One big thing futurists got wrong!

Steve Haziran 06, 2022

And that's the size of computers as time progressed.

Once again, I turn to Time Warp (apparently it is two words, not one like I had been writing) #5 and its story "The Vengeance of C-92." C-92 is a continent-sized computer (that's what the "C" stands for -- "continent") that runs -- you guessed it -- the whole continent.

Of course, today, we scoff at this erroneous prediction of massive computers. Just imagine what the intelligent folk at Popular Mechanics magazine feel like today based on their 1954 prediction of what a home computer would look like ... in 2004: UPDATE: This is an Internet hoax. Thanks to commenter Pat for pointing this out!

I don't know if you can read it, but the last line in the caption says "With teletype interface and the Fortran language, the computer will be easy to use." Wow.

One of the best-ever stories in early Iron Man issues is found in #5 -- "Frenzy in a Far-Flung Future." Tony Stark is whisked to the future to face judgment for his creation -- a massive computer named "Cerebrus" (see below) that has taken over the world and enslaved mankind!

In film, 1970's "Colossus: The Forbin Project" similarly believed that a powerful computer would need to be immense. Here's a shot of Colossus's "home," built inside a mountain:

This is not unlike "Krell," the planet-wide computer from "Forbidden Planet."

Colossus, and a similar Soviet supercomputer named "Guardian," joined together and took over the planet. But unlike "Skynet" in the "Terminator" films, Colossus did not desire to eliminate humanity. It actually wanted to learn from us, especially the concept of love. But don't be mistaken -- if we f***ed Colossus over and didn't do what it wished, it wouldn't hesitate to retaliate. When US military personnel attempts to replace the detonators on nuclear missiles with "dummies," Colossus explodes one of the nukes!

"Colossus" is an exceptional film despite its technology-guessing shortcomings. In fact, I use a modified version of the Colossus logo from the film at my politics-oriented blog!

Just consider how computer technology has really progressed from the earliest home computers that were available in the early 1980s. I recall an old magazine I discovered in my basement that displayed some of these models -- the "cheapest" of them cost around $5,000! Now, a laptop a fraction of the size of one of those units costs a fraction of that, and has a gazillion times the computing power. Oh, and Popular Mechanics? You don't need to know Fortran to operate it, either!