...it's like TV Tropes, but LINKED DATA!
Technology Marches On
- 696 statements
- 130 feature instances
- 238 referencing feature instances
Technology Marches On | type |
FeatureClass | |
Technology Marches On | label |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On | page |
TechnologyMarchesOn | |
Technology Marches On | comment |
So little Timmy is watching a show from the 1990s. In one episode, the characters are all excited because of a new computer game that will be released very soon. A computer game — on CD-ROM! And Timmy says, "What's a CD-ROM?" You see, technology has marched on, and things like CD-ROMs, VHS cassette tapes, etc. have relatively recently become either so little-used as to be obscure, or obsolete altogether. This isn't Zeerust, which is about futuristic tech becoming old rather than about modern tech becoming old. The important qualifications of this trope are as follows: Show takes place in modern or modern-ish times, usually the not-so-distant past. Show makes reference to something, usually a form of technology, that is "the next big thing" or "state of the art". And indeed it was — at the time the show was made. Said technology has since proved to be impractical, become obsolete, is on its way out, or just not in the spotlight anymore. Cue Hilarious in Hindsight moments for those who remember when said tech was either very common, hyped as the next big thing, or predictions that an emerging technology would never take off. As far as that last point is concerned, remember that there have been spectacular technological leaps in just the past twenty years — within the lifetimes of many (read: most) Tropers, in fact! note And if you haven't experienced it yet, don't worry. The first time will hit you completely by surprise sometime within the next five years. For the most part, once a technology is invented, it tends to develop at warp speed. Remember, it took only about 66 years (1903-1969) to go from one rickety plane barely able to get off the ground to putting a man on the MOON! So this can lead to some odd moments for those who grew up watching certain things go from "absolutely essential" to "taking up space in your basement". To clarify, an excellent example would be a scene in a 1995 episode of Friends where Chandler gleefully describes all the awesome features of the brand-new laptop that he has received from his company. Then, it really was pretty impressive, the joke being that he'd just be using it to play computer games and type out lists. But now... There was a time when these specifications would be mockingly contrasted with a then-modern counterpart. However, technology has moved on so far and so fast that Chandler's computer is now unimaginably primitive; within twenty years of the episode's first airdate, even a low-end smartphone was over a hundred times more powerful than that in every way, while fitting in the user's pocket and costing less than a tenth of what his company would have spent. Because of this, writers today generally don't get specific about computer performance to avoid sounding dated. Somewhat related are those moments during older films where you realize the entire plot could be resolved with something the world takes for granted today — cell phones, for instance. A perfect example of this would be Home Alone — the film was originally released on November 16, 1990, however within twenty years, the entire movie likely would have lasted about half an hour at most once you realize that a power outage likely wouldn't have caused a cell phone's alarm clock to reset like the plug-in alarm clock was, cell service wouldn't have been disrupted in the same way the landlines were, and in post-9/11 America, the family would have had plenty of time to realize that Kevin was missing due to the very lengthy amount of time it takes to travel through American airports due to security screenings, baggage checks, and so on.note And "lengthy" is not an exaggeration in this instance — it's often recommended that passengers arrive to the airport three hours before the flight even takes off for international flights, and all passengers should be at the boarding gate at least thirty minutes before departure. Since the family only had forty-five minutes to get from their house to the airport before the plane took off, they would have effectively missed the flight. A related and increasingly common source of humor shows down-on-their-luck characters as only able to afford the kind of older technology found in thrift stores today. Additionally, shows set in the past will often lampshade this for humor. A Long Runner might even have its earlier episodes/books/etc. have one level of technology, and later installments have more up-to-date technology with little or no Hand Wave at all. Often turns a work into an Unintentional Period Piece. Can sometimes be a Trope Breaker: A change in cultural context that affects Tropes. A cousin of sorts to Our Graphics Will Suck in the Future. See Magic Floppy Disk for cases when the tech onscreen in a futuristic series was dated when the show was made. See also Science Marches On, Abandonware, Computer Equals Tape Drive, What Are Records?, Snail Mail, and some examples of Aluminum Christmas Trees. Contrast I Want My Jetpack, where the writers overestimated the advance in technology. A fictional world where technology doesn't march on despite the passage of time is in Medieval Stasis or Modern Stasis. The question of how "advanced" a piece of technology looks to a layman observer, and what that even means, is part of The Aesthetics of Technology. |
|
Technology Marches On | fetched |
2024-04-28T00:01:18Z | |
Technology Marches On | parsed |
2024-04-28T00:01:18Z | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to ArtificialLimbs: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to BrandNameTakeover: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to BruceSpringsteen: Not an Item - IGNORE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to CarrieUnderwood: Not an Item - IGNORE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to CyberPunk: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to EdutainmentShow: Not an Item - IGNORE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to Franks2000InchTV: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to FunWithPalindromes: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to GameShow: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to HalloweenEpisode: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to InterfaceScrew: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to JohnnyCash: Not an Item - IGNORE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to LaVenganza: Not an Item - UNKNOWN | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to MyFriendsAndZoidberg: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to NoOSHACompliance: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to OurVampiresAreDifferent: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to PinkFloyd: Not an Item - IGNORE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to PlanetTerra: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to PoorMansPorn: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to RecordNeedleScratch: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to SciFiWritersHaveNoSenseOfScale: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to SlumberParty: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to StarWars: Not an Item - CAT | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to Starfire: Not an Item - UNKNOWN | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to SuddenlyShouting: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to Superfudge: Not an Item - UNKNOWN | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to TakeAThirdOption: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to TheCoconutEffect: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to TheNineties: Not an Item - IGNORE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to TheNotoriousBig: Not an Item - IGNORE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to TheSeventies: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to VideoGames: Not an Item - CAT | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to ZigZaggingTrope: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to invokedtrope: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingComment |
Dropped link to lampshadehanging: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
Technology Marches On | processingUnknown |
La venganza | |
Technology Marches On | processingUnknown |
Starfire | |
Technology Marches On | processingUnknown |
Superfudge | |
Technology Marches On | isPartOf |
DBTropes | |
Technology Marches On / int_104b5e68 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_104b5e68 | comment |
In The Pendragon Adventure's third installment, The Never War, Bobby Pendragon makes the mistake of asking his local counterpart Vincent "Gunny" Van Dyke where the TV is in a 1937 hotel suite. Naturally, Gunny has no idea what he's talking about, but notes that there is a radio around there somewhere when asked about it. | |
Technology Marches On / int_104b5e68 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_104b5e68 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Pendragon Adventure | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_104b5e68 | |
Technology Marches On / int_11e3f224 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_11e3f224 | comment |
In one episode of Everybody Hates Chris, when the family celebrates the fact that they could finally afford to buy a 19-inch TV, Adult Chris explains that in the early '80s, when the episode takes place, a family owning a 19-inch TV was a big deal, even though in the mid-2000s, when the episode aired, a 19-inch TV was a common staple in every college dorm room. | |
Technology Marches On / int_11e3f224 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_11e3f224 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Everybody Hates Chris | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_11e3f224 | |
Technology Marches On / int_14600393 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_14600393 | comment |
In Matilda (published and presumably set in 1988) the wealthy Mr Wormwood chides Matilda for preferring books to watching their "lovely telly with a twelve-inch screen", which is tiny by modern standards. To put this in perspective, the standard screen's size in a laptop computer in 2023 is about 19''. | |
Technology Marches On / int_14600393 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_14600393 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Matilda | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_14600393 | |
Technology Marches On / int_1484a16e | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_1484a16e | comment |
At one point in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Dudley is complaining about the fact that Vernon taking the household to a rickety old shack on an offshore rock in an ultimately futile attempt to throw off pursuit by Hagrid means he'll miss one of his favorite TV shows. This happens in late July of 1991. If it were set today, while Dudley, being Dudley, would still complain, it wouldn't mean quite as much since he would likely be able to watch the show on a catch-up service. If anything, a first-time reader (especially if they aren't aware of the time frame, which wasn't firmly established until Deathly Hallows) will simply be confused about why Dudley is so upset at all. | |
Technology Marches On / int_1484a16e | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_1484a16e | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_1484a16e | |
Technology Marches On / int_1510822e | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_1510822e | comment |
In GoldenEye, Bond pulls a few stunts in his old companion the Aston Martin DB5n while street-racing Femme Fatale Xenia in a Ferrari F355. While impressive by 1965 standards, the chassis and suspension of the DB5 would have never held up to a modern GTI, let alone a F355. To film the chase, the F355 had to be modified, otherwise it wouldn't drift. Maybe this is the reason Q retires the Aston and gives Bond a BMW instead. | |
Technology Marches On / int_1510822e | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_1510822e | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
GoldenEye | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_1510822e | |
Technology Marches On / int_15c6ea92 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_15c6ea92 | comment |
Wonder Woman (1987): Dr. Lazarus' Hard Light AI experiments seems very advanced on the surface, as they try to build a representation of a person or animal via a computer observing recordings of the target subject. However, the storage medium of the recording are VHS cassettes, stored in shelves taking up most of the lab, and the scientists store results on floppy discs. | |
Technology Marches On / int_15c6ea92 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_15c6ea92 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Wonder Woman (1987) (Comic Book) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_15c6ea92 | |
Technology Marches On / int_1765d186 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_1765d186 | comment |
A positive variant is depicted in The Magdalene Sisters, which the notorious Magdalene Asylums, de facto Irish gulags for women who didn't conform to local religious mores (like being raped), earned their main income from doing laundry which had to be done by hand in earlier years. Later, the first washing machines were installed and although the nuns and their prisoners didn't know it then, the very ubiquity of these relatively inexpensive and obviously practical appliances in personal residences would destroy the economic viability of those prisons. | |
Technology Marches On / int_1765d186 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_1765d186 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Magdalene Sisters | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_1765d186 | |
Technology Marches On / int_17af7793 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_17af7793 | comment |
