are still being used with very little upgrade ( I know - I was around in 68).
I'm not sure if we'll ever trust a two-minute 'scan' to replace a full physical - too much at stake and too many complicated systems to trust to one machine. I wouldn't necessarily call it 'behind' this prediction - just seems as it's gone in a different direction.
They predicted 350,000,000 people as the population in 2008. The 2007 census puts us at just over 300,000,000 - so I guess we're not procreating at quite the pace we were predicted to.
...it was an interesting article.
Quote:
The single most important item in 2008 households is the computer. These electronic brains govern everything from meal preparation and waking up the household to assembling shopping lists and keeping track of the bank balance. Sensors in kitchen appliances, climatizing units, communicators, power supply and other household utilities warn the computer when the item is likely to fail. A repairman will show up even before any obvious breakdown occurs.
Computers also handle travel reservations, relay telephone messages, keep track of birthdays and anniversaries, compute taxes and even figure the monthly bills for electricity, water, telephone and other utilities. Not every family has its private computer. Many families reserve time on a city or regional computer to serve their needs. The machine tallies up its own services and submits a bill, just as it does with other utilities.
Money has all but disappeared. Employers deposit salary checks directly into their employees’ accounts. Credit cards are used for paying all bills. Each time you buy something, the card’s number is fed into the store’s computer station. A master computer then deducts the charge from your bank balance.
Computers not only keep track of money, they make spending it easier. TV-telephone shopping is common. To shop, you simply press the numbered code of a giant shopping center. You press another combination to zero in on the department and the merchandise in which you are interested. When you see what you want, you press a number that signifies “buy,†and the household computer takes over, places the order, notifies the store of the home address and subtracts the purchase price from your bank balance. Much of the family shopping is done this way. Instead of being jostled by crowds, shoppers electronically browse through the merchandise of any number of stores.
Computers also handle travel reservations, relay telephone messages, keep track of birthdays and anniversaries, compute taxes and even figure the monthly bills for electricity, water, telephone and other utilities. Not every family has its private computer. Many families reserve time on a city or regional computer to serve their needs. The machine tallies up its own services and submits a bill, just as it does with other utilities.
Money has all but disappeared. Employers deposit salary checks directly into their employees’ accounts. Credit cards are used for paying all bills. Each time you buy something, the card’s number is fed into the store’s computer station. A master computer then deducts the charge from your bank balance.
Computers not only keep track of money, they make spending it easier. TV-telephone shopping is common. To shop, you simply press the numbered code of a giant shopping center. You press another combination to zero in on the department and the merchandise in which you are interested. When you see what you want, you press a number that signifies “buy,†and the household computer takes over, places the order, notifies the store of the home address and subtracts the purchase price from your bank balance. Much of the family shopping is done this way. Instead of being jostled by crowds, shoppers electronically browse through the merchandise of any number of stores.
We're way behind schedule on transportatio though. I gotta say, I think they were pretty ambitious in their predictions. Not that we don't have the technology to pull off some of the feats discussed, but it would mean a complete over-haul of all transportation - nationwide. Heck, most the highways that were around in 1968 are still being used with very little upgrade ( I know - I was around in 68).
I'm not sure if we'll ever trust a two-minute 'scan' to replace a full physical - too much at stake and too many complicated systems to trust to one machine. I wouldn't necessarily call it 'behind' this prediction - just seems as it's gone in a different direction.
They predicted 350,000,000 people as the population in 2008. The 2007 census puts us at just over 300,000,000 - so I guess we're not procreating at quite the pace we were predicted to.
...it was an interesting article.
Alma wrote:
I lost my post
Spooky how much they got right...
Spooky how much they got right...
You're a big Nostradamus fan, huh?
Disclaimer:
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
Quote:
You're a big Nostradamus fan, huh?
Nostrodamus made 1000's of ambigous statements that could be taken any of a dozen or more ways.
and he predicted that i died 8 years ago.
Quote:
Money has all but disappeared.
More prophetic than they knew!
