Manufacturing depicted in fiction

Natasha Carolan | HighWire Doctoral Training Centre | @natashacarolan

Design FictionDepictions of design and manufacturing in fiction

Tuesday, 11 October 2011

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Depictions of design and manufacturing in fiction


Metropolis






‘... the fiat of the Plurocracy went forth, and the small business men and manufacturers swamped him with a flood of notices that he must discontinue running their old advertisements’

The Iron Heel by Jack London

The Iron Heel






‘And everyone must lose his mind, everyone must! The sooner the better! It is essential — I know it.’

We by Yevgeny Zamyatin

We






‘Cleanliness is next to fordliness.’‘strange to think that even in Our Ford's day most games were played without more apparatus... imagine the folly of allowing people to play elaborate games which do nothing whatever to increase consumption.’

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

Brave New World






‘But actually, he thought as he readjusted the Ministry of Plenty's figures, it was not even forgery. It was merely the substitution of one piece of nonsense for another...’

Nineteen Eighty Four by George Orwell

1984






‘On the one hand, these things are networked volumetric printers, but on the other they are superb category busters that have achieved an entirely justifiable...market penetration

Makers by Cory Doctorow

Makers






‘He let the pictures of cloth designs flicker past his eyes while he let the persuasive voice of the catalog drone on until a pattern showed up which was distinctly unmilitary and not blue, whereupon he arrested the display and punched the combination for his size.’

Methuselah’s Children by Robert A. Heinlein

Methuselah’s children






‘From cars to radios to fine glassware, the Biltong life forms could create beautiful, working copies. The survivors of war relied on the Biltong life forms to make copies - "prints" - of necessary objects.’

Pay for the Printer by Philip K. Dick

Pay for the Printer






‘Why don't you just compile it?’ Harv said. ‘The M.C. can make wood.’

‘It can make fake wood,’ Rita said, ‘but some people don't like fake things.’

Matter Compiler in The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson

The Diamond Age






‘...each lithocule knew exactly where it was supposed to go and what it was supposed to do. They were tetrahedral building blocks of calcium and carbon, the size of poppyseeds, each equipped with a power source, a brain and a navigational system.’

The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson

The Diamond Age






Star Trek






‘The law especially disna like your kind owning 3D printers, fabbers capable of taking a design template off a pirate website somewhere and extruding it to the real world to an accuracy of a few microns... the Polis don’t like unmonitored fabs.’

Rule 34 by Charles Stross

Rule 34






‘When the 'Drink' button is pressed it makes an instant but highly detailed examination of the subject's taste buds, a spectroscopic analysis of the subject's metabolism... no-one knows quite why it does this because it then invariably delivers a cupful of liquid that is almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea.

The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy




Technology

Manufacturing depicted in fiction