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BRodda
Working on the SPUs and a few other things has me realizing that there are things that are just GONE from the house holds of 2070. Wondering if people can help me thing of others.

1)Full size fridge: No need for one with the SPU. People don't buy enough fresh foods at any given time to need a full size fridge or freezer. Maybe a micro-fridge like in a dorm, but that's it. Enough fresh food that you need to store it to make sure it keeps is the mark of the rich.

2)Ovens. Again the SPU has killed the standard stovetop and oven. Rich people might have one and the poor might use one because they have too, but the middle class? I can see more hot plates in that case anyway.

3) Desks. I can't really see a need for a desk other than to keep your soycaf on and maybe some pictures of the kids/pets. Almost everything would be done in AR.

4) Videogame systems: The standard comlink must have killed all the video game systems. Those that aren't on comlinks are probably just downloaded to your Trid.

5) Kitchens in general: Think about it. SPU is the only cooking instrument. Very little need for storeage space because there are no pots and pans. No place really needed to store other foods because the SPU makes it all. I'm guessing that almost everyone uses disposable (but recyclable or biodegradable) dishes and silverware. The space that was the kitchen is now used for something else. Maybe dropped all together to save space.

6)Pens and pencils: With the "go paperless" trends and AR and SINs I can't think of a reason people would use them for non-artistic reasons.

7)Paper: Again see the going paperless. No mail, no magazines or newspapers. All the forms are electronic. They already say that books are considered archaic collector items in the fluff.

8 ) Supermarkets: If I can fit all the goods people want in 4 aisles with a little variety of fresh produce/sandwiches/Meals ready to eat why waste all the space? I can see distribution centers that rush goods to the store so there are no backrooms and while there is probably a good variety, everything is compact.

9) Checkouts: No need for a checkout line. Shopping consists of putting stuff into your bags and walking out with all the RFID tags counting your purchases and sending the receipt to your comlink. Maybe a slight holding area to make sure you can pay for everything, but no registers with belts and scanners.

Again I'm left with this barren, almost claustrophobic and clean image in my head of the middle class in SR. I think I'll keep it because it fits well with the alienation of modernized society I like to have in my games.
BookWyrm
Well, the way you describe things is that, although they are exceedingly rare, they are not necessarilly gone/obsolete.

While such 'luxury' items such as large refridgerators and baking ovens would be rare, they are not necessarilly gone. A 'half-fridge' or smaller would keep the perishabvle essentials from spoiling, as you said, larger "top-bottom' or 'side-by-side' models would become more of a big-ticket item for those who can afford them (upper-middle class & above). The same with ovens.

Countertop stoves would still be in some use, but not as prevailent. With portable hot-plates and heaters (like we have today) it's a matter of available space in most apartments and squats that limit the need for stoves. I would imagine that most apartments& dwellings in 2070, of middle & lower-middle class, would adopt the Japanese concept of maximizing as much space as possible out of a living area. A large living-room area like we have today would become a common-use room, where bedroom, living room, dining/kitichen areas become a matter of shifting a few pieces of furniture. Of course, a lavatory/bathroom would still be it's own separate room (unless the character lives out of a capsule hotel-style apartment).
Solid-form desks, like those in an office, would become impractical, and with AR & VR, a simple lap-tray would function more like a comfort-item, giving the person a hands-on 'feel' of a solid desk beneath their hands.

Pens and pencils would still be in use. Likewise paper, although most would be made from recycled or synthetic wood pulp. Real-wood items become rare but not prohibitively expensive.
Synth-paper flyers, posters/adverts, even club-passes would still be around. The world of 2070 hasn't gone completely AR yet.

Supermarkets would still be un use. Supermarkets are still one of the best ways for a food-distrubution company to get it's products to the 'average consumer', and therefor be still in use, if uncommonly so. Most markets of fresh produce would most likely be like open-air markets or faires, sometimes using a partially-standing but gutten buliding for shelter from inclement weather.
Stuffer-Shack doesn't rule the planet.....yet.

