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"Bureaucracies hide their mistakes, because people's careers are tied to those mistakes. Therefore, bureaucracies are a perfect mechanism for perpetuating mistakes."
- Frank Herbert
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| Optophone (Opto) | ||
| A video call system. |
Unique name for a videophone, lost to history.
| "Miss Henderson has resigned, Mr. Conover." The voice of his chief clerk spoke from the optophone, simultaneously with the appearance of that individual's alert features in its disc. |
| From Too Many Boards!,
by Harl Vincent. Published by Amazing Stories in 1931 Additional resources -
|
Also, there appear to be specialized optos just for sharing news, placed in public places:
In the lower
levels of the great cities, the public squares were jammed
with horror-stricken humanity, waiting in vain for
definite assurance from the news announcers.
There is even a specialized optophone used in space ships:
Vincent uses this same word in his 1932 story Water-Bound Worlds:
He turned toward Zarko, but saw that he had engaged himself with the optophone. In the disc appeared the face of Kal Turjen, his usual cigaret dangling and eyes squinting through the smoke. The Martian was grinning cheerfully as he followed Zarko’s instructions in tuning the main radiophone transmitter. Kal was on the job in the radio room and was resigned to the situation.
Efforts were made to keep the news of the disaster
from the public, but, as is usually the case, there was
a leak. Within a very few hours the public and private
news optos throughout the world blared forth the in-
credible tidings...
Captain Davis stood at the hyper-optophone in the
control room of his space ship.
Captain Boe stepped wearily to the optophone and flipped its lever. The alert but unsmiling visage of the Venerian chief engineer flashed into view on the disc...
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'When confronted by hills, or rough terrain, it did not stop, but simply slowed until the task demanded equaled its steady power output.'
'... the brain is no longer subjected to the accustomed pull, and it expands slightly in all directions.'
