Universal Translator
Most of us have seen movies and read novels where people from earth go to Mars (or any other planets) and communicate with alien species in English. Fiction writers used to tell us that there is an equipment that generates a field that allows travelers to be understood. Which means, both sides speak in their native languages but the translating machine translates it for both parties, and it seems like other person is talking in the same language. This year many speech translator devices were developed, even one type uses your own voice. Of course most of the apps require Internet connection but there are few which store dictionaries and can work without Internet availability.
Head Mounted Computer Glasses
Charles Stross’ novel Accelerando takes us to the head mounted computer glasses where his character in the novel carries his data and his memories in a pair of glasses connected to the Internet. Today Google glasses serves the same purpose. You can carry your personal data with you all the time. And you can snap pictures (i.e saving memories) from it.
Private Space Flight
How many of you have seen Ridley’s Scott latest movie “Prometheus”? The concept where space travelling is private. Well this year Elon Musk’s SpaceX launched the first of a dozen planned missions to the International Space Station. The resupplying of ISS is kept in mind before designing the capsule. Musk is now thinking beyond just private space flights – his plans are to start making a colony on Mars in 2013.