In Trading Places, Louis Winthorpe tries to sell his watch at a pawnshop, mentioning how it's waterproof up to 3 atmospheres as proof of how top-of-the-line it is. Today, many watches are waterproof to as many as 50 atmospheres.note Although if you're that far underwater, you've got other things to worry about than 'What time is it?' | |
Technology Marches On / int_17af7793 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_17af7793 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Trading Places | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_17af7793 | |
Technology Marches On / int_22c338ea | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_22c338ea | comment |
The Lathe of Heaven. The year is 2002. A man can afford an egg maybe once a month, and it's been twenty years since any grain could be spared for making alcohol. Population, seven billion. | |
Technology Marches On / int_22c338ea | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_22c338ea | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Lathe of Heaven | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_22c338ea | |
Technology Marches On / int_22d87fc9 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_22d87fc9 | comment |
Intentionally used in That '70s Show. Eric makes clear to his parents that he wants a cassette player for his birthday, not eight-track, cassette. Of course, being out of touch with the latest technology, they get him an eight-track player, making his gift from Hyde (cassettes) worthless. | |
Technology Marches On / int_22d87fc9 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_22d87fc9 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
That '70s Show | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_22d87fc9 | |
Technology Marches On / int_2350acad | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_2350acad | comment |
There are at least two episodes of Cheers that exemplify this: The one where all of the barflies (and Lilith) get really, really excited when Sam buys a whopping (Cliff's wording) 32-inch TV for the bar. The one where Sam buys a used satellite dish and it's one of those giant things people would expect SETI to be using nowadays. |
|
Technology Marches On / int_2350acad | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_2350acad | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Cheers | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_2350acad | |
Technology Marches On / int_25305527 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_25305527 | comment |
When the .hack series debuted, MMORPGs were still in their infancy. The World, the MMO that the series revolves around, looks comparable to other MMOs released around the same time as .hack//Infection in 2002, even though the game takes place in the year 2010. For comparison, Final Fantasy XI was released the same year as Infection, while its modern successor, Final Fantasy XIV, was originally released in 2010. This could be justified, however, by the fact that, in the lore of .hack, development of MMOs stagnated for some time as a result of a devastating global computer virus in 2005. | |
Technology Marches On / int_25305527 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_25305527 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
.hack (Franchise) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_25305527 | |
Technology Marches On / int_2593d5ed | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_2593d5ed | comment |
In The Space Odyssey Series, by the year 3,000 humanity has developed technology to match song lyrics to the Ear Worm stuck in your head for you for a fee. Uh... it's called a search engine and it's free. | |
Technology Marches On / int_2593d5ed | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_2593d5ed | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Space Odyssey Series | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_2593d5ed | |
Technology Marches On / int_25d97c04 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_25d97c04 | comment |
The characters in the James Bond movie Tomorrow Never Dies had to repeatedly exposit what a GPS is, because in 1997 that was still obscure military technology. Nowadays, virtually every new car and cell phone has access to GPS. | |
Technology Marches On / int_25d97c04 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_25d97c04 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
James Bond (Franchise) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_25d97c04 | |
Technology Marches On / int_261c8d3f | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_261c8d3f | comment |
The Simpsons had the Simpson family using a CRT television from their 1989 premiere up until they transitioned to HD in early 2009, adding a new intro sequence that featured an HDTV in the end. Though, the show itself wouldn't have the family owning an HDTV till the next season. | |
Technology Marches On / int_261c8d3f | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_261c8d3f | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Simpsons | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_261c8d3f | |
Technology Marches On / int_26674ed5 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_26674ed5 | comment |
Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty has Mr. X give Raiden a phone, described in its description as an ordinary cellphone. However, it's an ordinary (good quality) cellphone as would be in 2001; by the real 2009, phone technology had gone in a broadly unexpected direction. The script actually notes this: Raiden stares at the cell phone (a current, therefore old, model). | |
Technology Marches On / int_26674ed5 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_26674ed5 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_26674ed5 | |
Technology Marches On / int_288ab9e4 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_288ab9e4 | comment |
Empress Theresa has one segment in which Theresa is given a call to adventure by a few Korean men who show her a videotape of a PBS documentary. The book was published in 2014, and Theresa happens to have a VCR player lying around. | |
Technology Marches On / int_288ab9e4 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_288ab9e4 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Empress Theresa | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_288ab9e4 | |
Technology Marches On / int_290d82d2 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_290d82d2 | comment |
Blood & Chocolate from 1997 has a werewolf hide in a workshop making film-printing machines, knowing rest of the pack won't even dare searching in a place full of silver dust. Notably the film adaptation, made mere ten years later in 2007, kept the plot point, but made the place closed and run-down. | |
Technology Marches On / int_290d82d2 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_290d82d2 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
BloodAndChocolate | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_290d82d2 | |
Technology Marches On / int_29950026 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_29950026 | comment |
Cellphones are present in Godzilla: The Series, but the designs are that of the old clam shell style with antennas, having aired from 1998 to 2000. | |
Technology Marches On / int_29950026 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_29950026 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Godzilla: The Series | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_29950026 | |
Technology Marches On / int_2dfc45f | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_2dfc45f | comment |
On Rescue 911, the prevalence of carbon monoxide poisonings looks weird to modern audiences because carbon monoxide alarms are about as common as fire alarms. There is cause and effect to this situation, though, as said poisonings were what led to demand for the development of an alarm that would detect carbon monoxide. For that matter it's a similar level of weirdness to see a story about someone becoming trapped under a garage door because the door did not have safety stop systems. In reality the amount of such occurrences in real life soon led to demand for mandatory implementation of safety stop systems including infra-red sensors and physical blockage sensors on all new garage doors. |
|
Technology Marches On / int_2dfc45f | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_2dfc45f | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Rescue 911 | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_2dfc45f | |
Technology Marches On / int_2e2efbf9 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_2e2efbf9 | comment |
Lampshaded in Back to the Future as Marty is in 1955: First, when Marty dines with his future maternal family, Lorraine asks whether his family owns a television set, to which Marty says, "Yeah, you know we have two of 'em...", making her younger brother say "Wow, you must be rich!", to which their mother says, "Oh, honey, he's just teasing you. Nobody owns two television sets!" Later, Marty tries to explain his knowledge of an episode of The Honeymooners as having seen it as a rerun. In several non-English dubs of the movie, the word 'rerun' doesn't exist (usually because the country concerned had not adopted the policy of re-airing episodes of television shows as of the mid-eighties), so Marty says instead that he saw "The Man from Space" episode of The Honeymooners "on tape". As the 1955 Doc looks at Marty's camcorder, he says "Now this is truly amazing: a portable television studio. No wonder your president is an actor, he's got to look good on television!" |
|
Technology Marches On / int_2e2efbf9 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_2e2efbf9 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Back to the Future | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_2e2efbf9 | |
Technology Marches On / int_31a48e8e | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_31a48e8e | comment |
The signature opening Control Voice lines for The Outer Limits (1963), about how "we are controlling transmission", specifically reference a number of technical glitches — misaligned images, blur, color distortion, rolling or flickering — that commonly afflicted early analog television sets. These days, glitches typically involve pixelation, scrambling, or judders between adjacent channels, and even the idea of "transmission", i.e. broadcasting, seems archaic in the era of cable, satellite, and streaming video. In addition, the opening monologue's most well-known lines are "we control the horizontal, we control the vertical". This referenced the fact that TVs of the era actually had controls that adjusted the vertical and horizontal width of an image, a feature that was dropped from TV sets by the end of the 1970s. | |
Technology Marches On / int_31a48e8e | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_31a48e8e | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Outer Limits (1963) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_31a48e8e | |
Technology Marches On / int_31ca9925 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_31ca9925 | comment |
The Dukes of Hazzard: "Double Sting," from the first season, sees Rosco using a large "field telephone" to communicate with Enos. The field telephone was typically used only by law enforcement (and in large cities, more populous counties and state agencies at that) and the very rich in 1979. Today, everyone – even in the most backwoods of communities – is using smartphones, perhaps video chat sites like Skype just like the rest of us. "Uncle Boss," taped in 1979 but aired during the third season, sees Boss Hogg's corrupt nephew, Hughie, introduce Boss and Rosco to the state-of-the-art technological marvel ... the video cassette recorder! Quite a bit of time is dedicated to explaining how one of these contraptions work. Although its purpose in the plot is to attempt to frame Bo and Luke for bank robbery (as a security camera is attached to the VCR), there may have been a subliminal message in it all – buy a VCR and you capture the Dukes on tape ... every week! In any case, the VCR has long met its match, and banks typically now use hard drives and hidden security cameras to monitor banks. In addition, note that Boss and Hughie hand-deliver the videotape with the incriminating evidence to the FBI ... but get detoured into a junkyard and are held up briefly by Cooter's magnet(!), which erases the tape; today, Boss could simply send the footage of his "bank robbery" to the FBI via a private Internet connection (such as file transfer protocol, or ftp, site), making his favorite scheme of hiring impersonators to pull off a "Duke boy bank robbery" even easier to accomplish without Bo and Luke even having a clue what's going on ... until federal authorities converge on the farm with warrants for their arrest. |
|
Technology Marches On / int_31ca9925 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_31ca9925 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Dukes of Hazzard | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_31ca9925 | |
Technology Marches On / int_331e009 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_331e009 | comment |
In the far future of Borderlands 2, storing data is still referred to as "taping." In Gaige's ECHO Logs, Gaige asks where the word came from. Axton claims it originally referred to physically taping something. Maya says that if he doesn't know, he shouldn't just make something up. | |
Technology Marches On / int_331e009 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_331e009 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Borderlands 2 (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_331e009 | |
Technology Marches On / int_3674320a | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_3674320a | comment |
In the original Carrusel, video games were not present at all. While this was Mexico in 1989-1990, the Brazilian 2012 remake did insert them, since it would no longer be credible to have a show about children's school and daily life without video games present in any way. | |
