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"All fiction is propaganda, and the fiction we like is the propaganda we believe in, and the fiction we don't like is the propaganda we don't believe in."
- Samuel R. Delany
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| Reading Machine | ||
| A projector which showed text on a screen or the ceiling for easy reading. |
I really like this device, for various reasons. First, it projects the words on the ceiling, which is a spectacularly good idea and would have saved me many a sore neck from reading too long in bed.
| She decided that she might as well go to bed. One wall was filled with books; she found a spool of Kipling's Just So Stories and took it happily upstairs.
The bed in her room was as modern as next week, with automassage, coffee dispenser, weather control, reading machine, etc. Jill decided that she would probably not oversleep, crawled into bed, slid the spool into the reading machine, lay back and scanned the words streaming across the ceiling. Presently the speed control slipped out of her relaxed fingers, the lights went out and she slept. |
| From Stranger in a Strange Land,
by Robert Heinlein. Published by Putnam in 1961 Additional resources -
|
I also like the fact that the lights would automatically go out when you fell asleep (I not infrequently find my son in bed, with the lights on, and a book nearby).
The most intriguing idea to me is that this is a device for convenient reading; it is not a device that reads aloud to the user. The only similar products today are used as assistive reading devices for people with vision problems. I'll bet if they used the ceiling, there would be fewer people with vision problems and neck aches.
In Arthur Radebaugh's popular newspaper comic “Closer Than We Think" we find an "electronic library" which seems to be what Heinlein has in mind here.
(Arthur Radebaugh's "electronic library")
Some unusual inventions for home entertainment and education will be yours in the future, such as the "television recorder" that RCA's David Sarnoff described recently.With this device, when a worthwhile program comes over the air while you are away from home, or even while you're watching it, you'll be able to preserve both the picture and sound on tape for replaying at any time. Westinghouse's Gwilym Price expects such tapes to reproduce shows in three dimensions and color on screens as shallow as a picture.
Another pushbutton development will be projection of microfilm books on the ceiling or wall in large type. To increase their impact on students, an electronic voice may accompany the visual passages.
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Additional
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More Ideas
and Technology from Stranger in a Strange Land
More Ideas
and Technology by Robert Heinlein
Tech news articles related to Stranger in a Strange Land
Tech news articles related to works by Robert Heinlein
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news articles:
- Lucent DVR Sleep Detector
- Book Time Page-Turning Robot
- Netflix Smart Socks Know When You Doze Off
| Amazon Blimp Parent Drone Concept |
| Tortoise Mobile Smart Stores |
| Sony Pocket Air Conditioner Is Phil Dick's Idea! |
| ROAM Robotics Skiing Exoskeleton |
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'The pokkecon rang again. *The coffee’s for him?* Tsuyoshi said.'
The Jetsons imagined so much future.
'Rod placed the brain inside the panel... the horse raised its head, wiggled its ears, blinked twice, gave a tentative whinny.'
'Pina2bo would have to operate full blast for many years to put as much SO2 into the stratosphere as its namesake had done in a few minutes.'
'Chain of hotels that specialized in non-human service.'
'But then... not every bulldozer operator works on the Moon.'
'Griff found the white and pink map distracting and switched it off using his tongue mouse.'
