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"One can see the free software movement as a precusor for a "free hardware" or "free wetware" movement--one that will provide free libraries of designs for biological or nanotechnological products that replicators can be programmed to churn out."
- Charles Stross

Schrieber Analyzer  
  Superior automatic air testing - for the discriminating space traveler.  

Whenever Wayne Hillder, space scout extraordinaire, sets down on a new planet, he has to perform a few tests. Chief among them is testing the quality of the planet's atmosphere.

Pre-exit rule number one is that air must be tested. What suited that crowd outside would not necessarily agree with him. Anyway, he'd have checked air even if his own mother had been smoking a cigar in the front rank of the audience.

The Schrieber analyzer required four minutes in which to suck a sample through the pilot-tube, take it apart, sneer at the bits, make a bacteria count and say whether its lord and master would condescend to breathe the stuff.

Technovelgy from Diabologic, by Eric Frank Russell.
Published by Astounding Science Fiction in 1955
Additional resources -

The sarcastic tone of this story makes it a lot of fun to read.

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Additional resources:
  More Ideas and Technology from Diabologic
  More Ideas and Technology by Eric Frank Russell
  Tech news articles related to Diabologic
  Tech news articles related to works by Eric Frank Russell

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Science Fiction in the News

Jetson ONE Air Races Begin, Can Air Polo Be Far Behind?
'If you're one of those rarities who haven't attended a rocket-polo "carnage", let me tell you it's a colorful affair.'

Will Space Stations Have Large Interior Spaces Again?
'They filed clumsily into the battleroom, like children in a swimming pool for the first time, clinging to the handholds along the side.'

Mornine Sales Robot
'Robot-salesmen were everywhere, gesturing...'

Bipedal Robot Floats Gently While Walking
'a walking balloon proceeded with long strides of its aluminum legs...'

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'You will notice that it... fits the suitcase nicely.'

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'Most men updated their PIP on New Year's Day...'

YES!! Remote Teleoperated Robots predicted by Technovelgy!
'...a misshapen, many-tentacled thing about twice the size of a man.'

Will Robots Ever Fold Landry?
Where have you gone, Mrs. Robinson?

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