
2000 as Seen in 1910 (23 pics) - coderdude
http://acidcow.com/pics/17678-futur-imagined-23-pics.html
======
51Cards
They weren't so wrong... sure their form factors were way off but they had all
the ideas down...

1\. Electronic Books 2\. High speed aerodynamic trains 3\. Computer aided
manufacturing 4\. Motorized personal transport 6&7\. Ok no one is letting a
robot cut their hair or do makeup, but we're using robots for surgery 9\.
Aerodynamic motorcycles 10\. Webcams 11\. Where's my flying car! 12\. Tanks
13\. Electronic news etc. etc.

If you look at the concept alone, for 100 years ago they weren't THAT far off.
Personalized flight on the whole was really the only big miss.

Edit: I understand the horse one now. Back then horses were used for
everything... but by 2000 they predicted everything would be machines, so
seeing a horse would be a curiosity, not the daily norm. You would take your
kids to see a horse, petting zoo anyone? Pretty prescient to me.

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Zak
_Personalized flight on the whole was really the only big miss._

I think the main reason that isn't more mainstream is that even with small
planes, we chose to emphasize safety far more than with road vehicles. I don't
know why that is; I'd gladly trade some amount of safety if it meant I could
afford to own and operate a plane.

A Cessna 172 is no more complicated than an economy car. It costs $275,000 due
to regulation and low volume, not because it's inherently more expensive to
produce than a car.

~~~
treeface
_A Cessna 172 is no more complicated than an economy car._

Not trying to sound snarky here, but have you ever piloted an airplane? The
pre-takeoff checks take a little while, require a good bit of technical
expertise, and are absolutely required if you want to be pretty damn sure that
your airplane won't fall out of the sky. Safety is, at times, overemphasized,
but then again your car won't fall from the sky when it stalls.

~~~
Zak
Well, there was this time when I was two and I was sitting on the pilot's
lap....

I've spent a lot of time as a passenger in small planes and I have a good idea
of what's involved in a preflight. I'm not against safety in general, but I
think lawsuits and government oversight have really held back general
aviation. A plane should be more reliable and therefore expensive than a car
with a similar level of sophistication, but it doesn't need to cost 15 times
as much.

Edit: based on khafra's comment, a possible reading of my earlier comment is
that it's no more complicated to fly a plane than drive a car. I intended to
say that it's no more complicated to _build_ a single-engine propeller-driven
airplane than to _build_ a car.

~~~
lloeki
People often underestimate how important regular car maintenance is for
safety. Just because it statically holds on ground or casual speed doesn't
mean it'll grip in a quick wet corner or handle safely in an emergency
situation. Hence (partly) car death+accident rate is abysmal compared to
flying vehicles. In addition to weekly maintenance checks, I personally always
run quick pre+post drive checklists on my car, but then that may be because I
received flight education :)

~~~
defen
Care to share your pre+post drive checklists?

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dandrews
Like the parent, I had an informal "pre-flight" inspection that I'd execute on
my motor home on travel days. Hatches closed and locked, hoses and cables and
steps and awning retracted and secured, ceiling vents closed, LP gas shut off,
tires aired up, engine fluids nominal.

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ugh
Paleofuture has – as always – at least some context:
[http://www.paleofuture.com/blog/2007/9/10/french-prints-
show...](http://www.paleofuture.com/blog/2007/9/10/french-prints-show-the-
year-2000-1910.html)

I wonder to what extent these prints are just jokes. Will someone in a
thousand years look back at Futurama and think it was a serious prediction of
the future?

~~~
jhamburger
Yeah I'm not sure they were really predicting that police would fly around in
hang-glider suits. The image was probably just comical then, as it is now.

~~~
moe
Comical?

Well, no hang-gliders yet, but have you seen those cops on their segways? Just
saying...

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georgecmu
This page doesn't give any context for the images.

This is a series of Villemard postcards from 1910. There's a set of 24 on
flickr (with titles):
[http://www.flickr.com/photos/amphalon/sets/72157615623434624...](http://www.flickr.com/photos/amphalon/sets/72157615623434624/)
, but I think their origin on the web is from the BNF (National Library of
France) exposition here: <http://expositions.bnf.fr/utopie/feuill/index.htm>

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JonnieCache
I love that the one with the room being lit by what appears to be an electric
light in the fireplace is captioned "Heating With Radium"

This was obviously in that period after radium was popularised and before all
those girls' teeth fell out.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radium_Girls>

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segabach
The one thing they totally failed to predict was the trend toward much more
casual clothing. Partially due to technology becoming available to all the
classes but even upper class people would find this level of dress over the
top for current times. How long before we end up in the stereotypical white
space jump suit?

~~~
icegreentea
One reason for the "casualization" of dress were the world wars. Rationing and
general mood (and having your country ripped apart) made it kinda impossible
to dress extragantantly as a rule anymore. After the war ended, it kinda stuck
(just like the daily shaving thing).

