Whole Lotta Rosie
The science fiction of each generation says more about contemporary thinking than any real future of course. Fritz Lang's Metropolis was more about class warfare and anxiety over the rise of fascism than it was about the distant future...the double-feature space monster movies of the 50's were always more about Cold War anxieties than the giant ants...don't even get me started about Starship Troopers.
As I was riding to work today on the retro-futuristic monorail, approaching the retro-futuristic Space Needle, I started thinking about computers and how predictive (or not) the sci-fi dreamers have been.
What does retro-futurism tell us about computers? Did anyone predict distributed computer networks, the World Wide Web, or the Internet? I don't think so -- generally, computers in science fiction come in three flavors:
- Super Computers that Threaten our Liberty (Colossus: The Forbin Project, I Robot, Tron, The Matrix)
- Defense Computers Run Amok that Threaten our Extinction (War Games, The Terminator)
- Cold, Disembodied Intelligences Rivaling or Superior to Humans (2001: a Space Odyssey, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy)
I cannot think of a single piece of science fiction that predicted microcomputers, distributed computing, or the digital revolution. Perhaps that's because the digital revolution is so unique and democratizing, that it failed to elicit the angst of the apocalyptic sci-fi visionaries.
So let this stand as a challenge: if you know of any well-known retro-futurist or science fiction writer who predicted the Internet please send me a mail that I might stand corrected.