Checkouts would be faster, not eliminated. Compare the time it takes one person with a debit card vs. cash vs. a 'scan and dash' system. While each has it's advantages, most neighborhoods will still deal in hard currency, even if the majority of the people in the area use at-home-shopping systems.

Remember, as technology improves most systems, the previous system finds it's way down to the next level and so on.
EX: In my area, most MTA buses were converted to the refillable metro-pass card system, but I can still access several smaller buses that still take hard currency. While the metro-card system has it's advantages, the hard-currency-takers are slightly more ecconomical and get me to the same destination.

The niches of such items simply moves either up to a more luxury item-cost or moves down to access a larger demographic.
BRodda
QUOTE (BookWyrm @ Feb 1 2010, 10:54 AM) *
Well, the way you describe things is that, although they are exceedingly rare, they are not necessarilly gone/obsolete.


I was refering to the middle class (lifestyle). I'm sure there are still fountain pens and refrigerators, but they are mroe status symbols now.
Rotbart van Dainig
QUOTE (BookWyrm @ Feb 1 2010, 05:54 PM) *
Synth-paper flyers, posters/adverts, even club-passes would still be around. The world of 2070 hasn't gone completely AR yet.

Actually, for those who didn't, there's ePaper.

With any package of paper you buy, there comes a free disposable printer. It's really rare.
Wesley Street
I doubt kitchens would go by the wayside in a middle-class home... if there's even such a thing in 2070+. Kitchens have been the center of home life for thousands of years. There's no reason they would disappear, even if they aren't commonly used as intended.

People will always want to shop, even with easy home delivery. It's a human societal thing. Supermarkets may disappear but they could easily revert back into specialty food stores like bakeries, butchers, cheese shops, etc.
BRodda
QUOTE (Wesley Street @ Feb 1 2010, 12:47 PM) *
I doubt kitchens would go by the wayside in a middle-class home... if there's even such a thing in 2070+. Kitchens have been the center of home life for thousands of years. There's no reason they would disappear, even if they aren't commonly used as intended.

People will always want to shop, even with easy home delivery. It's a human societal thing. Supermarkets may disappear but they could easily revert back into specialty food stores like bakeries, butchers, cheese shops, etc.


I can see the fragmenting of the supermarket. Not saying that markets would not exist, but the giant buildings with 5K+ items would disappear.

As for the kitchen, I'm not sold on that for SR. The family unit doesn't appear to be too intact from the fluff. (In our 2070 they will probably exist). In SR I can see the family room or dinning room taking over the role of the kitchen.
Khyron
Things missing from the modern 2070's home.

Privacy. Stupid spyfuture.

Also there's an in-joke that current cheap materials no longer exist and everything is made of soy. Soy-cotton shirts, Soy-TP, Soy-sporks, ect. biggrin.gif

hobgoblin
i suspect that fridge will be a small combo unit, with most of the space dedicated to freezer rather then above zero refrigeration.

most likely, the hot plate will not so much be hot as it being a induction place, one that can both be used to cook, or to charge devices. Heck, it may even interact comfortably with a water cooker (for all those packs of instant noodles) in such a way that when the water is hot, it will cut the power to the induction coil.

basically, the food supplies will be more tv dinner style, just micro or add hot water.

oh, and also:
http://vimeo.com/8569187
lonewolf23k
I honestly don't see home cooking disappearing anytime soon. People forsaw the end of home cooking way back with the invention of the TV dinner and the rise of Fast Food franchises, but here we are today, and people are still cooking home-made meals, and some rare folks even make their meals from scratch. So I'm not worried on that front.
BRodda
QUOTE (lonewolf23k @ Feb 1 2010, 07:39 PM) *
I honestly don't see home cooking disappearing anytime soon. People forsaw the end of home cooking way back with the invention of the TV dinner and the rise of Fast Food franchises, but here we are today, and people are still cooking home-made meals, and some rare folks even make their meals from scratch. So I'm not worried on that front.