~~~
jpr
That sure sounds plausible, but is there any evidence that this was actually
the case? I'm always looking for excuses to dress extravagantly and not shave.

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blhack
I think that our future is actually _more_ impressive than anything that they
could have even possibly imagined then:

<http://thingist.com/t/pageview/1674/>

What's interesting is that these illustrations are only 100 years old. The
things we have right now, smart phones, robots, the internet, MP3 players,
etc. seem _far_ beyond what the futurists of the last century were imagining.

Honestly, the things we have now seem beyond what people were imagining even
50 years ago.

I wonder if we'll see this large of a technological revolution again in the
coming 100 years (or an even bigger one [check this video out:
<http://vimeo.com/2319926> for an interesting take on this])

~~~
jodrellblank
_MP3 players, etc. seem far beyond what the futurists of the last century were
imagining._

Yes; the servant carrying a wax cylinder for the gramophone device was a huge
miss.

It missed electronic amplification and loudspeakers, it missed miniaturisation
of audio players, it missed room sized personal libraries of vinyl/tapes/CDs,
and of course it missed digitisation of music and electronic or wireless
transfer of information, and it potentially missed the ubiquity of cheap music
such that he's more likely to have music playing in the background while doing
something else than to sit down and listen to it as an activity in itself.

(and now that I think of it, why do they have robot builders, robot barbers,
robot makeup machines, but still a servant to carry a song to him on a silver
platter?)

~~~
kenjackson
_Yes; the servant carrying a wax cylinder for the gramophone device was a huge
miss._

Yeah, I don't get that one. What was the advance here supposed to be? I would
have imagined that's what rich people did in 1910.

~~~
joeyo
My interpretation is that the wax cylinder is being used as a calling card to
announce a visitor. If so, it's a miss for at least two reasons: 1. Why would
you choose to listen to a calling card rather than read it and 2. social
customs changed, eliminating the custom of leaving calling cards.

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pluies
There's an interesting pun in this one:
<http://acidcow.com/pics/20110225/future_11.jpg>

The label next to "concierge" reads "descenseur". It's a reference to the
French word for a lift, "ascenseur", from "ascension", "to go upwards". A
descenseur would then be the exact opposite of a lift - an apparatus to go
downwards. :)

~~~
pbhjpbhj
I simply read that straight as being "a lift moving downwards", can you
explain the pun?

~~~
pluies
Well, this _is_ the pun; although I guess a better description would be "a
made-up word with a meaning that might not be instantly clear to non-French
speakers" rather than a "pun".

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Jencha
Well, not "so wrong". For example pic 10. Today we call it skype with
webcamera. And it doesn't even need a footpedal. :)

~~~
itsnotvalid
They even got the helicopter and humvee right (sort of).

The people in 1900s have over-estimated the usage of robotic arms. We don't
have that kind of arms working on human yet, but we do have them on automotive
manufacturing.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Yes, they were in the age of mechanization and the easy prediction was
"everything will be mechanized"

~~~
itsnotvalid
The projector thing is really a very accurate prediction. Since there is no
such concept at that simply a light bulb could produce a clear imaging of some
remote users, without using any prerecorded films.

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joelburget
Looking back at old visions of the future, they always seem to imagine the
obvious things, e.g. flying cars and nuclear power. What I haven't ever seen
is anything close to modern computers, which arguably have just as profound an
impact on our lives and are probably more impressive technologically.

~~~
skore
Another well known phenomenon in old science fiction is the utter lack mobile
phones. Flying around space, shooting at each other with laser rifles. And
then they hop into a phone booth to have A VIDEO CALL! (Yes, I'm looking at
you, Blade Runner.)

(And before anybody mentions Star Trek - Those were actually more like small
and fancy Walkie-Talkies. Deal with it.)

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xster
the artist clearly isn't a union member, replacing all the jobs with robots

~~~
Vivtek
Except for videophone operator, and pill waiter, and record butler.

I love the way the futuristic technology is placed into a 1910 social context!

