What New Technology Would Past You Not Believe?

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My husband and I were talking about this last night.

In the late 1990s, I would not have been able to conceive of the Internet as it exists today (not like the ARPANET), cell phones as they exist today, or reality TV.

What invention(s) would have baffled you if your past self had been given a heads up?

Ha, well, nothing that I can think of. I read and watched a lot of scifi even as a child. So there isn't much that I wouldn't have expected.

I guess maybe smart phones.

I thought technology would be much more reliable.

I would be shocked to know about Netflix and also smartphones and iPods. The idea of being able to watch a show whenever I want (as long as Netflix has it lol) would have blown my young mind Also, the ability to listen to any song whenever you want to and wherever you want to would have excited me so much. I remember when iPods first came out and wanting one so badly

When I was a kid I thought the 21st century would be like The Jetsons, but instead it's more like The Twilight Zone.

Although in the ancient days of Atari 2600 games I used to wonder what video games would be like in the future, so I'd probably be amazed and delighted by the superior graphics, music, lifelike characters with personality and story lines, but freaked out by all the gore and graphic violence. I'd also be surprised that games and characters like Super Mario Brothers and Pac-Man are still popular now.

I would be really surprised how cheap some of these electronic toys are compared to the cost of electronics 40 years ago.

Being able to fit an entire music studio in a rucksac. When I started out making music, you had to scrounge to get together a mixing desk and a reel-to-reel tape machine (with razor blade and tape for "editing").

Now any old PC off the shelf can emulate the whole lot, I've got access to more instruments and effects than I could ever have dreamed of, and I can compose music sat out in the middle of a sunny field somewhere.

...And iPods sound nowhere as good as CDs. People are mad to get rid of CDs.

^^I must confess, I'm also a but cynical that the push seems to be for "more" rather than "better" so much of the time.

^ Yeah. I agree with you.

Blu-ray players. I didn't care for them until I got one. I wouldn't have thought them real if you told about them when I was still using VHSs.

From Star Trek:
- Communicators that flip open and let you talk with someone hundreds of miles away (Flip-Phones).
- Computer-based devices that tell you exactly where you are and how to get where you're going (GPS).
- Computer-based global communications systems (Skype).
- Computer-based reality simulators that can keep you occupied for hours (X-Box, et al).
- Computer-based systems that talk and respond to voice commands (Siri).
- Entire libraries of data on one hand-held device (Thumb Drives).
- The main viewer on the bridge (Flat-screen TVs).

From Anime:
- Flying Robots (Drones).