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
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A lot of science fiction or "futurologists" predictions get close to the mark... they just tend usually to be wildly overoptimistic about the timescale. I know this article has a lot of very large scale stuff they got glaringly wrong, but there's actually a lot that they got very close to the mark!
*flat screen TVs mounted in cars (except ours are mounted on the back of the front seats, for the backseat passengers to use)
*TV phone (a small flat screen)... not so different from a mobile, except this is fixed in the car.
*[while riding in a car] "A business associate wants a sketch of a new kind of impeller your firm is putting out for sports boats. You reach for your attache case and draw the diagram with a pencil-thin infrared flashlight on what looks like a TV screen lining the back of the case. The diagram is relayed to a similar screen in your associate’s office, 200 mi. away. He jabs a button and a fixed copy of the sketch rolls out of the device. He wishes you good luck at the coming meeting and signs off."
A tablet and laptop with wireless internet will do this. The associate with a colour printer attached to any computer. Both of you hooked up with webcams or just mics/headsets.
Frankly given the technology available in the late 60's it's incredible what we can do now, and what some of them could envision back then.
*"Private cars are banned inside most city cores" a lot of European cities ban cars from the CBD.
*"Electrostatic precipitators clean the air" - lots of people now have air ionisers at home or work to clean the air, and if they get the fancy ones, to create negatively charges ions of oxygen. "and climatizers maintain the temperature and humidity at optimum levels." Air-conditioners, anyone? There's a few variants that do humidity too.
*"Other conveniences ease kitchenwork. The housewife simply determines in advance her menus for the week, then slips prepackaged meals into the freezer and lets the automatic food utility do the rest. At preset times, each meal slides into the microwave oven and is cooked or thawed. The meal then is served on disposable plastic plates. These plates, as well as knives, forks and spoons of the same material, are so inexpensive they can be discarded after use."
I know there's people out there who eat like this all the time, when they don't have company. Of course, they have to manually take prepackaged food out of the freezer and put it into the microwave. When did disposable plastic cutlery and plates hit the supermarkets and fast food outlets, anyway? sounds like it hadn't happened yet in 1968.
* "The single most important item in 2008 households is the computer. These electronic brains govern everything from meal preparation and waking up the household to assembling shopping lists and keeping track of the bank balance...
Computers also handle travel reservations, relay telephone messages, keep track of birthdays and anniversaries, compute taxes and even figure the monthly bills for electricity, water, telephone and other utilities. Not every family has its private computer."
Come ON! This is GOOD!
*" Sensors in kitchen appliances, climatizing units, communicators, power supply and other household utilities warn the computer when the item is likely to fail. A repairman will show up even before any obvious breakdown occurs."
Households ARE increasingly wired, especially new houses built for the wealthy. Sensors are more likely to be on timers to automate appliance functions, granted. (like opening and closing blinds, turning off lights, turning on the coffeemaker...)
*"Money has all but disappeared. Employers deposit salary checks directly into their employees’ accounts. Credit cards are used for paying all bills. Each time you buy something, the card’s number is fed into the store’s computer station. A master computer then deducts the charge from your bank balance.
Computers not only keep track of money, they make spending it easier. TV-telephone shopping is common. To shop, you simply press the numbered code of a giant shopping center. You press another combination to zero in on the department and the merchandise in which you are interested. When you see what you want, you press a number that signifies “buy,†and the household computer takes over, places the order, notifies the store of the home address and subtracts the purchase price from your bank balance. Much of the family shopping is done this way. Instead of being jostled by crowds, shoppers electronically browse through the merchandise of any number of stores."
Not exactly Right, Exactly right, Very close to right, Right, Right, Right, Right, and Right Again.
*"Most of this study is in the form of programmed TV courses, which can be rented or borrowed from tape _ * libraries. In fact most schooling—from first grade through college—consists of programmed TV courses or lectures via closed circuit. Students visit a campus once or twice a week for personal consultations or for lab work that has to be done on site. Progress of each student is followed by computer, which assigns end term marks on the basis of tests given throughout the term."
