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"It is change ... that is the dominant factor in society today... the world as it will be. This means that ... every man must take on a science fictional way of thinking.""
- Isaac Asimov
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| Communicator | ||
| A small device that works to communicate over large distances. |
As far as I know, the first use of this expression in science fiction:
| The flying vessel had gone through the zone of feeble radiations which comprised the outer detector screen of the Fenachrone. But, though tenuous, that screen was highly efficient, and at its touch there burst into frenzied activity the communicator built by the captive to be actuated by that very impulse. |
| Technovelgy from Skylark of Valeron,
by E.E. 'Doc' Smith. Published by Astounding in 1934 Additional resources -
|
It may have dials! from One Against the Legion (1939) by Jack Williamson:
The tiny sound, peculiarly penetrating and insistent, was humming from the communicator hung by its thin chain about his neck. The Commander’s lean deliberate hands, drawing the little black disk from under his clothing, trembled slightly.
“It’s Legion Intelligence,” he told Giles Habibula. “An emergency call.”
Giles Habibula watched apprehensively as he touched the dial, whispered a code response, and lifted the little disk to his ear. The straining ears of the old Legionnaire failed to hear anything. And the face of Jay Kalam didn’t lose its grave, contained reserve. But his failure to breathe, and his frozen stiffness, betrayed enough.
“You’ve had bad news, Jay,” whispered Giles Habibula, when at last the Commander lowered the disk and broke communication. “Aye, mortal bad!”
...The Commander of the Legion found the small black disk of his communicator. His thin, trembling fingers turned the tiny dials, and tapped out a code signal. His thin lips whispered into it. Hal Samdu sat watching, his face rigid as a statue’s.
At last Jay Kalam lowered the instrument.
Compare to the Dirac transmitter from Cities in Flight (1957) by James Blish, the
comlink from Star Wars (1976) by George Lucas, the
communications disk from Exiles of the Moon (1931) by Schachner & Zagat, the
Ullran enunciator from Uller Uprising (1952) by H. Beam Piper, the
sleeve communicator from First Contact (1945) by Murray Leinster.
See also the audio relay (Robert Heinlein, 1951), the distrans (Frank Herbert, 1965) and the communications implant (Niven and Pournelle, 1981).
Km! Krrr! Km!
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'...small electric motors at the principal joints worked the prosthetic framework by means of steel cables...'
'Living protoplasm incorporated into the Ampek F-a2 recording system...'
'Twoflower's Luggage, which was currently ambling along on its little legs...'
'He came to as the ship went into free flight, arching in a high parabola over the plains...'
'The peculiar quality of this light, which gave it its great preeminence over all other penetrating rays...'
'The overworked leg motor would have to cool down before he could work on it...'
‘Where to, sport?’ the starter at cab relay asked.