Technology Marches On / int_3674320a | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_3674320a | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Carrusel | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_3674320a | |
Technology Marches On / int_378832f5 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_378832f5 | comment |
Kevin Spencer: The episode "Blow Job" had the Spencers getting a HDTV as a result of Percy getting his dick shredded off by a paper shredder. Near the end, the TV gets blown away by a hurricane and the rest of the series has them use the CRT television they had since the beginning. The intro for the seventh season has Percy and Anastasia use a modern television, with Percy using a remote to change the intros. |
|
Technology Marches On / int_378832f5 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_378832f5 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Kevin Spencer | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_378832f5 | |
Technology Marches On / int_38662f0a | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_38662f0a | comment |
In 1981's Escape from New York, a monitor displays a 3D wireframe model of NYC as Snake lands his glider in the city. The filmmakers wanted to use an actual computer model, but since technology wasn't there yet at the budget they had, they compromised by building a physical miniature New York, outlining it with reflective tape, and filming the result. This was the budget option. | |
Technology Marches On / int_38662f0a | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_38662f0a | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Escape from New York | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_38662f0a | |
Technology Marches On / int_39fe00f1 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_39fe00f1 | comment |
Dragon Age: Inquisition: The main plot requires you to lay siege to a fortress that was built during the Second Blight some centuries earlier, and has an impressive track record against the darkspawn. Cullen, however, is quick to point out that the construction is antiquated and no match for modern siege engines, and Josephine has pulled strings to get you the services of a team of highly skilled sappers. | |
Technology Marches On / int_39fe00f1 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_39fe00f1 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Dragon Age: Inquisition (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_39fe00f1 | |
Technology Marches On / int_3a88889a | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_3a88889a | comment |
In The Victorian Way, a cooking show set in Victorian Britain, the recipes for frozen desserts are complicated for obvious reasons, and the host Mrs. Crocombe makes several mentions of the ice house on the property, and made a half-joking comment saying that the delivery man must have gone to Alaska itself for the ice because he's so late. In those times, the only way to procure ice outside of winter would be to go all the way to the Arctic and bring it back in heavily-insulated containers, and ice-selling businesses were a booming enterprise during the summer months. "Artificial" ice produced in factories didn't become a thing until the early 20th century, and it took a few decades for refrigeration technology to reach the point where people had refrigerators and freezers in their homes, at which point "natural" ice from up north became the bigger hassle. | |
Technology Marches On / int_3a88889a | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_3a88889a | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Victorian Way (Web Video) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_3a88889a | |
Technology Marches On / int_3ab621ef | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_3ab621ef | comment |
In Cloak & Dagger (1984), everyone calls the game cartridge with the hidden data a "tape". | |
Technology Marches On / int_3ab621ef | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_3ab621ef | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Cloak & Dagger (1984) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_3ab621ef | |
Technology Marches On / int_3bbb1a1b | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_3bbb1a1b | comment |
Nash Bridges' ultra-rare and expensive as a Renaissance sculpture Hemi 'Cuda is beaten senselessly in both drag racing and maneuverability by a modern Mitsubishi Evo. Any Evo since the late 1990s. Then add a few hundred dollars' worth of mechanical improvements for the Evo... | |
Technology Marches On / int_3bbb1a1b | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_3bbb1a1b | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Nash Bridges | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_3bbb1a1b | |
Technology Marches On / int_3c829b09 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_3c829b09 | comment |
Exactly what the coin-operated robot in A Grand Day Out is meant to be often goes over the heads of modern audiences. It's actually based on coin-operated prepayment meters of the kind that used to be common in UK households: Instead of electricity and gas use being remotely tracked and billed, homeowners would instead insert coins or tokens into the device to pay in advance for however much energy they were ready to use, with staff from the utility company periodically coming around to empty the machines. | |
Technology Marches On / int_3c829b09 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_3c829b09 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
A Grand Day Out | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_3c829b09 | |
Technology Marches On / int_435ad625 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_435ad625 | comment |
Played for laughs in Runaways (2017), where the teenage Molly finds the important message her parents left for her is on a VHS tape, and she stares at it like it's something from Mars. | |
Technology Marches On / int_435ad625 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_435ad625 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Runaways (2017) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_435ad625 | |
Technology Marches On / int_45c8acdc | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_45c8acdc | comment |
Computers are another common example. Take a look at, for instance, a Tic-Tac-Dough episode from 1979, when the Apple II computer was offered as a prize (worth $2,000-plus(!), counting the disk drives, monitor and printer that came with it) ... state of the art for the time with its 64K memory (expandable to double it), and people were truly excited about winning one. Today, it's a museum piece, and even low-end modern computers have several gigabytes of RAM. Commodore, Radio Shack and Texas Instruments also saw their computers given away as game show prizes (with and without the other items), and likewise, except for hobbyists, these computers have long since become obsolete. | |
Technology Marches On / int_45c8acdc | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_45c8acdc | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Tic-Tac-Dough | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_45c8acdc | |
Technology Marches On / int_4617a9f2 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_4617a9f2 | comment |
There's an episode of Married... with Children that goes around Al's desires to watch his favorite John Wayne movie Hondo that, according to him, airs every 17 years, and of course as he's Al Bundy he missed the film after getting trapped in a store due to a computer malfunction and then after getting knocked off by said computer. When he awakes he hears the channel advising that they schedule the film to be presented again... in 2011 (the episode aired in 1994). Nowadays modern audiences will have problems grasping the concept of not being able to watch a movie whenever they want. In fact, the joke was ruined almost immediately: Hondo got a VHS release a few months afterwards. | |
Technology Marches On / int_4617a9f2 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_4617a9f2 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Married... with Children | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_4617a9f2 | |
Technology Marches On / int_46518682 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_46518682 | comment |
Sesame Street: Around the mid-1980s, Oscar the Grouch owned a "grouch computer." The buzzword back then was "friendly computer," which simply meant easy to use; of course, with Oscar involved, the "friendly greetings" were replaced by "grouch" ones. Other Sesame Street residents (notably, Luis and Maria) also owned a computer. All segments with computers were used to teach basic computer skills and workings of computers. And of course, these were computers that were state-of-the-art for the era, at a time when they were far less common. | |
Technology Marches On / int_46518682 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_46518682 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Sesame Street | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_46518682 | |
Technology Marches On / int_48c2633f | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_48c2633f | comment |
When Repairman Jack first appeared in The Tomb, written in the early 1980s, Jack had to put in a lot of work to maintain his anonymity but still find customers and stay off the grid. Actually renting an office under an assumed name with nothing in it but a phone and an answering machine, multiple mail boxes under multiple names that he would check for mail daily, always using pay phones, etc. Jump ahead to the present day and he's ditched the office and the answering machine and the mail boxes and just uses a web page with a phone number and email address displayed, buys cheap no-plan phones that he pays cash for and replenishes the minutes with using prepaid credit cards, etc. | |
Technology Marches On / int_48c2633f | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_48c2633f | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Repairman Jack | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_48c2633f | |
Technology Marches On / int_492240cf | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_492240cf | comment |
One of MADtv (1995)'s earliest regular sketches was "Lowered Expectations", a video dating service for extremely maladjusted individuals. Despite being hilarious, the sketches quickly became dated due to the rise of online dating, which rendered video dating services obsolete. As a result, the sketch was quietly retired by the early 2000s. | |
Technology Marches On / int_492240cf | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_492240cf | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
MADtv (1995) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_492240cf | |
Technology Marches On / int_49a87cb3 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_49a87cb3 | comment |
Final Fantasy VII, despite having plenty of futuristic Magitek like giant robots and holographic arcade games, has Cloud owning a "PHS" and using it to contact the other party members. This was a stripped-down Asian cellular phone service based around CDMA technology aimed at the personal market, which had a reputation for only being used by children or poor people. PHS became obsolete around the time that anyone could get powerful mobile phone coverage for extremely cheap, and few people remember it even in its home market — in the West, where PHS was never used, it's Lost in Translation. The remake includes the PHS, but as a terminal in a laboratory that talks to other terminals. Cell phones appear to be common, but not used frequently in the slums, possibly due to lack of coverage. |
|
Technology Marches On / int_49a87cb3 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_49a87cb3 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Final Fantasy VII (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_49a87cb3 | |
Technology Marches On / int_4b713425 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_4b713425 | comment |
Lucky Starr: Earth has a population of six billion. Enough to be dependent on food imports from Mars and Venus. | |
Technology Marches On / int_4b713425 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_4b713425 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
LuckyStarr | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_4b713425 | |
Technology Marches On / int_4d4b75f6 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_4d4b75f6 | comment |
Used Cars' climax hinges, literally, on a license plate acting as a hinged flap to cover the gas filler which was centered on the rear of the car. That was somewhat common on '60s and '70s cars but abandoned because of safety issues. | |
Technology Marches On / int_4d4b75f6 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_4d4b75f6 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Used Cars | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_4d4b75f6 | |
Technology Marches On / int_4f6620a5 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_4f6620a5 | comment |
Earth: Final Conflict, produced in the late 20th century and set in the late 2010s/early 2020s, also used bulky CRT monitors in government buildings, corporate offices, and the Taelon Embassy, despite flat screens becoming cheaper and more ubiquitous late in the show's run. | |
Technology Marches On / int_4f6620a5 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_4f6620a5 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Earth: Final Conflict | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_4f6620a5 | |
Technology Marches On / int_55f5c3aa | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_55f5c3aa | comment |
Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdom: Shifted back a couple of millennia, but over the course of the campaign iron will replace bronze, and in turn be replaced by steel, bronzeware utensils will fall out of fashion and be replaced by lacquerware, charioteers will be replaced by mounted cavalrymen and paper will take over from wood as the writing material of choice. Also, things like irrigation, currency (first copper coins, later printed paper money), and new crops like tea and rice will appear over the course of the campaign. | |
