What will life be like in 2008 A 1968 article

[alfredo]

http://blog.modernmechanix.com/2008/03/24/what-will-life-be-like-in-the-year-2008/

TV screens cover an entire wall in most homes and show most subjects other than straight text matter in color and three dimensions. In addition to programmed TV and the multiplicity of commercial fare, you can see top Broadway shows, hit movies and current nightclub acts for a nominal charge. Best-selling books are on TV tape and can be borrowed or rented from tape libraries.

A typical vacation in 2008 is to spend a week at an undersea resort, where your hotel room window looks out on a tropical underwater reef, a sunken ship or an ancient, excavated city. Available to guests are two- and three-person submarines in which you can cruise well-marked underwater trails.

Another vacation is a stay < on a hotel satellite. The rocket ride to the satellite and back, plus the vistas of earth and moon, make a memorable vacation jaunt.

While city life in 2008 has changed greatly, the farm has altered even more. Farmers are business executives running operations as automated as factories. TV scanners monitor tractors and other equipment computer programmed to plow, harrow and harvest. Wires imbedded in the ground send control signals to the machines. Computers also keep track of yields-, fertilization, soil composition and other factors influencing crops. At the beginning of each year, a print-out tells the farmer what to plant where, how much to fertilize and how much yield he can expect.

[truedelphi]

1. Well, my consolation is that at least I made it to 2008

Though I still remember the fully automated commute-o-rocket that we were promised (in the fifties)
to be the right of every American by 2001.

Oh well.

[GreenPartyVoter]

2. LOL I've got to read this to my kids later on

[jeff30997]

3. Well except for the space part...

It's pretty close.

Undersea resort:

http://www.poseidonresorts.com/poseidon_main.html

But where is my 3d TV?

[alfredo]

4. As they'd say in New Jersey, "I got your 3D TV right here."

The reason we don't have completely automatic automobiles that we can just let it do its thing is the same reason we still have standard transmissions. We like to have some control over the vehicle. I like working the clutch and shift lever. It keeps me interested and involved.

[Liberal Dose]

5. I'm still pissed that I don't have a flying car and a job at Spacely Sprockets! eom

[alfredo]

6. Spacely Sprockets has been outsourced, so you'd be out of work.

[Liberal Dose]

10. OH NO! What about Cogswell Cogs????

:rofl:

[alfredo]

12. Hostile takeover, bankruptcy, board of directors fled with assets.

[rug]

7. Too bad wars detoured that scenario.

[begin_within]

8. Check out this web site:

http://www.paleofuture.com/

[begin_within]

9. They got the part about executives running the farms right.

[alfredo]

13. Except for a few illegals.

[Redstone]

11. Hey, thanks for the post. I love reading that kind of stuff.

Redstone

[MrScorpio]

14. Where the Hell is my FLYING CAR?

[mike_c]

15. exactly-- they PROMISED us flying cars, dammit!

[alfredo]

16. Here we go

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDi0MZJZ-w0&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSNbVUG3hMA&feature=related

[EstimatedProphet]

18. Aren't there enough idiots on the roads now?

Can you imagine how bad driving would be if we had flying cars, and had to worry about Cletus smacking into us at 10,000 feet because he was too busy drinking and masturbating to pay attention to where he was going? I'll pass on the flying cars, thanks.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

17. Amazingly, he got some things spot on. To wit:

Money has all but disappeared. Employers deposit salary checks directly into their employees’ accounts. Credit cards are used for paying all bills. Each time you buy something, the card’s number is fed into the store’s computer station. A master computer then deducts the charge from your bank balance.

Computers not only keep track of money, they make spending it easier. TV-telephone shopping is common. To shop, you simply press the numbered code of a giant shopping center. You press another combination to zero in on the department and the merchandise in which you are interested. When you see what you want, you press a number that signifies “buy,” and the household computer takes over, places the order, notifies the store of the home address and subtracts the purchase price from your bank balance.

But then we see things like this...

People have more time for leisure activities in the year 2008. The average work day is about four hours.

:cry:

[alfredo]

19. Leisure time = unemployment