I believe the #1 usage of content based bandwidth online is religious material, followed by ironically titled "adult" material (or at least was not too long ago), so perhaps the Thought Writer is already in existence, translating the amount of thinking time spent by human subjects day to day into a corresponding volume of web material.
At 12:02 AM 8/19/2003 +0200, you wrote:
Thanks for a fine list Bryan!
Here's a cool idea I haven't heard anybody else articulate: computer assisted telepathy.
I expect it in my lifetime.
Instead of voice recognition "voice writer", imagine a brainwave sensitive headset (or imbedded sensors?) which allow, with individual man-machine training, "thought writer".
Text to synthetic voice already exists. Is it not possible to hook an audio amplifier directly into the audio nerves of a deaf person in such a way that they can "hear" something? In the future, "thought speakers" will be likely -- so your Google news feed bypasses airwaves and goes from your computer, wirelessly, to your ear amp and into your head.
And then the simultaneous Thought Writer -- Thought Speaker will be trivial. Voila. Comp assist. telepathy.
... and the need to broadcast comm to cosmos will rapidly diminish, as writers can try to speak directly into the thoughts of their listeners.
Maybe our evolution towards this is why the cosmos is so "quiet".
And I don't believe in faster than light travel. Sigh.
On the other hand, nanotech (influenced) recycling robots are also likely before 2020.
Cheers to all. Tom Grey (I think I'm becoming a Libertarian Paternalist)