Again I am not talking about our future,but in the SR timeline/fluff. Its a very specific set of social, economic and technological guidelines.
Whipstitch
I also think it's deceptively easy to understate the seismic shift that's happened in food preparation. Do people still cook? Sure. But we've entered a world in which upper middle class people who cook two or three times a week can call themselves "foodies" and can rightfully lay claim that they have more culinary knowledge than many of their peers. Historically speaking, the fact that cooking has gone from a daily chore to a friggin' hobby for many ordinary people is outright amazing, since eating isn't exactly optional. Perhaps people were exaggerating when they predicted the outright death of the kitchen, but it's not really far fetched at all to say that home cooking is merely a favored novelty for many, many people in the Western world. Plus, one of the reason cooking still persists is that many home prepared staples still are cheaper and healthier than prepared alternatives. In the 2070s, that's apparently no longer always the case.
Rystefn
Remember, it's a dystopian future. The things that we predict will still be around for social reasons will fall by the wayside for those exact reasons. You aren't supposed to have friends. The Corp will provide you with all your social needs.
Karoline
QUOTE (lonewolf23k @ Feb 1 2010, 07:39 PM) *
I honestly don't see home cooking disappearing anytime soon. People forsaw the end of home cooking way back with the invention of the TV dinner and the rise of Fast Food franchises, but here we are today, and people are still cooking home-made meals, and some rare folks even make their meals from scratch. So I'm not worried on that front.


Well, maybe you don't know, but home cooking has in fact declined amazingly. Back in the 50s and 60s or so, you expected every single meal to be home cooked from scratch (or virtually so) with every meal being a sit down affair for the entire family. TV dinners did a decent job of shifting some families into the living room to eat in front of the TV, or create the occasional "Oh, I just don't want to cook, lets heat up the delicious dinner mega pack." Around those times eating out was along the lines of a once or twice monthly affair as a special treat, though generally to a nice place, not fast food.

In modern culture however, most people only cook a few times a week, with most of their food being on the go fast food, restaurants, or something similar. Fewer and fewer meals are 'whole family sit down meals'. I really don't find it hard to believe that if fresh food is expensive, that 100% of the meals will be taken care of either by the SPU or eating out or 'quick heat' meals. And since the average middle class person isn't going to be cooking anything, I don't see why they wouldn't want to get an extra 200+ square feet of living room or private space or bedroom space or just a chunk off their rent by ditching the kitchen.

Now, admittedly there are likely to still be plenty of houses/apartments that were built before the SPU became so huge would still have kitchens, likely even with full stoves, but I'd guess that any apartments/houses that have been built in the last 20 years or so would have cut them out unless they were intended for upper class people who could afford real food.
Backgammon
You would not find affection and tolerance between spouses.

You probably wouldn't find any kids either, because they already said "fuck you, mom" and went to hang out in the streets, mall or cyber café.

Daylen
clothes? with the new virtual stuff who needs real clothes?
Karoline
QUOTE (Daylen @ Feb 1 2010, 09:47 PM) *
clothes? with the new virtual stuff who needs real clothes?


I'd think everyone that wants to go outside. You could do AR clothing, but all someone has to do to get a peek at you is set your Arrows to not show up or take off their glasses.
Rystefn
Also, there's the whole cold and rain and pollution, and being splashed with mud by passing traffic and other cleanliness issues.
BRodda
QUOTE (Rystefn @ Feb 1 2010, 09:58 PM) *
Also, there's the whole cold and rain and pollution, and being splashed with mud by passing traffic and other cleanliness issues.


<iPhone Voice>

"There's a filter for that"

</iPhone Voice>
ravensoracle
What about the guy that walks around with his AR being fed by a Comm that has it's signal turned off and is only using a disposable comm to broadcast his Fake Sin. No AR Spam for him. I actually run like this with one paranoid guy.
Daylen
thats how I'd think everyone would go around...
Warlordtheft
Rotary phones. There are also no phones, cell phones, or alarm clocks.

BTW-When I was a teenager (late 80's), some kid 5 or 6 came in to use our phone. He was lost or something. He looked at the rotary phone we had in the kitchen and said---what is that?

