Star Trek Beat Us To It

 

Tablet computers and mini tablet computers are all the rage this year.  That is, of course, if you believe the advertisements from the big department stores and electronic megastores.  Those coveted front pages are jammed with the latest must have devices.  Seeing this, all I could think about was how Star Trek beat us to it.

This is not a new thing.  I am sure William Shatner did a television show about this (It couldn't have been a movie).  Science fiction has usually predicted things long before they came about.  In fact, I would argue that science fiction shaped the way things turned out.  We all watched them use hand held computers on that TV show, so that's what they built.  If not for the incredible works of William Gibson, the internet might be a bland, monochromatic land of information (as opposed to the multi-coloured, multi-formatted, multi-everything you want and don't want kind of place it is now--I am trying not to focus on the huge pile of useless crap it contains)

So, Star Trek beat us to it.  For non fans, or Star Wars fans, this might anger you.  That probably doesn't stop you from using these devices, so stop your bellyaching.  The technology exists, and there is no way that genie is getting back in the bottle.

I have always loved science fiction, or speculative fiction as Harlan Ellison would rather have it called.  I have enjoyed tales of intergalactic empires, interstellar travel and battles, and of course interspecies love and trouble.  I have let my imagination wander those stellar pathways.  Now, I just wonder when we are going to get the other stuff that science fiction has promised.