Cultural References
“After all, this is why I am here, right? To dissect our relationship with technology as human beings. To understand the connections that we have amongst ourselves. And I’m sure there are a million different threads here. Endless possibilities to correlate, examine, and pursue our connections to make sense of it.”
-Sam in conversation with Q (I Am Q)
“For the most part, we’re a very ‘new’ people. Every generation is somehow new, more thoroughly cut off from the past than the one that came before.”
"It’s not often that someone calls here, on my landline. Only a few people actually have this number – not including telemarketers. This is the main reason I have an answering machine. Everyone thinks it’s crazy, but just three-years ago I dropped all modern mobile telecommunication from my life. I use a flip-phone with basic SMS."
“International dialing is a costly luxury reserved for jet-setters. Interstate calls cost per-minute and innovative platforms even permit you to forego change at the public telephone booths –those still have rotary dials.”
"A phonebook with numbers is still important. And the virtuous white and yellow pages give you all the necessary channels to maintain a household – from plumbing and fixing the boiler to ordering pizza – delivered right to your doorstep on a bi-annual basis."
"I pumped my Reeboks and moved around the office. I wasn’t sure what was in the coffee, but I felt hyped. Everything around me in this office smelled like mint. Not the herb, mint, but something fresh, like a new car or a new pair of sheets. I loved the sensation."
“Let me put it like this. Do you remember our prehistoric symbol that ran the wooden telephone poles? Our soul-soothing voice from the Lion King and Field of Dreams – Mr. James Earl Jones of Bell Atlantic?”
"I could see Q. I could see her holding up the rubik's cube. Her slender pianist-like fingers pressed against the glass. I wondered what we would have spoken about in the days to come – there were still many bullet-points left in my marble notebook."
“This malleable, plastic-coated, magnetic floppy disk. Its fate was rapidly being sealed into a more compact hard-disk around the same moments Reebok pump-shoes were starting to peak. Car-phones have arrived as well – a specific phone-line that ran through a system in your automobile, typically reserved for the Gatsby's and Wall Street type – but even those still had chords."
“Here you can be anyone. Or alternatively, they could be anyone. We’re all lesbians – even the 13/m with pimples in Kansas. The next day he can be someone else, too, like a 28/m from California with blonde-hair and a surfboard. It’s liberating…even dangerous, but we’re jumping lightyears ahead."
“Wow – I had no idea this existed,” said Q, pulling up the Wikipedia page about SimCity. “Simulated cities back in the 90s – this is so advanced.”
"Let’s just call it the ‘dial-up process’. It was remarkable. Completely novel. Sounds eternal. You were entering the binary and all your senses were encapsulated into these moments."