This is true now for a lot of remote country kids, and quite a lot of tertiary students.
*"Besides school lessons, other educational material is available for TV viewing. You simply press a combination of buttons and the pages flash on your home screen. The world’s information is available to you almost instantaneously."
Before the internet ever existed... this is a pretty good description of it.
*"In addition to programmed TV and the multiplicity of commercial fare, you can see top Broadway shows, hit movies and current nightclub acts for a nominal charge. Best-selling books are on TV tape and can be borrowed or rented from tape libraries."
Pretty close, between TV and the Internet, and video/DVD Rental stores.
*"While city life in 2008 has changed greatly, the farm has altered even more. Farmers are business executives running operations as automated as factories. TV scanners monitor tractors and other equipment computer programmed to plow, harrow and harvest. Wires imbedded in the ground send control signals to the machines. Computers also keep track of yields-, fertilization, soil composition and other factors influencing crops. At the beginning of each year, a print-out tells the farmer what to plant where, how much to fertilize and how much yield he can expect."
Family farms HAVE mostly given way to massive agribusiness companies. Some of the equipment they run is ENOURMOUS, some is roboticised, and there IS a lot of automation, computerisation and electrification.
*"Areas in bays or close to shore have been turned into shrimp, lobster, clam and other shellfish ranches, like the cattle spreads of yesteryear."
Yes.
* "Medical research has guaranteed that most babies born in the 21st century will live long and healthy lives. Heart disease has virtually been eliminated by drugs and diet. If hearts or other major organs do give trouble, they can be replaced with artificial organs."
There are drugs for heart disease. There are artificial hearts. Seen the latest? patients with it don't have a heartbeat. They just have to be REALLY sure to keep their batteries charged.
Edited, Mar 28th 2008 10:23am by Aripyanfar
*flat screen TVs mounted in cars (except ours are mounted on the back of the front seats, for the backseat passengers to use)
*TV phone (a small flat screen)... not so different from a mobile, except this is fixed in the car.
*[while riding in a car] "A business associate wants a sketch of a new kind of impeller your firm is putting out for sports boats. You reach for your attache case and draw the diagram with a pencil-thin infrared flashlight on what looks like a TV screen lining the back of the case. The diagram is relayed to a similar screen in your associate’s office, 200 mi. away. He jabs a button and a fixed copy of the sketch rolls out of the device. He wishes you good luck at the coming meeting and signs off."
A tablet and laptop with wireless internet will do this. The associate with a colour printer attached to any computer. Both of you hooked up with webcams or just mics/headsets.
Frankly given the technology available in the late 60's it's incredible what we can do now, and what some of them could envision back then.
*"Private cars are banned inside most city cores" a lot of European cities ban cars from the CBD.
*"Electrostatic precipitators clean the air" - lots of people now have air ionisers at home or work to clean the air, and if they get the fancy ones, to create negatively charges ions of oxygen. "and climatizers maintain the temperature and humidity at optimum levels." Air-conditioners, anyone? There's a few variants that do humidity too.
*"Other conveniences ease kitchenwork. The housewife simply determines in advance her menus for the week, then slips prepackaged meals into the freezer and lets the automatic food utility do the rest. At preset times, each meal slides into the microwave oven and is cooked or thawed. The meal then is served on disposable plastic plates. These plates, as well as knives, forks and spoons of the same material, are so inexpensive they can be discarded after use."
I know there's people out there who eat like this all the time, when they don't have company. Of course, they have to manually take prepackaged food out of the freezer and put it into the microwave. When did disposable plastic cutlery and plates hit the supermarkets and fast food outlets, anyway? sounds like it hadn't happened yet in 1968.
* "The single most important item in 2008 households is the computer. These electronic brains govern everything from meal preparation and waking up the household to assembling shopping lists and keeping track of the bank balance...
