Steve Jobs is the first non - science fable case to possess a reality aberration theatre ( RDF ) . Apple ’s MacWorld 2008 conference kicks off tomorrow with a keynote from Jobs , which leaves gadget devotee and iPod fiends white - knuckled on Tuesday morning as news of the next “ insanely great ” thing trickles out of Moscone Center in San Francisco . Why does this speech cause such rage ( and fury ) every twelvemonth ? RDF , of course of instruction . We ’ve get the scoop on how Jobs number to posse comitatus the RDF , and we ’ve get four other far-famed RDFs from science fiction for you to excogitate as you expect the mind - command ray that will emanate from MacWorld tomorrow .
A abbreviated story of the Reality Distortion Field
Steve Jobs and his Reality Distortion Field : Apparently the Star Trekly - esque named Bud Tribble was working on a computer software project for Apple in 1981 , and thought he had been given an unrealistic ten - calendar month docket from origination to ship day of the month . When require why he did n’t just ask Steve to change it , he reportedly tell “ Well , it ’s Steve . Steve insists that we ’re shipping in other 1982 , and wo n’t admit answer to the contrary . The best way to describe the situation is a term from Star Trek . Steve has a reality optical aberration field . ” Although it turns out no one could discover a connection between that terminal figure and Star Trek , and thus a legend was born .
The Scramble Suits from A Scanner Darkly : In Phillip K. Dick ’s novel about drug addiction and the paranoid world on both sides of that yield , government narcotic agent wear “ scramble suit ” that change every aspect of the reader , shift at a moment ’s notification so that citizenry depend at someone wearing one will never be able to tell what they front like . In the novel they shift highly quickly , but they slowed it down in the movie to show how they work . They change your voice as well , making you the most seeable inconspicuous homo / womanhood around : they jumble reality for everyone except you .
The Matrix in The Matrix : Nothing distorts reality more than entire system of machines set up to grow you from a fetus , nurture you , and feed your brain signals that tell it you ’re growing up normal inside a existence that does n’t exist . As Morpheus says , “ It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth . ” sound pretty distorty to us , although if they adjudicate to make us some sort of scientific discipline fiction superstar inside this simulation , we probably would n’t mind . Then you ’d all be ask round to the rad parties we ’d throw .
The Holodeck in Star Trek : Seriously , we could never understand why people just did n’t stay on the holodeck 24/7 . Sure , it ’s technically “ not existent , ” but it does everything you ’d need a veridical world to do . You ’ve got an entire program library of billions and billions of option of things to simulate , plus you may even deactivate the security protocols making it possible to actually die while you pretend you ’re inside Alice in Wonderland . It ’s like a portable Matrix To Go ™ , so how did they ever manage to get any study done with one of these things around ?
The macrocosm of They Live : you’re able to blame our current compulsion with this film on the fact that it ’s been picture up on overseas telegram a lot lately , but there ’s something about this Roddy Piper / John Carpenter film that makes it arduous to hate . In their world , an alien signal is being beam out that name humanity as complacent as cattle , and stops them from run into the aliens as they actually are . Thankfully , Roddy gets some witching crank that help him kick ass and thwart the fugly aliens . Although in retrospect , they just wanted to make him rich . Was that so speculative ?
We ’re waiting for the consumer version of the RDF – we need it for when we ’re hear to get someone to divulge secrets about new movies , or trying to convince them to designtwo useless screwsinto a laptop . We ’ll bring it to the lean of skill fable devices we want , right next to a meter - travel belt , a mentality - computing gadget interface for the iPhone , and ten - ray spex .
Image above from theJoy of Techwebsite . Full rendering can be seenhere .
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