Hello Fellow Technophiles,
For some reason there seems to be an abundance of Star Trek fans in the tech world. As you can see in the picture to the left, I am one of these. I am even fine with being called a Trekkie even though some fans, for reasons that I don’t understand, feel this is a pejorative term and prefer the term Trekker.
If you look closely at my picture, you will see one of the most iconic photos of all time. This is an Apple “Think Different” poster featuring Buzz Aldrin walking on the moon less than two months after the last episode of Star Trek aired on NBC. While this is a great photo, it has been upstaged as far as I am concerned. This picture taken last year is of Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti aboard the International Space Station wearing a Star Trek: Deep Space Nine era Starfleet uniform. As each tenant of the ISS gets a limited amount of personal items to bring aboard, it is a testament to her commitment to Star Trek that she chose to bring this up.
Star Trek’s influence also allegedly reaches into Apple’s design team. There are those that believe that the iPad was in part inspired by the PADD device used by Starfleet personnel. While there are some similarities here, I believe that the Star Trek technology that most closely resembles Apple technology is the voice of the ship’s computer; Apple’s analogue to this is Siri.
Siri’s functionality increases all the time and will be a full-featured personal assistant probably sooner than we think. As this becomes the case, along with the other voice-activated assistants out there, we will probably find that we type less and speak more. What will become of the written word in this scenario? Will literacy drop as we become accustomed to transmitting our thoughts primarily verbally? Will Ben’s article below on keyboard layouts still be relevant? Only time will tell.