~~~
klenwell
Reminds me of a quote I saw on Twitter somewhere:

Any vision of the future involving buttons, or humans, is a vision of
dystopia.

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ekanes
My favorite is that they've got some gadget upgrades, but they're all dressed
about the same. So comfy!

------
abredow
Well, they were right about 1 thing: mutton chops will never go out of style!

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tybris
Whatever happened to predicting the future? We should make predictions for
2100 for them to laugh at our naivety.

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Derbasti
It is 2011 and I _still_ don't have a flying car. What a shame!

~~~
sethg
As somone who lives in Boston, I think it’s just as well that our drivers are
limited to two dimensions.

~~~
jimbokun
In other words, the reason we don't have flying cars is the same reason we
don't have nuclear powered devices that run for decades or centuries without
recharging. We can't trust the general public to be responsible with them.

Thinking of this article that was on the front page of HN a couple days ago:

<http://chronopause.com/index.php/2011/02/07/67/>

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teyc
The surprising thing is what they totally got wrong.

1\. For instance, the backdrop of trees and green at the railway station. The
intensity of urbanisation over the century sees every piece of land getting
built over.

2\. The mass availability of high technology. For instance, we were shown
imaginings of servants bringing musical pieces for the phonograph.

3\. An unpredictable technology - the age of electronics - totally transforms
machines.

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tdrgabi
half of them already happened. I should start working on the other half

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marknutter
Anyone know of some modern equivalents? What do we think the year 2100 is
going to look like, for instance?

~~~
ghc
I believe you'd have to turn to science fiction writing these days. Well, that
or the futurist movement.

But for the most part, I think the public has lost its thirst for knowledge
about the far off future. We're much more of a "want it now!" culture. I find
it very sad.

~~~
JonnieCache
I think this is because people have gotten so used to rapid innovation that
they no longer look to the far future for the arrival of new tech, because it
now arrives week on week.

As a consumer, why speculate on the next 100 years when you _know_ from
experience that you will have some undreamed of tech next year?

I don't see this as a bad thing. As long as those in society that actually
_do_ the innovating don't completely succumb to a similar myopia.

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schrototo
What's interesting is that they weren't really that far off with a lot of
their predictions. They just couldn't get past their current level of
technology, their imagination was restricted by what they were familiar with.

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praptak
Hm, for some of them I couldn't even see which part is supposed to be so two-
thousandy, e.g. the fifth from the top. (Edit: Got it from paleofuture - it's
the "phonographic message")

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Perhaps some things weren't every going to change?

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JoeAltmaier
They had airports, bikes with farings, tanks, videophones, wireless news all
down.

Apparently fashions weren't ever going to change!

~~~
JonnieCache
_> Apparently fashions weren't ever going to change!_

It is very sensible of them not to attempt to predict fashion IMO, because it
is by its very nature unpredictable, and possibly irrational and random,
depending on how you look at it.

Imagine how much more ridiculous these would have been were all the people
depicted in one-piece silver jumpsuits or something.

~~~
bergie
Also, using fashion from their own era enabled the artist to describe the
social contexts. So you know who are wealthy people, who are servants,
policemen etc, because they wear the stuff you expect them to. Otherwise you'd
have to explain "the guys with the red jumpsuits are police, the yellow..."

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subwindow
A lot of the concepts are correct, but the surprising thing is the lack of
advancements in materials. The images use cloth, soft metals, wood and canvas
for everything. It's almost impossible to state how big an impact plastics and
high quality metals have made on our day-to-day lives.

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hernan7
I'm with those that think these were supposed to be comical.

BTW, related: the 1905 French time-warp house

[http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/europe/02/18/france.timewa...](http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/europe/02/18/france.timewarp.house/index.html?hpt=C2)

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moomba
Glad I didn't live in that future. As has been said by others, predictions of
the future often tell you more about the society making the prediction than
what will actually come to pass.

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maushu
I love this kind of stuff. Requesting more links if possible.

~~~
jodrellblank
Must tomorrow's man look like this?

[http://blog.modernmechanix.com/mags/PopularScience/11-1963/t...](http://blog.modernmechanix.com/mags/PopularScience/11-1963/tomorrows_man/tomorrows_man_0.jpg)

( Taken from <http://blog.modernmechanix.com/> which is full of old science
magazine clippings )

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kang
Does the 8th pic say that 'dinner shall remain dinner';the way of eating would
be unchanged?

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mih
Today's 'Steampunk' is yesteryear's 'Sci-fi'

