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"What television does is rent us friends and relatives who are quite satisfactory. This is quite something, to rent artificial friends and relatives right inside the house."
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This is a good prediction of the idea of an "ankle bracelet" - a device that is used to ensure that people on house arrest really do stay in their houses.
The first officially sanctioned use of ankle bracelets (or ankle monitors) occurred in 1983, under Judge Jack Love in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
It's also interesting that Dick mentions the idea of "telepathic content" to find out more about the subject than just location. Ankle monitors today can accurately report alcohol use, by sampling the subject's perspiration; results are reported via the Internet to police monitors. The device is called a SCRAM (Secure Continuous Remote Alcohol Monitor), and they've been used in Florida for DWI and domestic-violence cases. They are made by Colorado-based Alcohol Monitoring Systems Inc. and cost $100 each to set up and $12 a day to operate. Much cheaper than jail, for you taxpayers.
It's likely that the actual impetus for the development of the ankle bracelet or ankle monitor comes from the Spider man comic books:
He struck an arrangement with a computer salesman to develop the devices, which were introduced in New Mexico in 1983. They proved to work well, and a similar device was then developed in Florida a year or two later.
Both tests were successful, and the product then went national, leading to the current arrangement today.
Compare to the Wrist Search Display from A Matter of Size (1934) by Harry Bates,
Wireless Wrist Intercom from The Shape of Things To Come (1936) by H.G. Wells,
Reserve Bracelet from Plague (1944) by Murray Leinster,
Wristband Viewer from Changeling (1980) by Roger Zelazny,
Implant-Watch from Cloak of Anarchy (1972) by Larry Niven,
Predator Wrist Display from Predator (1987) by John McTierna,
Wrist Command from Tides of Light (1989) by Gregory Benford,
Tracking Bracelet from Shadowspeer (1990) by Patricia Jo Clayton,
Inertial Bracelet from Psychohistorical Crisis (2001) by Donald Kingsbury,
Command Bracelet from Sagramanda (2006) by Alan Dean Foster and the
Wristpad from New York 2140 (2017) by Kim Stanley Robinson.
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Science Fiction
Timeline
Brin's 1990 Novel Earth Still Full Of Predictions
'... making the point that their likenesses, every move they made, were being transmitted.'
Gaia - Why Stop With Just The Earth?
'But the stars are only atoms in larger space, and in that larger space the star-atoms could combine to form living matter, thinking matter, couldn't they?'
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'...to build up a video picture would require, say, ten million decisions every second. Mike, you're so fast I can't even think about it. But you aren't that fast.'
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'The area affected was five hundred kilometres across, and perfectly circular.'
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'And he had been sent with troops, supplies and bombs to command Russia's most trusted post, the Moonbase.'
Vast Apartment Living Will Get Even More Vast
'What is your population', I asked. 'About eighty millions.'
NASA Wants Self-Driving Or Remote-Controlled Vehicles For Lunar Astronauts
'THE autobus turned silently down the wide street of Hydropole. Robot-guided, insulated from noise and cold...'
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