The exterior of the Spaceship Earth ride at Disney World’s Epcot park is perhaps one of the most recognized landmarks on Earth. Housed in the giant geodesic sphere that serves as the gateway into the Future World section of the park, the ride is one of Disney’s finest examples of audio-animatronic magic. Created in 1982, this ride takes the traveler on a journey through the history of communications technology starting with cave drawings and ending with Disney’s vision of 21st century communications. After 25 years, the ride was updated this past February but its amazing to to consider how accurate the original vision of the future was.
The final scene of the old ride depicts two teenagers talking to each other; not on the telephone, but over an audio/video link using a computer and flat panel display. The kids are neighbors of sorts, although in this future view, they are part of the same “global neighborhood”. One is apparently in the US; the other in Asia. They can see each other and the computer is translating their words into each other’s language.
In 1982 when the ride first opened, this idea must have seemed fantastic, but in the last few years, the technology and bandwidth have become generally available to enable this type of interaction. The realization of the future really being now hit home this afternoon as my family was sitting outside enjoying a warm October afternoon. As teens like to do, mine was pretty much ignoring her mom and I, and was instead, having a conversation with three friends. Of course, teens no longer tie up the landline phone for this activity like they did back in 1982. Mine prefers to use her computer and social sites like BlogTV which enables video streaming. The friends she was talking to were neighborhood kids. Global neighborhood kids to be more accurate; from Norway, Sweden and Austria.
Consider the implications of that for a minute. What was considered part of a fantastic future just a few years ago is now an everyday activity for teenagers. Soon, they will be starting their careers, building families of their own and generally running the place. How fast will their ideas and trends travel as the distance and barriers between different cultures becomes smaller and smaller? How much will they begin to see and respect one another for what they have in common instead being fearful of differences?
Spaceship Earth image courtesy of Jeff B
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