October 23, 2009 at 16:36The computer future of 40 years ago
In 1969, the Japanese magazine Shōnen Sunday published a forecast of how computers will change our lives in the future. The magazine article was called “Computopia,” that is, computer utopia. You can look and conclude how the forecast 40 years ago is true.
For example, this is how school classes should look like at the beginning of the 21st century. On personal computers, children multiply 3000 by 25. Corrections are made with a light pencil directly on the display.
The teacher is present on the big screen where in the normal classroom there should be a blackboard.
Overseers are traveling around the room, who hit children with rubber balls on the head, apparently for a wrong solution to the problem or for bad behavior (sticks can also go down from the ceiling, so you won’t run away from the robot). Children laugh merrily if a friend got it. Along the walls of the class are magnetic tape drives and punch card receivers.
In the upper right corner of the illustration, the boy is standing in the grip of some kind of mechanism. Apparently, he was punished.
The second illustration shows the house of the future. It was assumed that this forecast will come true in twenty years, that is, by 1989.
Computers have become an integral part of people's lives, even in the home. Arriving home, a man can put on a home suit similar to Spider-Man’s clothes, sit in a comfortable streamlined chair and talk on a videophone mounted directly in the chair. At this time, the home computer (a large cabinet with a bunch of buttons) prints a fresh newspaper for the head of the family and displays information from the air conditioner on the monitor.
The wife sits next to him and makes a printout, similar to a cash register receipt. The paper comes out of the printer attached to the ironing board on which the robot iron travels.
There is also a robot chef in the room, he looks like a samovar and stands in the middle of the dining table, arranging food on plates. The table on wheels with heated dishes is also automated.
The child watch a three-dimensional TV (projectors from three sides), and flying cars outside the window. A robot cleaner is driving across the floor.
Futurological revelations of the Japanese end with the image of a computerized hospital.
Scanned Shōnen Sunday illustrations in full scale: 1 , 2 , 3 .
via Pink Tentacle
For example, this is how school classes should look like at the beginning of the 21st century. On personal computers, children multiply 3000 by 25. Corrections are made with a light pencil directly on the display.
The teacher is present on the big screen where in the normal classroom there should be a blackboard.
Overseers are traveling around the room, who hit children with rubber balls on the head, apparently for a wrong solution to the problem or for bad behavior (sticks can also go down from the ceiling, so you won’t run away from the robot). Children laugh merrily if a friend got it. Along the walls of the class are magnetic tape drives and punch card receivers.
In the upper right corner of the illustration, the boy is standing in the grip of some kind of mechanism. Apparently, he was punished.
The second illustration shows the house of the future. It was assumed that this forecast will come true in twenty years, that is, by 1989.
Computers have become an integral part of people's lives, even in the home. Arriving home, a man can put on a home suit similar to Spider-Man’s clothes, sit in a comfortable streamlined chair and talk on a videophone mounted directly in the chair. At this time, the home computer (a large cabinet with a bunch of buttons) prints a fresh newspaper for the head of the family and displays information from the air conditioner on the monitor.
The wife sits next to him and makes a printout, similar to a cash register receipt. The paper comes out of the printer attached to the ironing board on which the robot iron travels.
There is also a robot chef in the room, he looks like a samovar and stands in the middle of the dining table, arranging food on plates. The table on wheels with heated dishes is also automated.
The child watch a three-dimensional TV (projectors from three sides), and flying cars outside the window. A robot cleaner is driving across the floor.
Futurological revelations of the Japanese end with the image of a computerized hospital.
Scanned Shōnen Sunday illustrations in full scale: 1 , 2 , 3 .
via Pink Tentacle