Into the Future: Communications

Remember the phone booth, the home telephone or the pager? They may seem hopelessly antiquated now, but they were our key means of communication just a few short years ago. As technology has evolved, so have we. Today, nearly every person on the street can be seen texting or talking on their cellphone. These inventions have done nothing less than redefine our culture. But is this a case of too much of a good thing?

Into the Future: Communications examines the communication breakthroughs that still await us, and questions what they might mean for our society at large. The research and development of these highly advanced technological marvels are especially robust in Asia, where teams of talented designers are hard at work in places like Taiwan, Singapore, Korea and Japan.

Interactive interfaces will allow us to communicate, dance, and play games with a virtual partner who will respond to our actions and behaviors as seamlessly as a flesh and blood human being. The possibilities in this emerging technology is undeniably exciting, but at what cost? Will virtual companionship serve as a replacement for actual human interaction? In one sense, we enjoy a greater global connectivity than ever before. In another, we've never before been more isolated and encapsulated from the human world outside the comforts of our computer, television and smart phone monitors. Therein lies the eternal and unavoidable conflict inherent in many of our modern technological innovations.

That being said, much of the work that's currently underway to bring these new communication advances to fruition carry within them the promise of a better tomorrow. In Japan, interactive technologies dissolve the communication barriers between thousands of different languages, and does so in real time. Other applications could provide additional access to countless educational opportunities for students around the world.

From game play to improved mobile devices to super-realistic humanoid robots, Into the Future: Communications shows us the brave new world that lies just around the corner, and asks a series of searing questions regarding whether or not the human species is prepared to evolve at the same pace as its technology.