Computers also handle travel reservations, relay telephone messages, keep track of birthdays and anniversaries, compute taxes and even figure the monthly bills for electricity, water, telephone and other utilities. Not every family has its private computer."
Come ON! This is GOOD!
*" Sensors in kitchen appliances, climatizing units, communicators, power supply and other household utilities warn the computer when the item is likely to fail. A repairman will show up even before any obvious breakdown occurs."
Households ARE increasingly wired, especially new houses built for the wealthy. Sensors are more likely to be on timers to automate appliance functions, granted. (like opening and closing blinds, turning off lights, turning on the coffeemaker...)
*"Money has all but disappeared. Employers deposit salary checks directly into their employees’ accounts. Credit cards are used for paying all bills. Each time you buy something, the card’s number is fed into the store’s computer station. A master computer then deducts the charge from your bank balance.
Computers not only keep track of money, they make spending it easier. TV-telephone shopping is common. To shop, you simply press the numbered code of a giant shopping center. You press another combination to zero in on the department and the merchandise in which you are interested. When you see what you want, you press a number that signifies “buy,†and the household computer takes over, places the order, notifies the store of the home address and subtracts the purchase price from your bank balance. Much of the family shopping is done this way. Instead of being jostled by crowds, shoppers electronically browse through the merchandise of any number of stores."
Not exactly Right, Exactly right, Very close to right, Right, Right, Right, Right, and Right Again.
*"Most of this study is in the form of programmed TV courses, which can be rented or borrowed from tape _ * libraries. In fact most schooling—from first grade through college—consists of programmed TV courses or lectures via closed circuit. Students visit a campus once or twice a week for personal consultations or for lab work that has to be done on site. Progress of each student is followed by computer, which assigns end term marks on the basis of tests given throughout the term."
This is true now for a lot of remote country kids, and quite a lot of tertiary students.
*"Besides school lessons, other educational material is available for TV viewing. You simply press a combination of buttons and the pages flash on your home screen. The world’s information is available to you almost instantaneously."
Before the internet ever existed... this is a pretty good description of it.
*"In addition to programmed TV and the multiplicity of commercial fare, you can see top Broadway shows, hit movies and current nightclub acts for a nominal charge. Best-selling books are on TV tape and can be borrowed or rented from tape libraries."
Pretty close, between TV and the Internet, and video/DVD Rental stores.
*"While city life in 2008 has changed greatly, the farm has altered even more. Farmers are business executives running operations as automated as factories. TV scanners monitor tractors and other equipment computer programmed to plow, harrow and harvest. Wires imbedded in the ground send control signals to the machines. Computers also keep track of yields-, fertilization, soil composition and other factors influencing crops. At the beginning of each year, a print-out tells the farmer what to plant where, how much to fertilize and how much yield he can expect."
Family farms HAVE mostly given way to massive agribusiness companies. Some of the equipment they run is ENOURMOUS, some is roboticised, and there IS a lot of automation, computerisation and electrification.
*"Areas in bays or close to shore have been turned into shrimp, lobster, clam and other shellfish ranches, like the cattle spreads of yesteryear."
Yes.
* "Medical research has guaranteed that most babies born in the 21st century will live long and healthy lives. Heart disease has virtually been eliminated by drugs and diet. If hearts or other major organs do give trouble, they can be replaced with artificial organs."
There are drugs for heart disease. There are artificial hearts. Seen the latest? patients with it don't have a heartbeat. They just have to be REALLY sure to keep their batteries charged.
Edited, Mar 28th 2008 10:23am by Aripyanfar
A lot of science fiction or "futurologists" predictions get close to the mark... they just tend usually to be very overoptimistic about the timescale. I know this article has a lot of very large scale stuff they got glaringly wrong, but there's actually a lot that they got very close to the mark!
Are you people nine years old? Someone with a dart board of completely random predictions would have done as well if not better. They got nearly everything utterly wrong. No wonder psychics stay in business.
