So I saw this replica of the Star Trek Tricorder come across one of my feeds, and the first thing to run through my head was "cool, I want." I’m a sucker for these kinds of reproductions. But then the same old feeling came over me; a feeling of disappointment that the people making these things just don’t get it. Watch old Trek. Watch them do cool things with their "futuristic technology" – things we can do just fine today. It raises the obvious question: why hasn’t anyone actually DONE THESE THINGS WITH THESE REPLICAS?
I’ve seen it said many, many times on various geeky forums: put out a touch screen smartphone with an LCARS GUI, and you’ll have people lined up to buy them! Make a working cell-phone that looked like a TOS communicator, and you won’t be able to keep them in stock. Heck, make a replica comm-badge or Uhura’s earpiece as a bluetooth accessory, and you’d be RICH! This tricorder? It’s plenty big enough to stuff a media player/GPS/Nokia N95 into – and people would love carrying it around.
I know there have been a couple half-hearted attempts, but if someone really did it right, a lot of geeks would be very, very happy. So, what do you folks say? Any other classic science fiction gadgets you could see turned into functional modern gadgets?
Link to the replica Tricorder.
