Eventually computer games allowed us to sit in our rooms and play virtual baseball. Then we'll almost be back to square one. But even if we like to wax on about that dusty old Remington typewriter we still love, few among us really want to adopt Luddite lifestyles. And we'd risk missing real progress if we did. The same digital innovations that are incrementally enhancing the realms of sex, sports and entertainment are also changing our world in profound ways.
Doctors can conduct surgery remotely, controlling robotic hands from great distances.
Quadriplegics can move their paralyzed limbs, implanted with sensors, just by focusing their brain waves. These applications are proof of the wonders of our new world, one in which people live longer, healthier, happier lives. What's more challenging are the attempts to create new needs, to exploit technologies to their maximum potential before it's evident anyone even wants them. It takes the idea of TV product placement to its absolute extreme. Touch any item on the screen around the actors and you get product info.