Write the Next Big Thing?
Or…
Right….(eye roll) the next big thing (sigh)
Why we fight…
Almost too obvious to mention, we fight change because it’s scary. We fight each other over change (especially in technology) because it’s so hard to keep up. After a breath or a heartbeat or now a blink—you’re behind…
…and someone else is not behind.
And that returns to the have/have not paradigm, which in my mind is the fulcrum of all discontent and conflict.
“You have it. I want it. I take it.
You have it. I fear your new power. I fight you over it.”
What to believe…
It’s coming—oops, it’s now common.
“I’ve been around long enough to see some serious change.”
Once that claim was made by our grandparents. They would be riding in a car and tell us about cars becoming commonplace. They’d tell us about air conditioning and microwave ovens gradually becoming more widely accepted.
Now children can make such claims.
Today we say: "I remember when we had to use an mp3 player, phone, and camera separately." What will our children report? What are they saying now?
Believe this: the pace is much faster than we realize.
Believe that technology breeds technology. Without more readily accessible Internet, we would not have so quickly adopted social media. Without that Internet (with rapidly increasing speed and bandwidth) we would not be watching movies and engaging with AI constantly (whether we know it or not).
This demonstrates user adoption of software, which obviously moves much faster than hardware...and continues to move much more quickly!
Believe this? technology can outstrip user interface, allowing tech-to-tech engagement we can not fathom.
This is obvious to me when my friend tells me he can ask ChatGPT to invent code that will do something it would take him hours to engineer.
The question is: do we fear or embrace it?
Insatiable?
Once you start asking questions, there’s no end to this.
That, friend, is the stuff of science-fiction: speculating.
“Guess they’ve never heard of SkyNet,” some of my skeptical friends forewarn.
Even my friends tuned into Tic Toc are curious. And that curiosity, not the meteoric spikes in new tech or hungry users, makes me happy .
Being hungry is one thing, but being insatiable is quite another. A hungry person might eat everything on the buffet, but an insatiable person would even eat brussels sprouts. (A truly insatiable person might even eat all the condiments, even the garnishes, even the…)
Crazy adoption rates suggest we’re a manic nation of technophiles who crave the latest in everything. (Consumer Reports throws water on this, however, claiming only 12% of users upgrade phones annually.) Simple observation would lead me to believe people are obsessed with technology, even if not insatiably needy.
People will be driving to work and turn around to go get their phones. Leave the lunch and the laptop behind, no big deal, but no mobile phone? no deal. Kids—even the fiercely independent ones—will call home and beg and cry for parents to get that forgotten mobile device to them ASAP. I’ve seen people get migraines, break out in tears, generally fall despondent, without their phones.
Insatiable need. Manic obsession. Call it what you will, but it’s at the very least an unhealthy dependency.
Towels?
I still can’t figure out the towel thing in Hitchhiker’s Guide. Who’s to say, though. Maybe our next big obsession will be for linens.
This document and the supporting sources focus on the madness we expense on technology, but we’ve been fixated on other things over time, from golden calves to hourglass figures. Wars have been fought over salt and silk…and oil.
The future may bring us to desperation over high fructose corn syrup, like in my novels, or, say, our most precious resources like water and sunlight.
Writing into the ether
Writing about The Next Big Thing will always be hit and miss, but here’s the deal: even if we write about a future where toilet tissue is rare, it gives us pause to think. Oh. Yes, that happened.
Speculating about the next big thing opens all doors and avenues to reflect on greed and obsession as well as give us a good chuckle at what we once thought was so ‘on fleek.’
My focus is on communication and transportation in my novels so far. I feel I’ve barely scratched the surface of the impact of teleportation. It’s something I personally obsess over, for it takes me half an hour to get anywhere, often longer. When I was a kid, I had to drive 90 miles for a newly released film…or A&W root beer. I think a lot about teleportation on my commute. I dwell on it when I wish I could afford to see the rest of the world.
Just about anything can be equally as intriguing, once it’s played out beyond its current interest and value. Diamonds are just rocks, but to some, they’ve been (literally) ‘to die for.’ In the future, anything could be a threat, from invasive weeds to another species growing metaphorical legs and coming at us from the ocean.
Anything could hold promise, too. Who knew oil could bring us plastic, and that plastic would make the advent of these wonders of technology so accessible? We take so many discoveries and inventions for granted from penicillin to penguins.
Speculative writing gives us the chance to read of a future that’s taken one twist or turn or another dimensional angle we haven’t even imagined yet.