Technology Marches On / int_55f5c3aa | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_55f5c3aa | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdom (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_55f5c3aa | |
Technology Marches On / int_56f7aab4 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_56f7aab4 | comment |
In the song Rapper's Delight by The Sugarhill Gang, Big Bank Hank brags about having a color TV, which is definitely nothing impressive by modern standards. | |
Technology Marches On / int_56f7aab4 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_56f7aab4 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Sugarhill Gang (Music) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_56f7aab4 | |
Technology Marches On / int_585e7a79 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_585e7a79 | comment |
UHF has an example in the title — back when the movie came out, TV stations on the UHF frequency band were infamous for largely being the home of low-budget, cheap and often weird TV, which made it perfect for "Weird Al" Yankovic to use as a vehicle for parodies. Nowadays, UHF is pretty much meaningless in the age of streaming, cable and the internet; Al lampshades this on the DVD Commentary, explaining how the advance of tech rendered the title confusing to younger people, and how he should've probably named it The Vidiot or Vidiots instead (Orion instead used that as the foreign title... only to add on the American name, making it The Vidiot from UHF, which Al absolutely hated). | |
Technology Marches On / int_585e7a79 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_585e7a79 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
UHF | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_585e7a79 | |
Technology Marches On / int_58794dba | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_58794dba | comment |
J.G. Ballard's Crash seems a bit dated in the way its characters eroticize car accidents, since it takes place at a time when not only was automotive design more self-consciously sexual, people did not generally wear seat beltsnote The main character is only wearing his in his own accident near the beginning of the book because he wanted to keep his secretary, whom he was ending an affair with, from embracing him as he drove off. even though they were available, and airbags were not included in cars either, making the possibility of serious injury or death in a car crash more likely. | |
Technology Marches On / int_58794dba | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_58794dba | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Crash | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_58794dba | |
Technology Marches On / int_5ada53ed | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_5ada53ed | comment |
James Bond's Aston Martin DB5 was an exceptional vehicle... for the 1960s. 284hp may seem a lot (and 71bhp/L wouldn't be bad for a naturally aspirated engine today) until a turbocharged Ford Focus RS or Subaru Impreza WRX zips past. And it's a fourth of the price. The DB5, however, is still undeniably about 470 times cooler. How many wankers do you see rolling past with an ill-fitted trumpet exhaust on an Aston Martin? | |
Technology Marches On / int_5ada53ed | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_5ada53ed | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
James Bond | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_5ada53ed | |
Technology Marches On / int_5ae078da | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_5ae078da | comment |
At ECW November To Remember 95, November 18, 1995, during the Tommy Dreamer/Terry Funk vs. Raven/Cactus Jack main event, Dreamer hit Raven over the head with a VCR, then with the remote to the VCR, which would be much harder to find today. | |
Technology Marches On / int_5ae078da | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_5ae078da | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
ECW (Wrestling) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_5ae078da | |
Technology Marches On / int_5c897f4a | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_5c897f4a | comment |
Schlock Mercenary: Discussed when the company finally has a mission on Earth, one of the most heavily populated planets in the galaxy. Energy production and "agriculture" are so advanced that they can fit two-hundred billion people on the planet using only ten percent of the available landmasses (and some of the seas) for megacities that are measured in cubic kilometers instead of square kilometers. The remaining ninety percent of the land is preserved sort of like continent-sized national parks. | |
Technology Marches On / int_5c897f4a | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_5c897f4a | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Schlock Mercenary (Webcomic) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_5c897f4a | |
Technology Marches On / int_5d354f8 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_5d354f8 | comment |
In Red Dwarf, both the pilot's explanation for how Lister got caught with the cat, and the entire concept of the episode "Timeslides" hinge on the idea that, in the 22nd century, photos are taken on film and developed in a lab. | |
Technology Marches On / int_5d354f8 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_5d354f8 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Red Dwarf | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_5d354f8 | |
Technology Marches On / int_5e42de8e | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_5e42de8e | comment |
Stranger in a Strange Land has a plot point that hinges around a listening bug. The tiny recorder is described as the size of a cigarette lighter—and not the modern Bic a reader might assume—and uses a tiny spool of physical audio tape. Oh, and it's powered by a miniaturized nuclear reactor. Nowadays, the plot would likely involve hacking into a smart device already in the home. | |
Technology Marches On / int_5e42de8e | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_5e42de8e | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Stranger in a Strange Land | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_5e42de8e | |
Technology Marches On / int_5e91c7a | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_5e91c7a | comment |
Resident Evil has typewriters acting as save points and a slide projection for a puzzle hint. The game takes place in 1998, which wouldn't make typewriters and slides look too out of place, but typewriters had already fallen out of common use by that point. It makes sense in the setting of the first game though, which took place in a seemingly abandoned old mansion, but the franchise kept using typewriters throughout the sequels, with many of them spread out throughout Raccoon City in Resident Evil 2 and Resident Evil 3: Nemesis.note The original intent of the typewriter in Resident Evil is probably lost on people that have only played the remake (which lacks the explanation): when saving, the character is making a hardcopy of everything that they've done up to that point in-universe, in case anyone investigating their disappearance happens to stumble across it. Basically the equivalent of writing notes to other characters. Resident Evil 5 would be the first game to abandon the typewriter system in favor of simply having auto-saves after each checkpoint. Resident Evil 7 did away with auto-saves, but didn't bring typewriters back; instead, saving is done in tape recorders. | |
Technology Marches On / int_5e91c7a | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_5e91c7a | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Resident Evil (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_5e91c7a | |
Technology Marches On / int_5ec3a015 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_5ec3a015 | comment |
An episode of Adventures in Wonderland features Alice wanting to watch a show, but she has to do her homework. A modern viewer might wonder why she doesn't just watch it on demand, while others might wonder why she didn't just record it. Even in the early 90s, when a VCR was commonplace in a lot of households like this, she might not have had a blank tape available. | |
Technology Marches On / int_5ec3a015 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_5ec3a015 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Adventures in Wonderland | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_5ec3a015 | |
Technology Marches On / int_60e46d26 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_60e46d26 | comment |
In a MAD article about the 50 worst things about the Internet, one panel showed a family huddled around their computer watching a movie on Netflix on their tiny monitor, while their large beautiful flatscreen TV sat in the background collecting dust. The issue came out in 2009; nowadays there are several ways to watch streaming video through your TV (even back then, the family could have used an HDMI cable to plug the computer into the TV if they really wanted to). In fact, most newer TVs now have online connectivity, eliminating the need for a middleman altogether. | |
Technology Marches On / int_60e46d26 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_60e46d26 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
MAD (Magazine) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_60e46d26 | |
Technology Marches On / int_627b3897 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_627b3897 | comment |
On Everybody Loves Raymond, when Ray gets a satellite dish with all the sports packages to help with his job as a sports reporter, everyone in the neighborhood (including his parents) starts acting nicer towards both Ray himself and Debra, so they can come over to their house and watch TV. | |
Technology Marches On / int_627b3897 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_627b3897 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Everybody Loves Raymond | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_627b3897 | |
Technology Marches On / int_64c3d70a | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_64c3d70a | comment |
Lee Brice's single "Upper Middle Class White Trash" includes the lines "You ain't seen nothin', if you ain't seen, NASCAR on a 50-inch plasma screen." The song was released in 2008, when TVs that big where still seen as a luxury. | |
Technology Marches On / int_64c3d70a | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_64c3d70a | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Lee Brice (Music) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_64c3d70a | |
Technology Marches On / int_66394ca4 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_66394ca4 | comment |
The iconic intro to Neuromancer, "The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel", is somewhat spoiled by the fact that on many modern TVs, the color you see when you turn your TV to a dead channel is bright blue. (In 1984 when the book was written, it would have been an ugly gray static.) This is referenced and lampshaded in the first line of Neil Gaiman's book Neverwherenote (Well, the first edition, at least. The "Author's Preferred Text" version doesn't include it.): "The sky was the perfect blue of a television, turned to a dead channel." Same in Robert Sawyer's Wake: "The sky above the island was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel - which is to say it was a bright, cheery blue". And even that's an anachronism because modern video monitors default to black (or just power down outright) when no signal is present. Although, DirecTV and its sister service U-Verse use a blue screen to depict channels you don't get. Amusingly, the original line can still work, but as a critique of Case's over-urbanized attitude rather than of the city's pollution. As initially conceived, it makes it sound like the sky is horribly contaminated; in the era of "dead" channels being blue, it sounds like it's actually a gorgeous day outside, that anybody but Case would find an exhilarating feat of Nature, but his bad attitude and technophilia can only compare to freaking television. |
|
Technology Marches On / int_66394ca4 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_66394ca4 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Neuromancer | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_66394ca4 | |
Technology Marches On / int_67dee1b8 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_67dee1b8 | comment |
The cover art for Roger Waters' Amused to Death depicts a chimpanzee staring at an eyeball on a CRT TV. While the TV looks standard for the album's 1992 release date, the 2015 remaster replaces it with a new cover depicting a baby staring at an LCD monitor to address how televisions had changed in the intervening 23 years. | |
Technology Marches On / int_67dee1b8 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_67dee1b8 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Roger Waters (Music) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_67dee1b8 | |
Technology Marches On / int_6a4c8f1b | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_6a4c8f1b | comment |
One-Punch Man has an internal version with remarkable turnaround time. In the original manga (both ONE's webcomic and the Yusuke Murata remake), published in 2013, Saitama and Genos' mail is delivered via air drop because City Z is considered too dangerous for mail carriers to visit. In the Animated Adaptation, released in 2015, this is changed to a mail drone. | |
Technology Marches On / int_6a4c8f1b | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_6a4c8f1b | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
One-Punch Man (Webcomic) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_6a4c8f1b | |
Technology Marches On / int_6ea7e95c | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_6ea7e95c | comment |
The 8-Bit Guy - Discussed in "What Happened to America's Electronics Stores." The demise of electronic stores such as Radio Shack, Circuit City, and Fry's Electronics can be attributed in part to the existence of modern smartphones. | |
