At DVICE, we bring you forward-thinking designs and technological concepts every single day. But back in 1967, way before the Internet and personal computers (and us), the best way to see the future of technology was to tune into a show on CBS hosted by American broadcast journalist Walter Cronkite called "The 21st Century."
According to the Smithsonian, in one particular episode aired on March 12, 1967, Cronkite walked through predictions of what the future home office, living room and kitchen would look like in the year 2001.
For the home office: a console that relays news via satellite from around the world, an electronic stock ticker machine, a futuristic telephone with a monitor for video chatting and a closed-circuit TV system for surveilling other connected rooms in the home. Cronkite's prediction that "with equipment like this in the home of the future we may not have to go to work, the work would come to us" is surprisingly close to how people can work remotely today.
As for the living room, futurists imagined a master console that would "inform, instruct and entertain" the family of the future. There would be 3D TVs and "stereophonic music" capable of filling up the entire room.
Lastly, Cronkite walks through the kitchen of the future. In the video, he shows how preparing meals would be automatic — a person would only need to select their desired meal, while a high-powered microwave-like machine did the rest. Most interesting is how plates and cups are "molded on the spot" when needed and melted back into plastic afterwards. Sounds a little bit like 3D printing, doesn't it?
You can watch the three clips that take you back to 1967's vision of 2001 in the video gallery. VIDEO
Via Kottke and Smithsonian
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