Heinlein predicts... screen savers?

[Bill Leary]

In an article here, the author observes that Heinlein, in Stranger in a
Strange Land, predicted the screen saver.

http://www.cracked.com/article_18846_6-eerily-specific-inventions-predicted-in-science-fiction.html?wa_user1=4&wa_user2=Science&wa_user3=article&wa_user4=recommended

- Bill
_________________
I want to stand in the dark and see an audience feel the way I do.

[MajorOz]

On Feb 18, 10:47 pm, "Bill Leary" <Bill_Le...@msn.com> wrote:
> In an article here, the author observes that Heinlein, in Stranger in a
> Strange Land, predicted the screen saver.
>

> http://www.cracked.com/article_18846_6-eerily-specific-inventions-pre...

>
>     - Bill
> _________________
> I want to stand in the dark and see an audience feel the way I do.

...kinda like the endless loop of a crackling fireplace on your 60 in
plasma (providing about the same amound of heat ).

[Michael Black]

On Sat, 18 Feb 2012, Bill Leary wrote:

> In an article here, the author observes that Heinlein, in Stranger in a
> Strange Land, predicted the screen saver.
>
> http://www.cracked.com/article_18846_6-eerily-specific-inventions-predicted-in-science-fiction.html?wa_user1=4&wa_user2=Science&wa_user3=article&wa_user4=recommended
>

I don't think it's fair to say he predicted screensavers. He had no
technical reasoning behind it, just some random visual. You can get
videotapes, and now DVDs of fires burning in fireplaces, which is more
like it.

I'm sure Heinlein also used large screesn (and shouldn't he then get
credit for predicting large screen tvs?) as "windows", places where people
lived underground but had cameras outside for 'window". Certainly in
"Tunnel in the Sky" it's mentioned, though I can't remember if that's the
instance where someone refused to go underground, so while the neighbors
use their tvs as "windows" the family actually has a window. If that bit
isn't in that book, it is somewhere else.

Michael

[Chris Zakes]

On Sun, 19 Feb 2012 21:04:51 -0500, an orbital mind-control laser
caused Michael Black <et...@ncf.ca> to write:

>On Sat, 18 Feb 2012, Bill Leary wrote:
>
>> In an article here, the author observes that Heinlein, in Stranger in a
>> Strange Land, predicted the screen saver.
>>
>> http://www.cracked.com/article_18846_6-eerily-specific-inventions-predicted-in-science-fiction.html?wa_user1=4&wa_user2=Science&wa_user3=article&wa_user4=recommended
>>
>I don't think it's fair to say he predicted screensavers. He had no
>technical reasoning behind it, just some random visual. You can get
>videotapes, and now DVDs of fires burning in fireplaces, which is more
>like it.

Agreed. The "screensaver" is to hide the fact that it's a TV, not as a
feature of the TV itself.

>I'm sure Heinlein also used large screesn (and shouldn't he then get
>credit for predicting large screen tvs?) as "windows", places where people
>lived underground but had cameras outside for 'window". Certainly in
>"Tunnel in the Sky" it's mentioned, though I can't remember if that's the
>instance where someone refused to go underground, so while the neighbors
>use their tvs as "windows" the family actually has a window. If that bit
>isn't in that book, it is somewhere else.
>
> Michael

Yes, that's from 'Tunnel". There's also a large-screen TV--more like
the mega-TVs in some sports arenas--in the Fosterite church that Mike
visits. They use it to watch the church football team play.

-Chris Zakes
Texas
--

Life isn't fair. Anyone who tells you otherwise is either selling something or trying
to get your vote.

[Michael Stemper]

In article <Pine.LNX.4.64.12...@darkstar.example.net>, Michael Black <et...@ncf.ca> writes:
>On Sat, 18 Feb 2012, Bill Leary wrote:

>> In an article here, the author observes that Heinlein, in Stranger in a
>> Strange Land, predicted the screen saver.
>>
>> http://www.cracked.com/article_18846_6-eerily-specific-inventions-predicted-in-science-fiction.html?wa_user1=4&wa_user2=Science&wa_user3=article&wa_user4=recommended
>>
>I don't think it's fair to say he predicted screensavers. He had no
>technical reasoning behind it, just some random visual. You can get
>videotapes, and now DVDs of fires burning in fireplaces, which is more
>like it.

The article has some stupidity in it, starting with:

Somehow, Verne predicted that the astronauts would become weightless in
space. There was no way he could have known that at the time -- it was
just some crazy bullshit he made up to make the story interesting [...]

"No way he could have known that at the time", unless maybe he'd heard
of Isaac Newton.

[...] Leo Szilard figured an atomic bomb might be a profitable commodity
to control, so he patented it in 1934 [...]

He patented the idea of a nuclear reactor, which is slightly different.

In Gernsback's time, scientists thought that light needed a medium to
travel through, just as sound needs to travel through air.

They're talking about 1911, which was six years after the publication of
the first paper on Special Relativity, and 24 years after Michelson-
Morley.


--
Michael F. Stemper
#include <Standard_Disclaimer>
Nostalgia just ain't what it used to be.