10. Daft Punk – While their music isn’t all specifically sci-fi, their electronic sound certainly gets lumped into the ‘futuristic’ category. They’re well known for their high-tech visuals and costumes as well as for having interesting videos. They co-produced the animated film The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem, and (building on their machines-to-men theme) released a film called Electroma, the story of two robots trying to discover their humanity.

9. Devo – While perhaps best known for their geometric hats, sci-fi imagery, and the song Whip It, they were quite successful in the alternative/underground scene in the 80s, and Jocko Homo, Freedom of Choice, Girl U Want, as well as their covers (Satisfaction, Working in the Coalmine), were the musical soundscape to many sci-fi movies and shows. Nowadays, their music appears in several TV commercials.

8. Orbital While their music has been used in several sci-fi movies (The Saint, Event Horizon, Hackers, Mortal Combat, Johnny Mnemonic), they had to make the list via their Doctor Who theme song. In a way, it’d be pretty easy to make the entire list electronica bands, so I limited how many would be in the top.

7. Voivod – while there could be a strictly metal version of this list, this is the band that takes the top of the metal category. They’re based on the concept of the Voivod, a futuristic warrior/overlord.

6. Styx – While heavily parodied, the theatrics of their Kilroy was Here concept album (which told the story of a future where rock & roll was outlawed), featuring Mr. Roboto, were considered a musical sci-fi staple at one point. I have a backup NAS unit called a Drobo, which I named ‘DroboArigato’ after the line in Mr. Roboto.

5. Queen – Queen’s main sci-fi musical work was the Flash Gordon soundtrack, and to a lesser extent the Highlander soundtrack (which is more fantasy). But the band themselves had a very sci-fi presence to them – theatrical, otherwordly, and somewhat dystopian. [Of course, who could omit the memorable scene in the horror/zombie/comedy movie Shaun of the Dead featuring Don't Stop Me Now, albeit a stretch to include zombies as sci-fi...] To this day I can’t hear the world ‘Flash’ without adding ‘aah-aah’ to it.

4. Pink Floyd – While it’s fair to consider Pink Floyd a psychedelic band, Dark Side of the Moon is also a great sci-fi musical journey, and The Wall could certainly be considered an excellent example of a dystopian future, with its exaggerated themes of fear, insecurity, and loss (and how we end up trying to hide and protect ourselves from our fears). Pink Floyd also transcended their musical expression to their visual presentations, and were well known for their elaborate stages and lighting. [When I saw them live, a giant object was emerging from the center of the stadium; a friend next to me leaned over and asked me what it was, like somehow I'd know. I sarcastically blurted out, 'a giant disco ball.' It was a giant disco ball.]

3. Tubeway Army/Gary Numan – I’m cheating a little to include Gary Numan in here, but Tubeway Army’s sci-fi elements would be mostly his brainchild. They made one of the best sci-fi songs ever (Down in the Park), as well as songs like Are ‘Friends’ Electric?, and their song Listen to the Sirens quoted from Philip K. Dick.

2. Muse – these days it seems you can’t have a sci-fi show without it featuring some sort of Muse song in the ads. Unfortunately, this also has put their music onto a certain popular teen vampire franchise as well. Their Black Holes and Revelations album covered the sci-fi gamut from NWO to alien invasions. And let’s face it, not that many people can get away with making Supermassive Black Holes sexy (the actual ones, not just something that could be used as a porn name).

1. ELO – It’s kind of easy to forget how huge ELO was at one point. Another theatrical/big production style band, ELO had a spacey sound and used UFO-looking space stations on their album covers. Their music was featured in the sci-fi (yeah, it counts) movie Xanadu, and did some sci-fi concept albums as well. Recently, their song Mr. Blue Sky was featured on an episode of Doctor Who.

Honorable mentions: Hawkwind, Front 242, Kraftwerk, TRex, New Order, Manufacture, NiN, Skinny Puppy, Orb, Nitzer Ebb, PWEI, Iron Maiden, Ultravox, UFO, Judas Priest, KLF, Psykosonik, Sepultura, King Crimson, Talking Heads, Radiohead, Duran Duran, Fear Factory, MC Frontalot, MBM, Shamen, Art of Noise, B-52s, Earth Wind & Fire, Big Country, KMFDM, Black Sabbath, Blue Oyster Cult, Clash, Sisters of Mercy, Underworld, FSOL, Flock of Seagulls, Shriekback, Utopia, Rush, Police, Savatage, Who, Moody Blues, SSS, Rammstein, and a whole bunch of others. I have a ton more written down from when I was making this, but I’d love to hear your thoughts and additions too.

