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"Poised between intransigent scepticism and uncritical credulity, it [science fiction] is par excellence the literature of the open mind."
- John Brunner
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| Telephone Funnel | ||
| A kind of two-way public loudspeaker. |
| ...we stepped off the moving portion of the street into an open space surrounded by telephone funnels, at which small groups of men and women were listening. As he halted, a loud voice began calling:
“Latest news! Rain is expected. Don’t forget Freedom Day! Muster for your amusement in Picnic Park, or the Council will make it hot for you! The escaped defectives all caught and sent to the leathers. A foreign spy captured this morning after a desperate resistance and now under guard. The miserable defective has confessed, involving numerous others. He is a low-class brach and a filthy degenerate. Boss Lembken is on the job. Praise him!” “Hurrah!” shouted the mob. “Come,” said David, plucking me by the sleeve. It was only then I realized that the reference was to me. I must have uttered an indignant exclamation, for he drew me away hurriedly. “Hush! You must keep your tongue guarded in public,” he whispered. “One can hear at both ends of the telephone.” |
| Technovelgy from The Messiah of the Cylinder,
by Victor Rousseau. Published by AC McClurg & Co. in 1917 Additional resources -
|
They were present in rooms as well:
Compare to the membrane from We (1922) by Yevgeny Zamyatin and the telescreen from George Orwell's 1984.
To my surprise his voice dropped, and, before answering, he cast a cautious glance toward the telephone funnel. Then, rising, he stuffed a sofa cover into it.
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'Their only check on the growth and development of Vulcan 3 lay in two clues: the amount of rock thrown up to the surface... and the amount of the raw materials and tools and parts which the computer requested.'
'I guess there's nobody round this table who doesn't have a Crosswell [tapeworm] working for him in the small intestine.'
'Figments of his mind in one sense, of course, for he had shaped them...'
'So the parent drone carries a spotter that it launches...'
'...nurse drones that would cruise around dumping large amounts of power into randomly selected pods.'
'It's done with a flip of the third joint of the tentacle on the down beat.'
'...for months Grantline bores had dug into the cliff.'
'I hope all those other cars are on automatic,' he said anxiously.
'It’s smart enough to go wrong in very complicated ways, but not smart enough to help us find out what’s wrong.'