Technology Marches On / int_6ea7e95c | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_6ea7e95c | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The 8-Bit Guy (Web Video) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_6ea7e95c | |
Technology Marches On / int_707b2eff | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_707b2eff | comment |
Make Room! Make Room! (the book on which Soylent Green is loosely based): the year is 1999. As stated in the book: | |
Technology Marches On / int_707b2eff | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_707b2eff | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Make Room! Make Room! | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_707b2eff | |
Technology Marches On / int_74149a97 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_74149a97 | comment |
In Red Dragon, the killer works as a film developer for home movies, a profession now decades obsolete. The film updates this to him working in film-to-video transfer... another profession that, if not yet completely obsolete, is now so obscure that it's a story-breaker: if both victimized families had been having old filmstrips transferred to video, the FBI's investigators would have noted this incongruity as an immediate common link without the profilers' help. | |
Technology Marches On / int_74149a97 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_74149a97 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Red Dragon | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_74149a97 | |
Technology Marches On / int_76af8266 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_76af8266 | comment |
In the Ned's Newt episode "Et Tu, Newte?", Ned mentions that, while sleeping over at the Plucks' place, he and Doogle rented "Frankenstein Goes Head-Curling Part 2: The Final Bonspiel" on DVD, then Doogle spent the rest of the night trying to figure out how to rewind it. This was due to the fact that the DVD format was new at the time, and most people still owned VHS tapes. | |
Technology Marches On / int_76af8266 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_76af8266 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Ned's Newt | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_76af8266 | |
Technology Marches On / int_7ad62e34 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_7ad62e34 | comment |
Later, Marty tries to explain his knowledge of an episode of The Honeymooners as having seen it as a rerun. In several non-English dubs of the movie, the word 'rerun' doesn't exist (usually because the country concerned had not adopted the policy of re-airing episodes of television shows as of the mid-eighties), so Marty says instead that he saw "The Man from Space" episode of The Honeymooners "on tape". | |
Technology Marches On / int_7ad62e34 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_7ad62e34 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Honeymooners | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_7ad62e34 | |
Technology Marches On / int_7c4f1adb | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_7c4f1adb | comment |
Our Miss Brooks: A particularly glaring example of Technology Marches On occurs in the episode "The Tape Recorder". Walter Denton causes trouble by purchasing an outrageously expensive tape recorder ($385 in 1950 funds!) for Madison High School — in the grips of Mr. Conklin's latest economy drive. A circa 1950 tape recorder, incidentally, isn't a small device, but one of the huge reel-to-reel affairs seen here. Hilarity ensues as Miss Brooks and Mr. Conklin are forced to explain the purchase to school board head Mr. Stone. Even more Hilarity Ensues when the records Walter Denton made are played back in a mixed-up state. | |
Technology Marches On / int_7c4f1adb | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_7c4f1adb | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Our Miss Brooks (Radio) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_7c4f1adb | |
Technology Marches On / int_7f069934 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_7f069934 | comment |
The remake includes the PHS, but as a terminal in a laboratory that talks to other terminals. Cell phones appear to be common, but not used frequently in the slums, possibly due to lack of coverage. | |
Technology Marches On / int_7f069934 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_7f069934 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Final Fantasy VII Remake (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_7f069934 | |
Technology Marches On / int_89bf8ce | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_89bf8ce | comment |
Beepers were parodied in the 2006 series 30 Rock via character Dennis Duffy the "Beeper King" who just knew that they would make a comeback. | |
Technology Marches On / int_89bf8ce | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_89bf8ce | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
30 Rock | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_89bf8ce | |
Technology Marches On / int_8a3a1edd | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_8a3a1edd | comment |
In an episode of Saved by the Bell, Bayside High decided to put their yearbooks on videotapes. Good luck to them finding a VCR to play them on in the 21st century, as the last one was manufactured in July 2016. | |
Technology Marches On / int_8a3a1edd | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_8a3a1edd | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Saved by the Bell | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_8a3a1edd | |
Technology Marches On / int_8c771896 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_8c771896 | comment |
The creators of 9½ Weeks seems to have wanted us to be impressed with how John sets up the famous striptease scene using his CD player, and indeed that probably was the first time someone used one in an American film. Today it looks quaint. | |
Technology Marches On / int_8c771896 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_8c771896 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
9½ Weeks | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_8c771896 | |
Technology Marches On / int_8dea9503 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_8dea9503 | comment |
A notable example of the ubiquity of curved CRT screens in the future is 2010: The Year We Make Contact, which used small CRTs everywhere on the sets for the Discovery. (This is especially ironic as Stanley Kubrick used rear-projection to accomplish the illusion of flatscreen monitors for the same ship in 2001: A Space Odyssey.) | |
Technology Marches On / int_8dea9503 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_8dea9503 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
2010: The Year We Make Contact | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_8dea9503 | |
Technology Marches On / int_8dfbdff2 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_8dfbdff2 | comment |
On an older episode of Law & Order Lenny got a lead by looking at the victim's pager. Remember pagers? | |
Technology Marches On / int_8dfbdff2 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_8dfbdff2 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Law & Order | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_8dfbdff2 | |
Technology Marches On / int_8e0312e6 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_8e0312e6 | comment |
RuPaul's Drag Race: In the first six seasons, each episode would begin with "You've Got She-Mail," a brief video clip where Ru would give the contestants hints towards that week's main challenge. It was a pun on America Online's famous "You've got mail" alert. Even though the soundbite was removed from the show following complaints from transgender viewers ("she-male" is a slur against trans women), it had another problem: it was dated. Even in 2009 when Drag Race first premiered, AOL had already faded to irrelevance as users had jumped ship en masse for broadband. Young people watching (or competing on) the show might not even remember when "You've got mail" was in its heyday. | |
Technology Marches On / int_8e0312e6 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_8e0312e6 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
RuPaul's Drag Race | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_8e0312e6 | |
Technology Marches On / int_91103245 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_91103245 | comment |
In The Stars My Destination, tattoo removal becomes a plot point. The main character needs to remove a clearly identifying facial tattoo forced on him by a Cargo Cult, and the removal process involved bleaching out the tattoo by injecting acid into his skin while he is awake and screaming. The book was written in 1957 – three years before the invention of the laser, let alone laser tattoo removal, but nearly a decade after lidocaine became available and more than five decades since procaine (aka Novocain) was first developed. | |
Technology Marches On / int_91103245 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_91103245 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Stars My Destination | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_91103245 | |
Technology Marches On / int_91cf7917 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_91cf7917 | comment |
Foundation Series. Trantor needs twenty agricultural worlds to feed its forty billion people. That works out to each one feeding two billion on Trantor. Or less, as later sources indicate that Trantor synthesizes a significant amount of food locally, as well. For planets specifically designated as “agricultural,� surpluses which feed just two billion people each (if that!) seem downright paltry. On a related note, Trantor is a single, planet-wide city, reaching down hundreds or thousands of levels below the surface. To see the sky requires visiting special observation towers. (Wait, then why not grow crops on the surface?) If the planet is roughly equivalent to Earth, that amount of space is preposterously massive – even for 40 billion people. For comparison, 95% of the current 8 billion people on Earth live on 10% of the land. That includes cities which cover 3%, and less densely populated areas for the other 7%. So Earth’s population is 20% of Trantor’s, but covers only about 10% of the available land. And most of that is not cities. And that’s all relative to land area – relative to total surface area, it’s even less. So for the math to work out, Trantor must be one dinky little planet. But that raises questions about gravity… Compounding the problem even more, Asimov was self-admittedly bad at scale, and bad at remembering how many people were supposed to live on Trantor. Depending on which book you’re reading, its population varies from 40 billion to 4 trillion. (With 4 trillion, the average agricultural planet feeds up to 200 billion Trantorians. Unrealistic as hell for here and now, but for sci-fi, sure why not.) |
|
Technology Marches On / int_91cf7917 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_91cf7917 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Foundation Series | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_91cf7917 | |
Technology Marches On / int_92ef018a | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_92ef018a | comment |
In Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Ferris' line "I asked for a car, I got a computer. How's that for being born under a bad sign?" seems strange today. A typical teen in 1986 wouldn't know what to do with a computer, but every teen in modern times would like his or her own private computer for social messaging, file sharing, and pornography. | |
Technology Marches On / int_92ef018a | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_92ef018a | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Ferris Bueller's Day Off | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_92ef018a | |
Technology Marches On / int_9591f30c | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_9591f30c | comment |
In Time Bandits, the embodiment of evil explains that he knows better than the Supreme Being because he has knowledge of "Digital watches. Soon I shall have knowledge of video cassette recorders and car telephones. And when I understand those I shall understand computers. And when I understand computers I will be the Supreme Being." In 1981, those really were cutting edge and were meant to be. Now they can be considered evidence that Evil is a little out of touch. | |
Technology Marches On / int_9591f30c | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_9591f30c | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Time Bandits | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_9591f30c | |
Technology Marches On / int_95f45f6b | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_95f45f6b | comment |
In Shadowrun Returns: Dragonfall, obsolete tech becomes a plot point. Mysterious Employer Green Winters leaves behind a video diary on a series of DVDs, a medium which in the Shadowrun-verse is completely and utterly outdated. Finding a DVD player, a screen that has the right ports to accept input from a DVD player and someone who knows how to restore badly degraded DVDs becomes a major part of the plot. | |
Technology Marches On / int_95f45f6b | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_95f45f6b | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Shadowrun Returns / Videogame | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_95f45f6b | |
Technology Marches On / int_97abe183 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_97abe183 | comment |
A 2002 episode of The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius revolves around Jimmy traveling back in time to make his parents rich so he could purchase a set of print encyclopedias, which still existed when the episode was written, but the writing was on the wall for their obsolescence by a free alternative. | |
Technology Marches On / int_97abe183 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_97abe183 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_97abe183 | |
Technology Marches On / int_9b412c87 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_9b412c87 | comment |
