Predicting the Future (of Reality Computing)

Think of the many times that literature and other art forms have correctly predicted future technology advances.

• Jules Verne’s 20,00 Leagues Under the Sea, published in 1870, was set in a submarine.
• George Orwell’s novel 1984 with Big Brother (published in 1949) foreshadowed today’s world of internet tracking, ubiquitous CCTV cameras, and NSA's secret surveillance programs.
• The 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey featured tablet computers (and a clip from the movie was even submitted as evidence during the 2011 intellectual property lawsuit between Apple and Samsung).
• Don’t forget Marty McFly’s hoverboard in Back to the Future Part 2 (1989), driverless cars in Total Recall (1990), and a gesture-based user interface in Minority Report (2002).
• And although we’re all still waiting for the Jetson’s flying car, the 1962 cartoon did feature many aspects of current technology, from flatscreens and video chatting, to mobile devices and interactive media.

 

Has Reality Computing technology been predicted by past authors or screenwriters? At least one author did: Cory Doctrow.

His novel Makers (released in 2009, but written in the aftermath of the dotcom crash) is a near-future imagining about two friends working from a garage that invent a cure for obesity, crowd-sourced theme parks, and…easy 3D printing! Check out this passage from the beginning of Part 1, that perfectly describes the capture, compute, and create aspects of Reality Computing.

In the passage, the inventor-entrepreneurs are demonstrating how they create some of their unique artwork to a technology reporter. First they use a 3D scanning machine to scan a Barbie Doll head (capture), then they drape a bitmap version of a Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom soup label (of all things!) over Barbie’s digital head (compute), and finally use a 3D printer to produce the finished artwork (create).

As an aside, you may enjoy reading the whole book, which one review describes as “a combination of business strategy, brilliant product ideas and laugh-out-loud moments of insight [that] will keep readers powering through this quick-moving tale.” The novel can be downloaded for free from the author's website (using a Creative Commons license agreement) and also has been published in traditional paper form.