The Future is Not Orange. It is Blue and Flickery...

Greetings all!

I am writing over my concern about the future of communications technology. We have seen in numerous sci-fi movies how the humble voice method will be supplanted by video technology. Yep, picture screens where you can see the caller's face. Wow! High tech! Star Trek have had that system since 1966!

So what comes next? Hologram communication! Even wower! I can't wait to use that to ring in sick to work. But wait! Have you ever seen it in operation? Of course you have! Star Wars uses it all the time!

Nute Gunray (Trade Federation Viceroy): What's that? Darth Sidious wants to reverse the charges on a call from Naboo? Naboo? that means he's really...

Can anybody think of one single instance in any movie when the teleholo (is that what it's called? If not, I call dibs on the name) caller didn't appear blue and flickery and the image didn't keep breaking up? Nope, didn't think so.

So communications in the future are going to suck even more than they do now. You'll have a hand-held unit with GPS version XXV so the government can track you to the millimetre and sellers know everything you buy or consume. Your boss/friends/partner will be able to Google where you are in realtime, on real maps, via satellite. No more sneaking out for overpriced coffee! No more ' I'm just staying in with the missus', when you are out with your real friends and no more furtive visits to 'Abrakebabra'. The shame!

You'll have the Internet, of course, so everybody can look stuff up, which will save them the bother of actually knowing or learning anything. Say goodbye to pub table quizzes. They have already gone. The unit will also be an access key to all information about your life - from school reports to when you last took a dump and what the fibre rating of said excreta was. So next time you lose your phone, you'll become a social, financial and political non-entity and have to go on the run with Sandra Bullock. Luckily she's nicer in real life than her films would have you think. Worst of all... as you try your best to fall asleep on the maglev to work, you'll be sitting next to a trio of school girls giggling over a tinny, flickering hologram of High School Musical 43 'Krump Off Uranus'.

Bugger.