Wednesday, December 26, 2001

The future is near

By BILLY MURPHY
Laugh Lines

In a Jules Verne kind of way, I have seen the future.

I have dreamt it and here are the devices and services that we should expect to see in the days and weeks and years to come.

I see a day when the gadgetry of computers and software will be simplified. I see a time when we can bypass all the complications of word processors and spell checks and formatting. There will be no need to wait for spooling to the printer and the time lapse between typing words to the screen, then moving them to the printed page. I see a device not dependent on electricity, free of circuitry and wires.

This device will actually, through mechanical means, type directly onto the page, through an ergonomic action powered by human fingers and nothing else. No more misaligned pages due to robotic-like guidance structure. You will actually load the pages yourself through a simple roller and latch system. No more expensive ink jet or laser cartridges. This device will simply contain a cheap, replaceable, ink-based ribbon. This device will be called the "Mechana-type-ometer."

I see a replacement for one of the most expensive and inefficient consumables known to the family today, the disposable diaper. Landfills brim with these chemical-based sanitary devices. It seems you throw away the infant undergarments as fast as you place them on your child. The future holds a better way; a non-disposable, reusable diaper made from all natural, fiber-based components. You only purchase a few of these sanitary devices and you start saving money immediately. Best of all, these 21st century marvels of technology can be sanitized in cleaning appliances you probably already own! These money saving, earth-loving inventions will be called the "Environment-Friendly Infant Waste Management System."

I see a day in the future, when expensive and risky cornea surgeries will no longer be needed to correct one's vision. Neither will anyone need to place dangerous and possibly unhygienic foreign objects directly upon their eyes. Instead, inexpensive and unbreakable plastic lenses will be manufactured specifically for the patient's visual need. Patients will wear them conveniently in front of their eyes inside rugged, versatile frames, able to be removed at their leisure. Such a device will be called a "Myopic Correction Mechanism."

In the future I see automobile security remote electronics being replaced with a system by which you have a small instrument individually matched to your car that would unlock its doors. Bulky technology would no longer fill people's purses and pockets with dangerous gamma rays. A man could use one of these "Unique Mechanical Utensils" to open the door for his wife, rather than the constant bickering we hear now, like, "Let the handle down while I am unlocking the door ... now ... no!! Let it down ... take you hand off the door ... the handle ... take your hand off the handle!"

There are many other items I see coming in the future. For example, watches that don't need expensive, constantly replaceable batteries. In the future people will have time pieces that will run simply by winding a protrusion exposed on the side. I see a service in the future where someone conveniently delivers groceries everyday and directly to your door. Items that are dependent on freshness, like milk.

There might even be a day when people replace all the faxes, cell phone calls and pages with personal, actual, face-to-face conversation. But then again, I am a dreamer and a utopian.

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