Good Vibrations~!

[M-Type]

It's really just evidence of how useless we are at predicting what technology will do even a decade or so from now. Think back to 1995 or even 2000. How many of us would believe half the stuff that's taken for granted today!

I hear ya. My dad and I get Popular Science, and I love to read their articles where they look back at their own articles from the 40s-50s to see how close they got to certain modern devices.

Some things are eerily accurate, while others are quite laughable.

[Panther Al]

It's really just evidence of how useless we are at predicting what technology will do even a decade or so from now. Think back to 1995 or even 2000. How many of us would believe half the stuff that's taken for granted today!

Totally agree - I think no one saw the change the mobile phone was going to make, especially as computers kept getting smaller and smaller and turning into smartphones.

I think if some one looks back to the 95-15 era, they will probably come to the conclusion that it was the humble camera cell phone that was the biggest, most influential invention of the period.

[raketenjagdpanzer]

Anyway, I think this new group - should we get a chance to actually play - will find the "alt-world" pretty interesting.

One thing about pervasive computing: a LOT of it was predicated on the demilitarization of the internet and supporting technologies. Its no mystery as to why suddenly from 1992 until now it seems like there has been an exponential leap in what we can do with computers not just in terms of local technology but with communications, to the point that consumer technology has lapped military tech and COTS is now the rule of the game in the face of an ever-shrinking military budget: the end of the cold war gave birth to a vastly more open internet, and once those technologies were in place it was Katie bar the door!

However, in T2k, that never happens. 1992 sees a USSR just as immovable and belligerent as always; there is no want cause or need for the US Military to open the floodgates of the Internet to even benign developers like Tim Berners-Lee, et al. Oh, sure, there were already "social websites" (for lack of a better term) in place with CompuServe, BIX, GENie, and so on, but the degree of consumer-level networking that we saw even back in the mid 90s is nowhere to be found in the Twilight:2000 universe. I would say its alternate-setting computing would be that individual workstation/desktop PCs would be more-or-less the same, just with less emphasis on networking them - why fiddle around with an ethernet card for your PC or laptop when there's jack-all to do with them save LAN stuff And in the mid 90s most of that is all still do-able via sneakernet anyway.

[CarolG]

It's really just evidence of how useless we are at predicting what technology will do even a decade or so from now. Think back to 1995 or even 2000. How many of us would believe half the stuff that's taken for granted today!

I become amuse at a lot of the anachronisms in old S.F. One of my current favorites is in Startide Rising by Brin where information is faxed to another part of the ship as the fastest method of transmission.
As a player, I at times have had to stop and think about what technology would have been available to us.

[raketenjagdpanzer]

I was reading SLAN, by A.E. van Vogt (winner of the "Weirdest Old-School Sci-Fi Author's Name" award 40 years running) and there was a google-like service whereby a person would make an information request via televisor (very high-tech!)...aaand then a printout of the request was brought via courier to the requester, taking mere hours :P

[Graebarde]

Oh my god, kid, I got jackets older than you Here and I thought it was us crotchety old 40somethings who played T2k

40something YOU are a pup too. I've been doing T2K since 87, and was 40 then!!! LOL
My grandson that is 18 has played T2K.. you should have seen my daughters face the day she walked in and he was READING the BYB asking me questions, he was nine then. Her comment, "OH GOD!! NOT another one." BTW she met her husband at a FTF gaming session at my house LOL. Three Generations of Twilight.

[Adm.Lee]

Re: sci-fi missing the tech advances: Can't find it now, but I recently saw a cover from a '50s sci-fi magazine. There's a space pirate leering through a porthole, with a slide rule in his teeth.

Second thought on failures to predict: I graduated college in 1990, with a degree in military history, and a minor in national security policy, with a touch of Russian language. Unfortunately, it was in Dec. 1990, after the Baltics had started revolting, the Wall had come down, and Saddam had shifted the strategic focus of the US. No hiring at DoD for people like me, nor CIA, nor anywhere else. Ooops.

[Sanjuro]

I guess we like it so much as we expected to live it one day...

The first few times I went to Moscow, Ekaterinberg, Damascus, Baku and Tblisi I thought "I only ever expected to see these places through a bombsight..."

[Mahatatain]

I know what you mean about ShadowRun but at least they did get something right with their treatment of mobile/cell phones - even if it was a happy coincidence.

I played a 2nd Edition ShadowRun campaign a couple of years ago where the GM refused to allow mobile phones to have cameras built into them because they weren't on the equipment list like that! All of the players pulled out their own real camera phones and sat there looking at her like she was an idiot. GM's sometimes make terrible decisions.....

40something YOU are a pup too. I've been doing T2K since 87, and was 40 then!!! LOL
My grandson that is 18 has played T2K.. you should have seen my daughters face the day she walked in and he was READING the BYB asking me questions, he was nine then. Her comment, "OH GOD!! NOT another one." BTW she met her husband at a FTF gaming session at my house LOL. Three Generations of Twilight.

I have two sons aged 5 and 3 and my subtle indoctrination of them to play RPGs has already started, much to my wife's annoyance!

[Targan]

I become amuse at a lot of the anachronisms in old S.F. One of my current favorites is in Startide Rising by Brin where information is faxed to another part of the ship as the fastest method of transmission.
As a player, I at times have had to stop and think about what technology would have been available to us.

I'm a huge David Brin fan and loved Startide Rising and all the novels in that series but I'd forgotten those tech details! I might have to re-read it...

[mikeo80]

40something YOU are a pup too. I've been doing T2K since 87, and was 40 then!!! LOL
My grandson that is 18 has played T2K.. you should have seen my daughters face the day she walked in and he was READING the BYB asking me questions, he was nine then. Her comment, "OH GOD!! NOT another one." BTW she met her husband at a FTF gaming session at my house LOL. Three Generations of Twilight.

I think that I am the next oldest here on the board. I played in very late 80's- early 90's. (Gonna be 59 here in May)

Never could get the kids or grandkids into RPG's...(SIGH )

But, I will borrow from Lynyrd Skynyrd.....

"My hair's turning white, my neck is still red, my collar's still blue...."

Long live T2K!!

My $0.02

Mike

[Adm.Lee]

This was the picture.

FWIW, my dad used to work for a big R&D firm. In the late '40s, they helped Xerox develop the photocopier. In their final report, the researchers thought their institute might need as many as two of these things.

[B.T.]

Cool picture, Adm.Lee.
But what does "FWIW" stand for

[boogiedowndonovan]

Let's accentuate the positive: last night my AD&D group came over and my T2k 1e boxed set was on the table, one of my players asked what it was and I broke it down for him and he was fascinated...at least a couple of them want to give it a try! And they are NOT "grognards" by any stretch. They've only been playing AD&D for a year or so now and to date have played it, one session of d6 Star Wars RPG...and now they wanna give T2k a spin! So cool...

cool man, good luck!

post periodic status updates if you can, like Chris does at

http://twilight-later-days.blogspot.com/

I was gonna post something OT related to your subject line, but I'll hold off on that. Webstral may know where I'm going, or maybe not...

[Ironside]

FWIW = For What It's Worth

@Adm.Lee Thanks for the picture