Also missing is the TV/VCR or DVD, you've got a trid.

Sadly, no Atari.... frown.gif
Orcus Blackweather
Television - Replaced by Tri-D and AR
Playground - Only the wealthy can afford to "waste" space for children to play, and the wealthy do not want their children exposed to toxic rain and UV radiation.
Radio - Almost dead in our time, by 2070 radio will be fed directly to each user Ala Pandora, and it will come through the comm link like all the other entertainment.
Free Public Education - All education will be corporate sponsored, and the poor and underprivileged will at best be fed corporate pap for just a brief time, at worst the street is the education.
Literacy - Replaced almost universally by Icons and symbology. If the masses are uneducated they do not pose a creditable threat to the corporate masters.
Freedom - Fear for our children will see them implanted with tracking devices at birth. Our every move will be monitored by government, corporations, and anyone else with the technology and know how.
Karoline
QUOTE (Orcus Blackweather @ Feb 2 2010, 12:25 AM) *
Freedom - Fear for our children will see them implanted with tracking devices at birth. Our every move will be monitored by government, corporations, and anyone else with the technology and know how.


Being a runner would be really hard if you had a tracking devise planted in you.
hahnsoo
Supermarkets won't die. They will thrive, but they will be different. They are the new battlefields of the 21st century, especially in the Awakened world. Corporations will use supermarkets as a staging ground to out-compete and out-brand their fellow corps. It is yet another "channel" by which corporations can insinuate themselves into your lives. It is their lifeline to the poor and downtrodden, a social layer that allows the privileged to separate themselves from the proletariat masses. The average middle or upper class citizen doesn't need to go to a Walmart, but you can be damn sure that consumer goods are primarily pumped through superstores within walking distance of urban blight. Indeed, I can't really see an urban sprawl without such superstores.

Everything about RFID tags in SR4 fiction points to the checkout NOT disappearing, but instead becoming much more automated than before because of ubiquitous tagging.

Video game consoles will be "obsolete", I guess, but the entertainment enthusiast will have a new form of media to roll around in, and that's a Simdeck. While the average shadowrunner won't even bother to sample the simsense on his/her commlink or home trid, the Simdeck is the consumer electronics equivalent of a home theater and video game console all rolled into one, and the quality will matter to the average tech geek and gamer. Just like you could watch your favorite sports team play on your cellphone, but why would you want to when you have a bigscreen TV at home. Also, I could imagine that there are gaming-specific simdecks/sim modules out there. Or commlinks, for that matter.

Don't discount the value of actual tactile feedback. I'd imagine that desks would still exist, but as a location where you could put a few mementos and have a nice flat surface to work on while using both virtual/AR tools and real world ones. For example, maybe you want to work on your latest sim module to unlock some features. You just put it on your AR-enhanced table, put on your image linked glasses, then watch as virtual tutorials and pointers appear around the object, highlighting the good stuff.
LivingOxymoron
QUOTE (lonewolf23k @ Feb 1 2010, 04:39 PM) *
I honestly don't see home cooking disappearing anytime soon. People forsaw the end of home cooking way back with the invention of the TV dinner and the rise of Fast Food franchises, but here we are today, and people are still cooking home-made meals, and some rare folks even make their meals from scratch. So I'm not worried on that front.


Here's the thing, though. If you look at high population density, urbanized societies you find 2 things: 1st, no one cooks at home because a kitchen is a colossal waste of space from a relative standpoint, and 2nd, "fast food" is both the norm and of a much higher quality than what westerners are accustomed to. If you look at modern sprawls of today with a reasonable standard of living like Hong Kong, Tokyo, Singapore or Kolkotta, the middle class and working poor mostly eat out. The typical eatery is also very small and specialized; usually a lunch counter or a few tables serving a handful of dishes prepared from the same basic ingredients. When I lived in Japan, there were little allyway shops that ONLY served skewers (like yakitori), or ramen, or okonomiaki, etc. The other version were street carts, again serving a single type of food (and overseas, this was usually where all the best food was to be had anyway.