Little Fuzzy: Jack Holloway records the activities of the Fuzzies, then has to spend hours developing the film. Written a few decades before digital photography became common. | |
Technology Marches On / int_9b412c87 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_9b412c87 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Little Fuzzy | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_9b412c87 | |
Technology Marches On / int_9f78fda3 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_9f78fda3 | comment |
On Murder, She Wrote, Jessica's practice of recording audio versions of her novels was slated to be discontinued, because her publisher claimed there weren't enough blind people to maintain demand. A somewhat reasonable argument in the 1980s when a complete unabridged audiobook would fill four to six cassettes and a Walkman's batteries were only good for a couple of hours, but even at the time the idea that only the visually impaired had any use for books on tape would have been dubious, and by the time MP3 players started to become commonplace it was flatly absurd. Discontinuing accessible versions of her books because disabled people weren't a profitable enough marketing demographic wouldn't be received too well these days either, for that matter. | |
Technology Marches On / int_9f78fda3 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_9f78fda3 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Murder, She Wrote | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_9f78fda3 | |
Technology Marches On / int_9fc0dbb7 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_9fc0dbb7 | comment |
While a period piece, in The Grapes of Wrath the Joads have to deal with a broken transmission — they have to find an old one in a junkyard and then install it themselves with only basic hand tools, something only the most hardcore car guys would attempt on a do-it-yourself basis and would require at least a hoist in any post-World War II vehicle. | |
Technology Marches On / int_9fc0dbb7 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_9fc0dbb7 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Grapes of Wrath | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_9fc0dbb7 | |
Technology Marches On / int_a04b0ca3 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_a04b0ca3 | comment |
Tintin: In the original 1930s version of The Black Island, Tintin is shocked to enter a room and discover the source of the noises he heard is "...a television set!?!" It looks quite Hilarious in Hindsight to later readers, which is probably why the 1960s reprinting changed his line to "It's only a television set!" | |
Technology Marches On / int_a04b0ca3 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_a04b0ca3 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Tintin (Franchise) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_a04b0ca3 | |
Technology Marches On / int_a4dabf68 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_a4dabf68 | comment |
Speaking of music devices, one Sale of the Century shopping-level prize was a $12,000 video jukebox. Users deposited their money into the jukebox and chose one of several selections which the machine would pick out and play on the video screen. They date back to the 1940s and have seen several evolutions over the years, from the 1940s Soundies on black-and-white 16mm film, to the 1960s Scopitones on color 16mm film, to the 1980s Rowe International videocasette jukeboxes offered on Sale of the Century, to the current models that stream videos via WiFi and are much more compact than the physical-media-based models of old. | |
Technology Marches On / int_a4dabf68 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_a4dabf68 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Sale of the Century | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_a4dabf68 | |
Technology Marches On / int_a796bde8 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_a796bde8 | comment |
In Metal Gear Solid, Psycho Mantis's television-breaking powers imitate the Video mode on a specific brand of '90s Sony CRT TVs, making the holdover quite odd when they reappear with Mantis's Continuity Cameo in Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes, a game released on consoles made primarily for HDMI output. | |
Technology Marches On / int_a796bde8 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_a796bde8 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Metal Gear Solid (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_a796bde8 | |
Technology Marches On / int_a849cfab | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_a849cfab | comment |
In James Blish's Cities in Flight series, written in the 1960s, the galactic economy runs on germanium as a treasured metal. Because it's essential to electronics. In a more subtle example, it is mentioned in the first volume that it is impossible to have complex electronics on Jupiter at a depth where other machines are shown to successfully operate. This is likely because the pressure would crush vacuum tubes. | |
Technology Marches On / int_a849cfab | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_a849cfab | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Cities in Flight | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_a849cfab | |
Technology Marches On / int_a8729c90 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_a8729c90 | comment |
An early episode of The Fairly OddParents!, "The Switch Glitch", has Vicky blackmail Timmy with a tape recorder. Tape recorders were used well into the Turn of the Millennium, but by the turn of The New '10s, they'd fall out of favor. | |
Technology Marches On / int_a8729c90 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_a8729c90 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Fairly OddParents! | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_a8729c90 | |
Technology Marches On / int_ac03a2dd | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_ac03a2dd | comment |
This line in the song "Somewhere That's Green" from Little Shop of Horrors gets funnier with each passing year: | |
Technology Marches On / int_ac03a2dd | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_ac03a2dd | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Little Shop of Horrors (Theatre) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_ac03a2dd | |
Technology Marches On / int_ac58f5fa | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_ac58f5fa | comment |
An inventor in The Dead Past by Isaac Asimov demonstrates his newest gadget, a time viewer. He turns on the monitor, then warns his impatient colleague to "let it warm up." When the story was written, televisions used vacuum tubes and frequently took 30 seconds to a minute to display a picture after being turned on. | |
Technology Marches On / int_ac58f5fa | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_ac58f5fa | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Dead Past | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_ac58f5fa | |
Technology Marches On / int_ad97534 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_ad97534 | comment |
One of the Alien Nation TV movies had people using CRT monitors well after flatscreen monitors had become cheap and readily available in the real world. This was deliberate on the part of the filmmakers... while they were still using CRT monitors, they were using much more advanced interface devices and streaming video was slightly ahead of where it is even today, several years later. This was to highlight that technology had developed in entirely different ways due to the Newcomers. | |
Technology Marches On / int_ad97534 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_ad97534 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Alien Nation | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_ad97534 | |
Technology Marches On / int_af21d690 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_af21d690 | comment |
Before the days of digital cable and satellite, in order to know what was on television, one either had to wait for information on a particular channel to roll by on a repeating scroll (such as the Prevue channel, which became the TV Guide Channel at the Turn of the Millennium), or use the listings in the local newspaper or the print-copy of TV Guide. As digital cable became more and more prevalent, cable and satellite providers began adding interactive guides, which let consumers look at listings themselves, often much further out than the old rolling scrolls did. This digitalization is also what made it possible for high-speed Internet to come to more and more homes. | |
Technology Marches On / int_af21d690 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_af21d690 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
TV Guide (Magazine) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_af21d690 | |
Technology Marches On / int_af593042 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_af593042 | comment |
Assuming the first part of the Day of the Barney Trilogy takes place in 1996, and the second part takes place in 2002-2003, the third part of the trilogy would take place sometime around 2023-2024, when children's programming on free-to-air TV has largely died out in favor of streaming services and the internet, rendering Barney's plan to brainwash children through hijacking free-to-air television broadcasts largely ineffective by today's standards. | |
Technology Marches On / int_af593042 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_af593042 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Day of the Barney Trilogy / Fan Fic | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_af593042 | |
Technology Marches On / int_b0b22636 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_b0b22636 | comment |
Even though Wheel of Fortune switched to an electronic puzzleboard in 1997, people still refer to the letters being "turned" as if they were still physical trilons. | |
Technology Marches On / int_b0b22636 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_b0b22636 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Wheel of Fortune | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_b0b22636 | |
Technology Marches On / int_b24f49ab | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_b24f49ab | comment |
Seen in a 2015 era antique store in Back to the Future Part II: Funnily enough, the Dustbuster continues to enjoy popularity and has even taken on Brand Name Takeover. And paper books may be on their way out, dust-proof or otherwise. |
|
Technology Marches On / int_b24f49ab | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_b24f49ab | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Back to the Future Part II | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_b24f49ab | |
Technology Marches On / int_b618b457 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_b618b457 | comment |
The famous quote from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy that humans are so primitive "they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea." Funny in the late '70s, a bit baffling by the early '90s (they had marched on from being impractical high-tech gadgets to a commonplace item nobody would call "neat"), rather on-the-nose now. The radio adaptations in the mid-2000s had novelty ringtones instead. Not quite as dated yet. Douglas Adams defended the original line from a copy editor who wanted to modernise it to cellphones. According to Douglas, digital watches are inherently ridiculous (in the middle of a period defined by finding visual ways to show information clearly, we took the graphic display we'd had since medieval times and replaced it with a string of numbers, just because we could) in a way that cellphones aren't. As long as humanity continues to believe there's a point to digital watches, he considered the "pretty neat idea" dig valid. |
|
Technology Marches On / int_b618b457 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_b618b457 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_b618b457 | |
Technology Marches On / int_b6e84c40 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_b6e84c40 | comment |
Years before Skype and other no-cost proprietary voice-over-IP services, there were videophones. At least one episode of the 1980s version of High Rollers, which is uploaded to various video sharing sites, offers video phones (a $500 item) as a prize; it was touted as state-of-the-art way to see and hear the people you're talking to. Videophones differ in one key respect from all the other items in this entry in that nobody really wanted them. Video chat systems, the modern equivalent, are nothing like as popular as voice only or text chat. | |
Technology Marches On / int_b6e84c40 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_b6e84c40 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
High Rollers | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_b6e84c40 | |
Technology Marches On / int_bcadd7cb | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_bcadd7cb | comment |
Warhammer 40,000: Zig-zagged. On the one hand, hive cities easily reach populations in the billions, but the reason they exist is that they're the only habitable (sorta) places on the planet (usually a Death World, in desert, an ocean, or so polluted and/or radioactive even bionic systems only last a few minutes variants), so a planet of ten billion people has them in three or four hives. These get pretty much all their food from off-planets, with other worlds entirely devoted to agricultural production (using both mind-bogglingly advanced machinery and manual labor techniques medieval peasants would have laughed at). On the other hand Holy Terra is so densely populated that its soil is utterly barren and its atmosphere is a fog of pollution. Massive, labyrinthine edifices of state sprawl across the vast majority of the surface. Its oceans have long ago boiled away. Many mountain ranges have been leveled, perhaps all of them except the Himalayas, which seemingly remain all but untouched due to the laboratories said to be underneath and the chambers of the Astronomican that course throughout the whole mountain range. No specifics are given on the population anymore, just "billions", possibly at least a trillion depending on the source. |
