Star Trek & communications
I should be writing right now so of course I'm doing other things at 3:45 AM my time.
surfing around, rpg stuff led me to Trek stuff and hence to this wonderful thing: a replica Star Trek (original series) communicator, with some neat bells and whistles, that you can buy for only $29.99. Check out the video, kinda cheesy, advertising on the cheap, but amusing: http://www.entertainmentearth.com/prodinfo.asp?number=DC17711
I would have killed for one of those when I was 13.
Today, we have cell phones instead. And although they do not (yet) talk directly with spaceships, they were styled after the Trek communciator. "Dr. Martin Cooper, inventor of the modern mobile phone, credits the TOS communicator as being his inspiration for the technology", Wikipedia informs me.
So really, we have Gene Rodenberry and his production designer (and whoever drafted the first prop) to thank for our cell phones of today.
Is that too trippy, or what??
Us science fiction writers/imaginers are controlling your future.
Bwahahahaa.....