* Photo: Randal Ford * When Arthur C. Clarke went to the great geosynchronous orbit in the sky last year, he left behind a huge legacy, not least of which was a quote oft cited by Silicon Valley visionaries and wannabes. "Any sufficiently advanced technology," the sci-fi master wrote in 1962, "is indistinguishable from magic."
I thought of Clarke's observation recently while I was playing with a Flip MinoHD camcorder. It's a stripped-down device with a footprint smaller than an Altoids tin, yet it holds an hour of video (in high definition!) and even has 2X zoom. It sports a clear 1.5-inch screen for shooting and playback. Its controls are so simple that even an adult can master them on the fly. It has a pop-out USB plug for uploading to a computer and recharging without fumbling for a cable. Its price tag is $230, less than the cost of a really good seat at a Van Morrison concert.
When I was growing up, television production was confined to studios, and video cameras were giant cyclopsian beasts that included chairs for their operators. Only TV stations and networks could capture a video image, and "getting on television" was an event that required alerting all your friends and the entire family tree. When the age of consumer video arrived, it was like a miracle—even though the earliest camcorders had to be propped up on a shoulder and could record just a few minutes of video. Of course, the black-and-white machines cost a bundle—enough to buy tickets for an auditorium of Van Morrison fans back then.
Sir Arthur would undoubtedly agree that the transformation from TV studio to Flip is the very definition of magic. This applies to all the similar fruits of Moore's law. In the past 40 or 50 years, such mind-stretching advancements have become the norm.
But what happens when magic is an everyday occurrence? Consider that the Flip MinoHD—a once nearly unobtainable piece of technology—is now a 3-ounce knickknack. Better yet, it's rendered so elegantly that its coolness is baked in, not slapped on. Barely a minute after opening my review unit, I had the gizmo fired up and ready. My first experiment was to grab a long tracking shot through the rows of Wired's cubicles. I downloaded the footage and was impressed that all was captured as planned. However, the handheld image was a bit shaky ... maybe too vérité. As a result, my first thought was not so much "What hath God wrought?" as "What? No image stabilization? Where's the built-in steadicam?"
We all, I think, have become inured to Moore's law. The astonishing advances that once would have brought us to our knees are now reduced to a thumbs-up on Gizmodo. They're removed from the realm of magic—they're just cool gear.
Which brings me back to Sir Arthur. His quote makes me think of the European explorers who encountered previously unknown tribes. I used to imagine what it would be like to venture deep into the bush and unveil my latest gadget—a digital tape recorder, an iPod, an electric toothbrush.
But now my daydreams are different. As technological magic becomes routine, I wonder whether a visit to a preindustrial society might teach me more than it teaches them. The only thing more fascinating than our technology is the idea of getting along without it. Maybe the way to recapture the magic is to turn all that stuff off.
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