Now, it seems like the world of SR is gradually coming back to real food, at least in certain areas. Seattle has Snohomish, and the SSC right over the border; the CalFree Central Valley is still used to grow real food as well (with Horizon making a big push into that market already dominated by Aztechnology). More than likely, people who live in the rural areas mostly survive on real food, at least of the local variety... even a low class person probably gets to eat real beef every week or two in certain parts of Texas, for example.

My guess, though, is that a since real kitchen in a Low, or even Middle class home has fallen by the wayside and cooking is no longer a casual hobby skill among the masses, there are probably restaurants that specialize in simple, (relatively) inexpensive real food dishes. Figure it can be a monthly treat for Low lifestyle and a once weekly occurrence for Middle.


Karoline
QUOTE (hahnsoo @ Feb 2 2010, 12:39 AM) *
Supermarkets won't die. They will thrive, but they will be different. They are the new battlefields of the 21st century, especially in the Awakened world. Corporations will use supermarkets as a staging ground to out-compete and out-brand their fellow corps. It is yet another "channel" by which corporations can insinuate themselves into your lives. It is their lifeline to the poor and downtrodden, a social layer that allows the privileged to separate themselves from the proletariat masses. The average middle or upper class citizen doesn't need to go to a Walmart, but you can be damn sure that consumer goods are primarily pumped through superstores within walking distance of urban blight. Indeed, I can't really see an urban sprawl without such superstores.


Superstores I imagine continuing to exist, in fact I imagine they would be the main form of physical store, all owned by a single corp most likely, with space for other corps available to be purchased so they can move their stuff.

Supermarkets however are massive stores dedicated to the sale of food, and with soy packets being the main form of food, I can't see having such large buildings. There will certainly still be food markets, but not the massive affairs we are used to I think. That said though I wouldn't be surprised if old supermarkets were repurposed to continue using the freezer/cold section and an isle or two to sell food while the rest of the store is filled with other kinds of consumer goods.
Rotbart van Dainig
QUOTE (Karoline @ Feb 2 2010, 07:27 AM) *
Being a runner would be really hard if you had a tracking devise planted in you.

Well, Security and Stealth tags can be implanted at no Essence cost and are used for access control, so... it's not "at birth", but it is normal for Joe Average.
Karoline
QUOTE (Rotbart van Dainig @ Feb 2 2010, 08:43 AM) *
Well, Security and Stealth tags can be implanted at no Essence cost and are used for access control, so... it's not "at birth", but it is normal for Joe Average.


True. No trouble believing that Joe Average lights up like a christmas tree to most every company thanks to all the RFIDs in him, but a smart runner won't have all that on them. Or rather a runner that gets past their first mission.
Mickle5125
I imagine a smart runner will have a selection of RFIDs he can activate at will to blend in with the masses. After all, being the only tree to not light up makes you stand out almost as much as being the only source of light for miles...
Wesley Street
QUOTE (BRodda @ Feb 1 2010, 12:51 PM) *
The family unit doesn't appear to be too intact from the fluff.

How so?
QUOTE (BRodda @ Feb 1 2010, 08:17 PM) *
Again I am not talking about our future,but in the SR timeline/fluff. Its a very specific set of social, economic and technological guidelines.

Which has been fairly large and diverse since 2nd ed. Not every locale in the Sixth World is identical in tone to Seattle or Neo-Tokyo.
hobgoblin
QUOTE (Karoline @ Feb 2 2010, 06:27 AM) *
Being a runner would be really hard if you had a tracking devise planted in you.

tag erasers and cyberdocs wink.gif
Daylen
activate an RFID at will... you realise RFIDs are basically just innert pieces of metal right?
Delarn
QUOTE (BRodda @ Feb 1 2010, 02:35 PM) *
6)Pens and pencils: With the "go paperless" trends and AR and SINs I can't think of a reason people would use them for non-artistic reasons.