|
Technology Marches On / int_bcadd7cb | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_bcadd7cb | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Warhammer 40,000 (Tabletop Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_bcadd7cb | |
Technology Marches On / int_bcb32dc6 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_bcb32dc6 | comment |
Shadowrun did not anticipate the advent of cultured meat, so soy is the main staple of the world's food supply, along with farmed krill. Nearly every possible permutation of food in the Sixth World has a soy substitute. Having regular access to natural food is rare enough that it merits being counted as a positive Lifestyle quality. It could be justified as the MegaCorps that control the world's food supply would want to make it as difficult as possible for people to get their meals from sources they don't control. | |
Technology Marches On / int_bcb32dc6 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_bcb32dc6 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Shadowrun (Tabletop Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_bcb32dc6 | |
Technology Marches On / int_bd310eaa | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_bd310eaa | comment |
In an El Goonish Shive comic from 2003, Ellen, Nanase, & Justin go to a video store to rent a movie. They meet Susan there, who invites them to watch it at her place. Also, said TV is thick enough that Ellen can sleep on it without immediately falling off. |
|
Technology Marches On / int_bd310eaa | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_bd310eaa | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
El Goonish Shive (Webcomic) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_bd310eaa | |
Technology Marches On / int_bf471bbe | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_bf471bbe | comment |
Men in Black II: Kids who grew up with DVDs and digitally downloaded movies probably won't get the locker-aliens' "Be Kind, Rewind" reference. The "Adult section in rear" gag, teens can probably figure out, though it also dates the picture. | |
Technology Marches On / int_bf471bbe | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_bf471bbe | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Men in Black II | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_bf471bbe | |
Technology Marches On / int_c0974a16 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_c0974a16 | comment |
Same in Robert Sawyer's Wake: "The sky above the island was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel - which is to say it was a bright, cheery blue". And even that's an anachronism because modern video monitors default to black (or just power down outright) when no signal is present. Although, DirecTV and its sister service U-Verse use a blue screen to depict channels you don't get. |
|
Technology Marches On / int_c0974a16 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_c0974a16 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
WWW Trilogy | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_c0974a16 | |
Technology Marches On / int_c40207f9 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_c40207f9 | comment |
A testament to how long Duke Nukem Forever spent in Development Hell comes from some early leaks and promotional material showing Duke possessing a media room... full of CRT screens that would have been very swanky in the late '90s and extremely dated when the game actually released in 2011. | |
Technology Marches On / int_c40207f9 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_c40207f9 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Duke Nukem Forever (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_c40207f9 | |
Technology Marches On / int_c6482e0b | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_c6482e0b | comment |
Journey into Space: In Journey to the Moon / Operation Luna, the Moon landing is broadcast to Earth over the radio on October 22, 1965. However, there is no mention of it being shown on television. When he wrote Journey to the Moon in 1953, Charles Chilton failed to anticipate how ubiquitous television would be by 1965. Since television was already very common in the UK by the time that Operation Luna was broadcast in 1958, it was already dated even then. | |
Technology Marches On / int_c6482e0b | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_c6482e0b | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Journey into Space (Radio) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_c6482e0b | |
Technology Marches On / int_cf98a034 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_cf98a034 | comment |
The protagonists in Ken Grimwood's Replay are stuck in a 25-year "Groundhog Day" Loop from 1963 to 1988, so it isn't surprising this pops up. The author had shown his work though, by pointing out that some devices could be procured before they caught on with the public (though they were expensive) there were appearances of the Wang 1200 and Sony VTR. The following quote happens in 1974: | |
Technology Marches On / int_cf98a034 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_cf98a034 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Replay | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_cf98a034 | |
Technology Marches On / int_d4b87479 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_d4b87479 | comment |
Lampshaded nicely in The Wedding Singer: Glenn brags about buying a CD player for around $1,000, and Julia promptly offers to get a record to play on it. | |
Technology Marches On / int_d4b87479 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_d4b87479 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Wedding Singer | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_d4b87479 | |
Technology Marches On / int_da02c1ef | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_da02c1ef | comment |
In Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, Mario can eavesdrop on crows in Twilight Town. One of them talks about how it's got a blazing fast Internet connection, at 100 Mbps. While still pretty decent today, back in 2004 when the game first came out, that kind of speed would've been downright luxurious. | |
Technology Marches On / int_da02c1ef | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_da02c1ef | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_da02c1ef | |
Technology Marches On / int_da2dd49e | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_da2dd49e | comment |
This is lampshaded in What We Do in the Shadows (the movie rather than the TV show) in that the main three vampires draw each other pictures of what the others look like when getting dressed to go out, but once they meet Nick and Stu (one a newly-turned vampire and the other his IT-guy friend), they are delighted to find that digital cameras and even webcams work for them. | |
Technology Marches On / int_da2dd49e | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_da2dd49e | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
What We Do in the Shadows | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_da2dd49e | |
Technology Marches On / int_daea1f62 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_daea1f62 | comment |
One Hour Photo was released in 2002 in the final days of film photography. Digital cameras completely took over once they became a standard feature on cell phones, and if the movie had come out even five years later, it would've needed a period setting to explain why people were still dropping off film cartridges to be developed into photos. | |
Technology Marches On / int_daea1f62 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_daea1f62 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
One Hour Photo | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_daea1f62 | |
Technology Marches On / int_db06439 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_db06439 | comment |
In the original print of Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret. by Judy Blume, Margaret is instructed in the proper use of a belt to secure her menstrual pad. The invention of menstrual pads with adhesive backing (something often taken for granted these days) had to wait until women's undergarments became snug enough for adhesive pads to be practical, which in turn required the invention of Spandex and cheaper methods of creating inexpensive fine-gauge cotton knits. | |
Technology Marches On / int_db06439 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_db06439 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret. | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_db06439 | |
Technology Marches On / int_dbf18509 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_dbf18509 | comment |
Speaking of Tic Tac Dough, each of those video screens on the big board was generated by its own Apple II, in stunning 16-color 40x40 lo-res graphics, with the nine Apples networked by an Altair 8800. Compare, at the time, the 1978-79 version of Jeopardy!, which still used printed cards on their big board! By 1984, when the Alex Trebek edition of Jeopardy! debuted, its 30-screen board made Tic Tac Dough's board look quaint by comparison. | |
Technology Marches On / int_dbf18509 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_dbf18509 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Jeopardy! | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_dbf18509 | |
Technology Marches On / int_dc29e4d0 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_dc29e4d0 | comment |
Your neighbors in Animal Crossing will sometimes ask you to retrieve items for them. Some of these items include VHS tapes, Game Boys, and the obscure Pokémon Pikachu device. All of these were pretty common back in 2002 when the game first released. Funny enough, the game runs in real time, so they'll still ask for these items nearly two decades after they've been rendered completely obsolete. Cranky Villagers also speak about e-mails as if they were an alien concept, when nowadays they are even more common than the hand-written letters the characters send. | |
Technology Marches On / int_dc29e4d0 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_dc29e4d0 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Animal Crossing (2001) (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_dc29e4d0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_dd3fe595 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_dd3fe595 | comment |
A passage in Atlas Shrugged (written in The '40s and The '50s and set in something like an alternate crapsack Diesel Punk universe) mentions a "super-color-four-foot-screen television set" being "erected" in a public park like it was some sort of monument. Four-foot screen would indeed look like a lot in The '50s, when the common size of a TV screen was more like four inches, but in the late New Tens 48" TVs are in the mass market niche already. | |
Technology Marches On / int_dd3fe595 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_dd3fe595 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Atlas Shrugged | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_dd3fe595 | |
Technology Marches On / int_dea18d47 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_dea18d47 | comment |
Central Park West had characters use a very primitive form of email (which had just been introduced into the workplace around the time the series was created), and didn't have any modern functions such as inactivity timeout, password protection or full text editor. A large part of stockbroker Gil Chase's storyline is that several characters (including his ex-girlfriend and a romantic rival) are able to access his email without any password and nearly destroy his reputation by playing havoc with his contacts. | |
Technology Marches On / int_dea18d47 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_dea18d47 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Central Park West | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_dea18d47 | |
Technology Marches On / int_df07d96e | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_df07d96e | comment |
In the pilot of Lois & Clark, the Kents' use of a fax machine was presented as evidence they weren't subject to the old-time "American Gothic" farmer stereotypes. Now it has the opposite effect of making them seem out-of-date. | |
Technology Marches On / int_df07d96e | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_df07d96e | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
LoisAndClark | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_df07d96e | |
Technology Marches On / int_df6c9f95 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_df6c9f95 | comment |
An episode of Airwolf revolved around a Vietnamese boy who might have been the son of Stringfellow's missing brother St. John, and the end of the episode has Archangel lamenting the fact that they may never know if the boy really is St. John's son and String's nephew. Within 10 years of that episode airing, taking a cheek swab of both would have answered that question in a few weeks. In the current day, with the technology that the Firm presumably would have access to, it could have been answered in a few hours. | |
Technology Marches On / int_df6c9f95 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_df6c9f95 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Airwolf | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_df6c9f95 | |
Technology Marches On / int_e5feb1e | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_e5feb1e | comment |
The Ace Attorney series tends to use technology more or less consistent with the time the games were made, despite generally being set 15-20 years in the future. By 2009, when Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth came out, DVDs were common enough that any security footage was presented on DVDs, even in the flashback case that took place chronologically earlier than any case in the series to that point... in 2012, still shortly in the future. Earlier games, however, frequently used VHS despite being set even later.note Ironically, VHS was actually used more than DVD for security systems even into the 2000s, as unlike a DVD a tape can be recorded to over and over. And while most security systems had switched to recording to hard drives by the time the games take place, a system still using tapes wasn't unheard of. So the older games are actually more correct! | |
