Copyright Ian Pearson, BT Futurologist

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The future of entertainment

For Business and Technology January 1998

I’m particularly interested in entertainment at the moment, having just taken part in a discussion show about the future for Channel 4 going out on New Year’s Eve. It made me think quite a bit about what entertains. Watching other people do just about anything can be entertaining, even if they are just sitting around chatting. In the future, as we get video networks everywhere, you may be able to watch ordinary everyday activities anywhere, like old ladies on a park bench watching life go by. As computers get smarter, they will eventually be able to interpret real time video and alert us to anything going on that may be of interest to us, as it happens. News will never be the same again. As computers get smarter still, when there are numerous computer personalities, will we find it interesting to watch entirely synthetic discussion programs, or computer generated circus acts? Somehow, I doubt it will be as fascinating as watching other people. Or maybe I’m just specist.

It is quite unbelievable just how much effort goes into TV production in spite of all our technology, or maybe because of it. For our programme, it took hours for a dozen crew to meticulously set up the set and equipment and another three hours to film one hour of chat. We expect ever higher quality and more excitement. More sophisticated equipment allows a wider range of shots, more clever editing and tricks, better lighting and so on. Consequently, though the cost of electronics falls continuously, the cost of entertainment rises. So as you get richer, you spend more on entertainment and become more demanding. So what is next? 3D, holographic TV, Star Trek Holodeck? Total fantasy via direct nervous system input. Well not yet, but maybe in 20 years time. The Nintendo games machine you just bought the kids is certainly capable of 3D graphics, but domestic goggles have been delayed due to the concerns over potential eye problems and consequent threats of litigation. They will soon be obsolete anyway, thanks to lightweight glasses with video projectors reflecting off small mirrors to give virtual screens.

However, the ultimate Christmas present for the teenager with everything in ten years may be the active contact lens. It should be possible in that time frame to miniaturise all the electronics, receiver circuitry and lasers to write an image directly onto the retina, all inside a contact lens. Your kid can then play 3d games all day with much reduced eye strain. He (or she I suppose, though girls seem to be much less keen on gadgets). With ear phones he will have the full audio-visual capability of the computer, videophone and TV at his disposal. Robocop and Terminator are good models for the display, with information overlaid on the real world, or substituted for real life. Any mix between totally real and totally computer generated is possible. With VR goggles, you can go to the virtual office without ever leaving your bed. With the active contact lens, you won’t even have to open your eyes. We may have a generation of students who stay in bed apparently comatose all day while attending lectures from universities anywhere in the world. The entertainment potential for active lenses is huge. Apart from TV and information overlays, there are virtual environments, shared spaces where you can meet your friends or colleagues, but less obvious is the advantage of watching a display without anyone else being aware, since the lenses will appear just like any other lens, or possibly slightly coloured.

But when you mix computer generated images with the real world, it goes far beyond Robocop information overlays though, more than just flashing post offices and arrows. Imagine you are on a roller coaster, and just after you have passed the top of a hill, you see the track collapse in front of you. You don’t know whether the accident is real, or just part of the ride. Neither are you sure whether the drop is ten or a hundred feet. When you get off, you can’t be certain whether the person meeting you is really your better half, or whether she is playing another trick on you and you are talking into thin air to an image. Random events and uncertainties such as this could be injected into your everyday life. Entertainment might not be just something you engage in at specific times in the evening when all your work is done, it could be a background activity all the time. Entertainment is usually more fun when we enjoy it with our friends, and being in permanent visual contact with them will allow us to share so much more, and interact more. You have a few years left of relative certainty about reality, but it won’t last very long. Your life could become much more fun as a result.

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