Disclaimer:
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
To make a long story short, I don't take any responsibility for anything I post here. It's not news, it's not truth, it's not serious. It's parody. It's satire. It's bitter. It's angsty. Your mother's a *****. You like to jack off dogs. That's right, you heard me. You like to grab that dog by the bone and rub it like a ski pole. Your dad? Gay. Your priest? Straight. **** off and let me post. It's not true, it's all in good fun. Now go away.
OMFG This dude forgot to add that they have new lemonade flavored Gummi Bears, what a **** he wasn't even close...
Smasharoo wrote:
A lot of science fiction or "futurologists" predictions get close to the mark... they just tend usually to be very overoptimistic about the timescale. I know this article has a lot of very large scale stuff they got glaringly wrong, but there's actually a lot that they got very close to the mark!
Are you people nine years old? Someone with a dart board of completely random predictions would have done as well if not better. They got nearly everything utterly wrong. No wonder psychics stay in business.
Given that the examples I pulled out consisted of fully half the article, I beg to politely differ.
I'm still hoping that one will come true:
Seriously, can't fUcking wait.
Quote:
The average work day is about four hours
Seriously, can't fUcking wait.
RedPhoenixxx wrote:
I'm still hoping that one will come true:
Seriously, can't fUcking wait.
Quote:
The average work day is about four hours
Seriously, can't fUcking wait.
Tell me about it.
I'm still waiting for most people to consciously realise that advances in technology and manufacture productivity won't EVER release ANY employee from working hours. Competition will always ensure that as productivity rises, that efficiency will go towards drops in product prices, increases in product out-put or increases in share-holder profits, NOT to shorter work hours.
Once one company has new technology, every competitor will aquire equivalent technology, or go under. What they produce will go up, but the one constant that won't change will that there will have to be man-hours in there somewhere, supervising things and pushing the buttons. And you can never alter what a man-hour means.
The only way a 40-hour week will survive is if employees and citizens fight for it. Competitive pressure and inflationary pressure means employers will always try to increase the hours employees work, and decrease their compensation. The only exception are the lucky skilled employees in a labour shortage, who will get compensated well. But even they will be under pressure to work as many hours as their employers can wring out of them.
Quote:
The only way a 40-hour week will survive is if employees and citizens fight for it.
Well, I don't mean to brag or anything, but in France we passed legislation for the 35 hours week a few years back. Business grumbled, but it's still alive, if a little battered. And we did it for precisely the reasons you cited: increased productivity, gdp value of free time, etc...
And it's working ok, we have one of the highest rates of productivity in the world.
RedPhoenixxx wrote:
Quote:
The only way a 40-hour week will survive is if employees and citizens fight for it.
Well, I don't mean to brag or anything, but in France we passed legislation for the 35 hours week a few years back. Business grumbled, but it's still alive, if a little battered. And we did it for precisely the reasons you cited: increased productivity, gdp value of free time, etc...
And it's working ok, we have one of the highest rates of productivity in the world.
When US employers catch on to the fact that they're only getting about 4 hours of work/day out of their 40 hour/week paid employees, they might be more amenable to reducing the work week.
Alma wrote:
I lost my post
The Elinda of Doom wrote:
When US employers catch on to the fact that they're only getting about 4 hours of work/day out of their 40 hour/week paid employees, they might be more amenable to reducing the work week.
Exactly my thoughts. I make good money, but not great, working for a wholesaler. I have the highest GMP and just got employee of the quarter (which doesn't mean ****). Been in the industry for roughly 10 years.
I maybe work 2 hours a day...
Of course, being a wholesaler, they have to keep the doors open 7am-5pm.
Quote:
When US employers catch on to the fact that they're only getting about 4 hours of work/day out of their 40 hour/week paid employees, they might be more amenable to reducing the work week.
...Oh wait.
Quote:
The average work day is about four hours.
Almost got that one right.....
I work 20 hours a week. 8 Hours on a tuesday, and 12 on a wednesday.
But its mostly 'cos I married well.
"If you have selfish, ignorant citizens, you're gonna get selfish, ignorant leaders". Carlin.
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