This article appeared in the Tacoma News Tribune on April 11, 1953.

A prophet. Now, we see, the Iphone has taken over our country. I am a Luddite but I hate Iphones and they do more harm than good.

Remember when Dick Tracy had the little wrist watch phone ?

I remember my dad saying back in the 60s, “some day you will be able to see the person you are talking to on the phone”

Yup, and whenever he used it, we got the little caption '2 way wrist radio'. I liked the 1 man magnetic air cars. I could think of thousands of uses for one of those.

Yeah, but predictions about smellovision replacing television never came to fruition.

With the popularity of shows like Dr. Pimple Popper, etc that may not be a bad thing.

Saw that as a wall phone with a screen at the 1964 World's Fair...

Where's my 9uckin' jet pack?

I wonder if he forecast robocalls?

LOL. I was about to post that one, too.

Dick Tracy calling Go Go Gomez!!!

Dick Tracy calling Go Go Gomez!!

Maxwell Smart had his in his shoe! Generation after Dick Tracy, who would have thunk it!

Yep. I’d forgotten about that.

I forgot when I first heard about cell phones, but it was a long time ago. I'm old enough to recall, as a kid in the ( late ? ) 1950's, folks walking around with an actual working radio that could fit in their shirt pocket. That transistor technology was mind blowing back then and there were all kinds of futuristic predictions being made.

As handy as this modern technology is, a big part of me wishes that it hasn’t advanced so far. Our privacy is seriously gone.

When I was a teenager, my folks got cell phones, but back then a cell phone was something you had installed into your car, not something you carried around. They gradually transitioned from that to hand held phones about the size of a typical home telephone that you clipped on your belt to carry it around. Then came the flip phones you could put in your pocket. Smart phones made them obsolete.

I worked on the Motorola Microtac flip phone and the internal name was "the dick phone" after Dick Tracy's. Management didn't like the name and renamed it "Rich".

Apparently George Orwell somehow "knew"...or maybe he just thought the 4.2 million people in gulags after the war was a harbinger.

I just got an app on my phone that will identify a bird by its sound. It's from Cornell University and it's free. It's called Merlin. It works. So far I've tried it on birds I knew around the house, Northern Cardinal, Carolina Wren, Carolina Chickadee and Coopers Hawk. This kind of stuff just leaves me shaking my head.

Dad had a radio-phone in the work crummie by '79 or '80. IIRC it had a rotary dial.

Lol,
Dick Tracy...
You guys are dating yourselves.

The best I can come up with is that Tesla came up with the idea.

Later on in the 30s HG Wells wrote a couple books that mentioned wireless communication. He predicted this as he did many other future inventions. What makes it interesting are his VIP connections to several illuminati members. He had a role to play too.

http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0301391h.html

http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0200221.txt

For thousands of years we went hunting and fishing with no phone. You still can.

Whey back,

what are the odds that it geotags their (your) location too?


gotta be free for a reason...

It does. They are very upfront about the data collected and the use of it. Quite honestly, I’m not the least bit worried about it. Given my importance in the grand scheme of things, if I would need to be hyper-paranoid and delusional to think anyone could find some nefarious use for knowledge of when and where I want to identify birds by their sounds.

Cell phones are now just another unfortunate fact of life. Very useful, to be sure, but totally overused by everybody.
I’m part of one of the last generations who grew up without them, so I’m nearly incompetent at the finer points of operation. There are quite a few days I don’t use it at all. I’ve got fat freakin fingers, so I seldom text except for important things, groceries and things like that.
I could give it up without too much more than an inconvenience.
It kills me to see people, especially families, sitting at a table and staring at a device in their palm, ignoring the very people they’re with at the time. And it really annoys me seeing kids tweens and younger doing the same. They should be learning to interact and communicate with each other socially.
I still think there’s probably a special place in hell for the people who have forced these things on us.
7mm

The abuse of phones will get worse. Don't use them unless you have to. The more we use them in our day to day life the more REQUIRED they will be to simply conduct normal life activities.

Wearables and the Internet of Things is another technology which will destroy our future.

Don't buy stuff connected to the internet, or at least don't connect stuff to the internet just because you can. Don't connect your pets or your livestock or your kids to the internet. Learn how old tech works. It is JUST as good functionally and you and your kids will be glad in the future.

Remember that carburetor video. You will glad you learned how it worked in the future.

I still do. I do have a cell phone, but where I live the signal is so bad that it is not a reliable way to communicate, so it stays in my truck. I then forget to carry it on my person when signal is available. It is handy when I go on trips. miles

The problem is not the useful app that you may use. The problem is the deep dependency that constant cell phone use will create in society.

There is a time coming when you will not be able to conduct normal life activities without a phone or it's equivalent. That is VERY bad.

Detecting ambient sounds can be used for a lot more than identifying birds.

Thanks. I couldn't have said it any better. And I hate it when I try to do some sort of business or get something done and am told "There's an app for it". I have only a vague notion what an app is.

Paul

And I do. I have a cell phone but rarely use it. Not much point taking it when there's no service most of the places I go hunting/fishing. I used to take it to work with me in case of a breakdown as I have roadside assistance with my car insurance. The only problem being that I had no service for most of the way there.