Technology Marches On / int_e5feb1e | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_e5feb1e | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Ace Attorney (Franchise) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_e5feb1e | |
Technology Marches On / int_e936047a | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_e936047a | comment |
Barely 10 years after the series premier in of Hey Arnold! 1996, younger viewers seeing the show the first time would wonder what exactly Helga's father, the "Beeper King" of "Big Bob's Beepers", was selling. It doesn't help that the term "beeper" itself became less common than "pager". Even the show's original run slightly acknowledged their obsolence, later episodes calling the store "Big Bob's Beepers and Cellphones". The Jungle Movie goes in the opposite direction, showing Bob still only sells beepers even after Comic-Book Time has made smartphones omnipresent, his refusal to get with the times putting him in financial dire straits. | |
Technology Marches On / int_e936047a | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_e936047a | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Hey Arnold! | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_e936047a | |
Technology Marches On / int_ea4f62db | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_ea4f62db | comment |
The Family Guy episode "Brian & Stewie" has Brian and Stewie accidentally locked inside a bank vault and they spend the entire weekend trapped inside with no way to break out. Bank vaults usually have a button or other mechanism that allows people to open the door from the inside (not to mention every vault would have cameras inside, so the person watching the cameras could see something was wrong), which means the bank Brian and Stewie were at was extremely old with just as old architecture or they got trapped for the sake of drama and tension. | |
Technology Marches On / int_ea4f62db | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_ea4f62db | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Family Guy | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_ea4f62db | |
Technology Marches On / int_ef3b6e43 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_ef3b6e43 | comment |
In JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Eyes of Heaven Jotaro Kujo time travels from 1989 to 2011 to team up with his Kid from the Future, who's dealing with a villain that can steal people's memories and powers with special CD-ROMs. Jotaro... understandably doesn't know what a CD-ROM even is (even though the CD had already been out for seven years from Jotaro's perspective). | |
Technology Marches On / int_ef3b6e43 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_ef3b6e43 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Eyes of Heaven (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_ef3b6e43 | |
Technology Marches On / int_ef4fd083 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_ef4fd083 | comment |
The Brave Little Toaster has the Villain Song (of sorts) Cutting Edge where a bunch of new (at the time) appliances gloat about how advanced and trendy they are compared to the "obsolete" titular Toaster and his friends. The hilarious part is Toaster and his friends, a lamp, electric blanket, upright vacuum, and radio are all still in common use to this day thanks to their Simple, yet Awesome timeless usefulness... while the "cutting edge" appliances like the boombox, an Apple II-ish pc, land-line phone, and canister vacuum are dead-in-the-ground obsolete nowadays. | |
Technology Marches On / int_ef4fd083 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_ef4fd083 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Brave Little Toaster | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_ef4fd083 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f16ee232 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_f16ee232 | comment |
The Caves of Steel. Everyone lives in megacities, almost all the food is yeast, efficiency is necessary to the point of a personal cubicle in the communal bathroom being a luxury, and there is strict Population Control. Population? Eight billion. | |
Technology Marches On / int_f16ee232 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f16ee232 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
The Caves of Steel | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_f16ee232 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f26c58d6 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_f26c58d6 | comment |
In World in Conflict a Running Gag is Mike's inability to find batteries so he can show off a high-status gadget of his, a portable CD player. Granted, World in Conflict is a Period Piece set in 1989, but in the modern day, when CDs have gone the way of the dodo, it stands out. | |
Technology Marches On / int_f26c58d6 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f26c58d6 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
World in Conflict (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_f26c58d6 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f2e1b686 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_f2e1b686 | comment |
In Half in the Bag, Mike and Jay run a VCR repair store, and their main source of income is from Harry Plinkett, who they defraud and lie to in order to have him constantly return his VCR for repairs. | |
Technology Marches On / int_f2e1b686 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f2e1b686 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Half in the Bag (Web Video) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_f2e1b686 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f6f3857c | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_f6f3857c | comment |
Racing simulators such as Forza Motorsport and Gran Turismo often showcase the huge gap in automotive performance over the years. In Forza, for example, the roaring first-generation Mustang GT will get curb-stomped around a race track by a modern Ford hatchback due to the newer car's better power delivery, tires, and more advanced transmission. However, older cars often end up being more upgradeable due to their layout and simple design, allowing tuned muscle cars to thrash (lower-end) supercars around the track. | |
Technology Marches On / int_f6f3857c | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f6f3857c | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Forza Motorsport (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_f6f3857c | |
Technology Marches On / int_f72ec4f4 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_f72ec4f4 | comment |
Bananas: The humor of the scene where Mellish buys a bunch of magazines and the cashier loudly calls across the store asking a coworker for the price of Orgasm is completely lost on younger viewers since they were all born well after scanner-equipped cash registers and UPC codes made price checks unnecessary. | |
Technology Marches On / int_f72ec4f4 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f72ec4f4 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Bananas | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_f72ec4f4 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f74b5f80 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_f74b5f80 | comment |
The producers of Babylon 5 tried to hide their use of CRT monitors by embedding the screens in bulky, futuristic looking equipment with lots of lights and buttons. Unfortunately you can still see that the screens are curved, like the screens of CRT monitors in the early-mid 1990s. | |
Technology Marches On / int_f74b5f80 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f74b5f80 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Babylon 5 | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_f74b5f80 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f7c1b2d3 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_f7c1b2d3 | comment |
In a 1990 episode of Only Fools and Horses, Boycie gets a ridiculous free-standing satellite dish that is about five feet tall. It is so large that it ends up getting confused with an air traffic control dish stolen from Gatwick Airport. | |
Technology Marches On / int_f7c1b2d3 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f7c1b2d3 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Only Fools and Horses | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_f7c1b2d3 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f9742e61 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_f9742e61 | comment |
Appears in the Dragonriders of Pern series. The Skies of Pern, written in 2001, has cell phone-ish tech cropping into usage. All the Weyrs of Pern however, written in 1991, essentially has the Dragonriders saving the world by what amounts to handling ships' embedded electronics via console (Take That!, graphical interface!) because the "real" computers were removed millenia ago. Funny part is that lots of things that are only one notch above PIC but run OS-s used to support telnet terminal access are already here. | |
Technology Marches On / int_f9742e61 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_f9742e61 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Dragonriders of Pern | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_f9742e61 | |
Technology Marches On / int_fb9c177d | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_fb9c177d | comment |
The Transformers franchise has a few characters who in the original incarnation of the brand turned into at-the-time current technology, most famously Soundwave and his minions (who respectively turn into a (micro)cassette player and cassette tapes). Owing to the fact that no-one uses cassettes anymore, most new toys of the characters either refer to their alt-modes by different names or give them entirely new (or slightly different*such as Titans Return's "Spy Tablets") alt-modes entirely. | |
Technology Marches On / int_fb9c177d | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_fb9c177d | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Transformers (Franchise) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_fb9c177d | |
Technology Marches On / int_fd8221d2 | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_fd8221d2 | comment |
The use of double-spacing at the end of sentences. This is a holdover from the days of typewriters with their monospacing (where every character occupies the same amount of space), to help the period stand out. Such a necessity has long been rendered obsolete by digital word processors and just plain looks silly when used nowadays, but a lot of older typists (or younger ones taught by them), still use two spaces after periods. Even on this very wiki, though That Other Wiki and other MediaWiki-based wikis generally format pages so only one space is displayed even if more than one is typed into the code for the page. It's still a handy method for students to pad papers that are to be a certain number of pages long. Two spaces at the end of every sentence adds up. It's not just useful for padding, either: double-spacing at the ends of sentences helps to visually distinguish one sentence from the next. This makes proofreading their paragraphs slightly easier for the student, and assessment of the finished product's content and grammar significantly easier for the teacher. Especially a teacher whose eyes are already tired from scanning many other essays. And this practice continues to serve its original purpose if something is to be printed in Courier or another typewriter-like font. It's also a handy habit when texting or writing notes on a cell phone, as adding the second space after the end of a sentence will cause the text function to automatically insert a period. Ever proving the ancient maxim, "There's the right way, the wrong way, and the Army way," the U.S. Department of Defense (which shows up on this page in several places) still uses the "two space" rule in official correspondence, even though the proportional Times New Roman is the mandatory font, and still has instructions like "indent three spaces", which don't make much sense when using proportional fonts. Another typewriter holdover is the practice of using all-caps for emphasis or work titles due to italic type being either unavailable or impractical to use on the fly as it required changing the typebars (or typeball in an IBM Selectric) from non-italics to italics then back again. Even with software making italics quick and easy to use, older typists will often still SUDDENLY SHOUT in places where italics would be more appropriate. |
|
Technology Marches On / int_fd8221d2 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_fd8221d2 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Wikipedia (Website) | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_fd8221d2 | |
Technology Marches On / int_ffc6c28f | type |
Technology Marches On | |
Technology Marches On / int_ffc6c28f | comment |
An instructor in Starship Troopers was blinded in combat. Towards the end of his class, he feels the watchface to see how much time is left. Maybe he couldn't afford a talking watch.note Although braille watches are still being manufactured and sold in 2017, so it may have been simple personal preference. Soon, it's likely that readers will be asking why he didn't get prosthetic eyes. | |
Technology Marches On / int_ffc6c28f | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Technology Marches On / int_ffc6c28f | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Starship Troopers | hasFeature |
Technology Marches On / int_ffc6c28f |
The following is a list of statements referring to the current page from other pages.
Copyright of DBTropes.org wrapper 2009-2013 DFKI Knowledge Management. Imprint. - Thanks to Bakken&Baeck for hosting. Contact.
Copyright of data TVTropes.org contributors under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.
Copyright of data TVTropes.org contributors under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.