7)Paper: Again see the going paperless. No mail, no magazines or newspapers. All the forms are electronic. They already say that books are considered archaic collector items in the fluff.


Old school people still exist. I would like to point that mage with certain tradition will strictly use paper and different type of ink. University will have history book in paper. Paper must be still around and handwriting also.
BRodda
QUOTE (Delarn @ Feb 2 2010, 05:37 PM) *
Old school people still exist. I would like to point that mage with certain tradition will strictly use paper and different type of ink. University will have history book in paper. Paper must be still around and handwriting also.


Again I'm talking average Joe wageslave. I'm sure that people in the Barrens use paper too, I'm just saying it is not a staple of modern life.

Besides in our world the trees don't have a chance to come to life and EAT the loggers.
Draco18s
QUOTE (BRodda @ Feb 1 2010, 12:51 PM) *
I can see the fragmenting of the supermarket. Not saying that markets would not exist, but the giant buildings with 5K+ items would disappear.


They've already disappeared, really. The "big box stores" stock mostly "big box store" brand items. And more and more shelf space is being diverted to their brand. So its mostly large so they can stock enough for 1 days worth of shoppers.
Delarn
QUOTE (BRodda @ Feb 2 2010, 11:03 PM) *
Again I'm talking average Joe wageslave. I'm sure that people in the Barrens use paper too, I'm just saying it is not a staple of modern life.

Besides in our world the trees don't have a chance to come to life and EAT the loggers.


Has a corpo I would have a printed news paper to let my wageslave read it in the metro.
Dumori
QUOTE (Orcus Blackweather @ Feb 2 2010, 05:25 AM) *
Free Public Education - All education will be corporate sponsored, and the poor and underprivileged will at best be fed corporate pap for just a brief time, at worst the street is the education.
Literacy - Replaced almost universally by Icons and symbology. If the masses are uneducated they do not pose a creditable threat to the corporate masters.

I don't think academia would have gone in 2070's they'll still be universities maybe even joint sponsored by rival corps as to keep them free of ideology. These unis would still act as recruiting grounds however for corp researches. This alone would stop free education for dissaparing and the same with Literacy. However the lower classes woudn't get this and god forbid the sinless.
lonewolf23k
Well, formal education for lower classes might become harder to access, but home schooling with AR/VR assistance might take off. We have Wikipedia and Wiktionary available today, so I can only imagine the kind of online information databases that'll be available in the future.
Bira
I don't think restaurants and supermarkets will go away that easily, either. Selling pre-packaged or pre-prepared food is too big a business to just disappear. Even if a "soy processing unit" can prepare lots of different dishes starting from little protein packets, I imagine they can't just make anything a user would want, or at least are not made to be portable. So you can't just rely on your home SPU when you're an hour away from your home.

It's funny that the Sixth World seems to have less people in it than we do today, and yet it uses the cyberpunk trope of "the world is overpopulated, so everyone eats soy because nothing else can be produced in the necessary amount".
Ascalaphus
In my imagination, yeah, lotsa people die, but the rest didn't stop breeding. In typical third-world fashion, the reaction to adversity is to procreate, make sure you have kids to take care of you later, make sure the species doesn't die out etc.

It actually makes a lot nastier world when you have both mass death AND overpopulation like crazy.
BRodda
QUOTE (Bira @ Feb 2 2010, 09:07 PM) *
I don't think restaurants and supermarkets will go away that easily, either. Selling pre-packaged or pre-prepared food is too big a business to just disappear. Even if a "soy processing unit" can prepare lots of different dishes starting from little protein packets, I imagine they can't just make anything a user would want, or at least are not made to be portable. So you can't just rely on your home SPU when you're an hour away from your home.

It's funny that the Sixth World seems to have less people in it than we do today, and yet it uses the cyberpunk trope of "the world is overpopulated, so everyone eats soy because nothing else can be produced in the necessary amount".


My take on it is that the urban areas are a LOT more crowded do to all the dangers and general lack of people in the outlying areas. In my games the areas between sprawls is a hostile nightmare with wild spirits, paracritters, go-gangs and all sort of other stuff.

Basically the places that used to produce food were ravaged by paracritters and spirits. Also the farming industry was practically destroyed because large industrial farms were overrun after the wakening by Hell Cows, Cockatrices and other Awakened livestock (I tend to use the 1% rule across all species). People are now just learning how to deal with them, and even turn a larger profit off of these animals, but it was a sharp learning curve.

And I was jsut talking about supermarkets. I think there are even more restaurants and convenience stores then before. More little noodle stands and such.
hobgoblin
QUOTE (Daylen @ Feb 2 2010, 11:31 PM) *
activate an RFID at will... you realise RFIDs are basically just innert pieces of metal right?

the more basic store alarm type may be, but the more advanced ones have built in batteries and such.

heck, in SR, even the lowliest of RFID tags is a node, but one that one usually interacts with using data requests.
hobgoblin
on the topic of restaurants, i suspect they will thrive, especially those that can be picky about its customers.

the people there is in a given area, there more up front the whole ladder of status becomes...
The Overlord
!Warning!: Wall of text incoming.

While there is definatly a great deal of change in the way people live their lives in the 6th world, you cant just shrug off a couple thousand years of tradition, culture, custom, and habit. Humans are creatures of habit and like to stick to what they are use to, some are just more flexible in regards to alternatives. While some things will surely change, just as many will remain basically the same; simply altered.

1. I wouldn't say gone, but surely uncommon for the lower classes; and that would just be the modern ones. "high quality" versions of older models from the past are likely now available to people who wouldn't be able to do so in our time. This is also true for other things, just as someone mentioned prior.
2. Another thing that isn't gone, just less common. It would probably be less common than a fridge, but still around. However pre-made self cooking food packages are likely available.
3. Why would these go out? Just because there are comlinks, it doesn't mean that the desk will disappear; Desks are used for more than just computers. They are work spaces, organizational spaces, and surfaces to do countless things on. Yes you can use a table as a desk, but the opposite is true. AR doesn't automatically replace everything.
4. Again, Comlinks wont necessarily erase the videogame console. Why would a Corp wana get rid of something else they can make money off of? plus Not everyone has a comlink. Many parents likely dont allow their kids to have a real comlink until they are older, giving them cheap pseudo com links. (I will expand at the end).
5. Again, another thing that won't ever really be removed from homes. Many homes, specifically prefab/cubical apartments will probably have shrunken them down so they are much smaller, though again it depends on the area and class.
6. sometimes it is best to write things down rather than just enter it into a digital database. Paper trails are useful sometimes and by extension pens and pencils. Though they are likely recycled.(see comlink comment at bottom)
7.See above
8. Yet again something that wont entirely go away. Shrink, maybe. But not disappear. Maybe they would just become like larger versions of the stuffer shak.
9.Like others have said, it probably has simply become faster, not vanished. Seeing as there are more ways to steal, even with RFID tags and such, having people still walk by someone in the meat is still a viable (albeit fallible). Plus people still use hard currency in the form of cred sticks (they haven't been fazed out).


TV- I doubt it will go away. Some times people just wana look at a normal physical screen, plus there are still purist type folks who don't wana give up such a thing as TV over AR.
Playgrounds- This one could have some merit, but I still think us unlikely. Public parks still exist and playground likely can be found there. The question regarding it is whether it is still Public, and not just reserved for those with Sins. Plus there are still likely old dilapidated play grounds in the slums and such.
Radio- One could argue that it is gone, though some might just say that it has changed form, ie radio through Comlink rather than old fashion radio. Though you can still find radios i bet.
Free public Education: We have that now? Though i wouldn't be surprised if Corps did sponsor schools and uses them as tools or something.
Literacy- Even now we still have such a problem. There are still a good number of people who are illiterate. It would probably be more accurate to say that Literacy rates are lower than they are now in 2070, though it depends on the demographic being examined.
Freedom- Yes and No. I feel no particular desire to expand on this one.

Comlinks (and AR): While this is a personal opinion, allow me to say that the existence of the Comlink does not mean that so many countless physical things and activities have disappeared or been replaced by it. Granted the comlink can do a boat load of things, it strikes me as less of a full blown replacement of things as it is a PDA/multi-tool used as an alternative means of interacting with something else wireless-ly; thus allowing us to do other things. Cell phones for example in modern times; we still have hard line phones despite cell phones. Cell phones allow us to not be anchored to one point in the house. We also have cordless phones as well. TV remotes have not replaced the manual method of changing the channel on the TV. Thus in SR the Comlink is in the same vain; it allows you to interact with other things without touching them and since virtually everything is wireless and has a computer running it, the comlink is just like a remote is to the TV. Granted it is a very advanced remote. Plus, while it is a computer in multiple respects, even if it has enough space to store everything you have on it, it would be very unwise to do so since you run the risks that is inherent to the digital medium: hackers, permanent loss if to badly damage, and so on.
KCKitsune
I can see the commlink replacing TVs and Phones. Why have a TV when you can use a commlink with a SIM module to "watch" TV on a big screen.

Cell phones and land lines would be replaced with commlinks. Heck, we're seeing this today with people not having a regular land line. They only have a cell phone.

Now what I don't see going away... Radio. Normal broadcast radio would not go away because of the money to be made, and the signal range used by radio is not good for high speed data transmission (small bandwidth)*. HAM Radio would most certainly not go away. I do see the functionality of a Radio receiver being rolled into a commlink though.



* == I believe this to be correct. I do not know for certain
Bira
QUOTE (KCKitsune @ Feb 4 2010, 06:01 AM) *
Now what I don't see going away... Radio. Normal broadcast radio would not go away because of the money to be made, and the signal range used by radio is not good for high speed data transmission (small bandwidth)*. HAM Radio would most certainly not go away. I do see the functionality of a Radio receiver being rolled into a commlink though.


Broadcast radio wouldn't go away, but it would be delivered via the Matrix rather than via antiquated analog radio waves. That spectrum is probably used by wireless connections in 2070.
Daddy's Little Ninja
Supermarkets will thrive. They are the corp distribution point. They will crush out the mom and pop stores, which is what they do already.

I think kitchens will still be there but, as someone said, they will be the Japanese style, very compact and utilitarian. People will still want a cooking area but it might be induction coils. Turned off it is a counter top, turned on and you are boiling water.

There will still be pens and paper. People like the feel of things and jotting down a to-do list, even if their com link can do it to.

Clothes will not disappear. To much money to be made by corps making them.
Whipstitch
QUOTE (Daddy's Little Ninja @ Feb 4 2010, 12:43 PM) *
People liek the feel of things and jotting down a to-do list



Have you been to a college recently? Many, many students don't use pens and paper unless you ban bringing laptops. The last time I took a creative writing course for fun it turned out a rather large number of young students can't really write in cursive anymore; I got a lot of compliments on my handwriting as well as a couple puzzled looks. With SR4 fluff/tech being what it is, I would rather suspect that pens, pencils and paper would be relegated to little more than art supplies or a way to add a more personal touch to certain types of correspondence. In other words, stuff your average wage slave will hardly have time for.
DireRadiant
My youngest cannot read or write yet uses an iPhone better then her mother....

Paper... I look at my bookcases full of books and then look at my iPhone and laptop and the prospective large format ereaders and just laugh.
Whipstitch
Books are an iffy one. Personally, I think production will be largely over with. The tricky part is that reading is already a somewhat divisive activity. I know people who don't own any books. Hell, I donated away most of mine and pretty much exclusively use libraries these days. I just don't want to give up that space anymore, despite the fact that I am rather fond of reading. I also seem to remember a fairly recent poll indicating that one in four Americans didn't read a book in the last year. On the other hand, those who do read are often voracious. My grandmother would go through two dozen large books a year, minimum. Text will remain, of course, since it is cheaper to produce than other forms of entertainment, but hard bound books I have doubts about. The big thing is that 60 years isn't really -that- far away.
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