Wait? No David Bowie? No Kate Bush? Thomas Dolby? Bjork? Since this was bands, individual artists weren’t included, nor individual songs (Mars Needs Women, Planet Rock, Spice, Intergalactic, We Are Made of Stars, Rocket Man, More Human Than Human, etc.) – a top list of these may be coming soon, though…

As a kid, my mother used to go out every night, and I’d either stay home and take care of myself or I’d go out to the bars with her. My dad, on the rare occasions he’d spend time with me, would take me to strip clubs. I grew up way before my parents ever did, but I never had any concept of fun or carelessness because of that. I never really genuinely laughed, because I was always worried. My mother ended up dating a violent man who pulled a gun on me when I was 10. I can never forget the look in his face, the anger. There’s a line that you see in people when they’re angry – where you can look into their face and see that they’ve snapped, that they no longer have control of themselves. He had that look. My father used to get that look when he’d fight with my mother; they were toxic to one another and it was frightening to see.

I dealt with the pain of childhood by shutting down, hiding, reading, and diving into work. I worked hard all of the time; that was the only way I knew how to escape. Everyone loved my writing and I was published frequently from the age of five (and started my first business then too). I never stopped; I was afraid to stop. I ended up getting full scholarships to three great schools, but my mother wouldn’t let me take them. She wanted to make me suffer since she blamed me for everything that had gone wrong in her life. I never understood blame. I thought, you could waste time with blame or you could fix things, so why not fix things? She died miserable in part because she never wanted to make anything better, she just wanted to control everything. But I was always trying to fix everything, overcompensating for feeling guilty about merely existing. I’d ask everyone what they needed and tried to help them. I got into a bit of a martyr role, but it was easier than dealing with myself. I pushed everyone away that grew close to me to ensure that they’d be happy – I believed that everyone would be so much happier without me in their life, that I was just a burden and worthless. I’d been told that for so long that I believed it. But I kept fighting too, trying to believe in myself. I’d get moments and bursts of confidence and then get shot down again and again. I’d deal with all kinds of abuse and pain. I would get kicked while I was down, but kept getting up. Sometimes the situations I ended up in seemed so surreal that it was like living in a bad sitcom. But no matter what happened, it seemed that there was always someone there anxious to take things out on me, to tell me that things were all my fault, that I did everything wrong and should be blamed. Even when I wasn’t responsible for things, I always felt like I was – because I was so conditioned to having to be accountable for everything. Others never seemed to own their actions since I was such an easy target and could so easily be blamed. That was when I started to see that those people didn’t care about fixing anything, they just wanted pity or attention or to take things out on others to avoid dealing with their own problems. They just wanted to go back to that state of being a child where everyone sticks up for you tells you that you’re right no matter what you’ve done, where you’re always the victim, where you don’t have to worry about anything because someone else is babying you. I can’t relate to that desire to be treated like an inferior, helpless child. I’m not sure if that’s because I never got to be a child, or because I thought better of people when they were grown. Some people wanted support, reassurance, to have someone believe in them and tell them things would get better – all reasonable things – but were unwilling to give that in return to others. That’s the part that is the most childish; that place of desire where everything is about what you get, and not what you give. What you give isn’t about keeping score or proving how awesome you are; it’s about respecting others and wanting them to be happy. Growing up isn’t all bad, and being a child isn’t all good.

The problem with this is twofold. First, these patterns are always going to be seen, because they are actively being sought, albeit not deliberately. Your brain is always looking to make sense of things that happen (in its own varying way), so when something traumatic (and therefore irrational) happens, it tries to connect pieces to make sense of it. The brain is going to see patterns everywhere; that’s what it does. Trouble is, it’s not going to make the distinction between rational fears and irrational ones when it’s in a seeking mode, it’s just going to build data. And even though people constantly claim that you should look for patterns (suggesting that seeing similarities will help you prevent mistakes from happening), there are a lot of problems with doing this. There are so many data points, it’s easy to focus on the wrong ones. You’ll grow weary of people with certain physical traits that remind you of [trauma/past], or other trivial non-causal items, instead of a relevant item. If someone chews gum the same way as the guy who shot your puppy, you’ll project that prior event onto them (things that set off these connections are usually called ‘triggers’). You may start to either use that data to absolve yourself of responsibility (‘it was all their fault, because they all did things x, y, and z’) or blame yourself (‘I should have seen that/prevented that/known’). When our brains are being defensive (either anticipating pain based on paranoia, or because something traumatic has just happened), the instinct seems to be to rationalize trying to find these patterns and to look for ‘wrong,’ which only makes the problem worse.

Secondly, looking for ‘bad data’ and previous trauma will only magnify any present situation and prevent healing. All of your brain’s focus will be on negative, detrimental items and will be unbalanced as a result. The best thing to do whenever the brain sees or starts to look for negative patterns (fear, pain, and so on), is to focus on ‘good data’ and dissimilarities (joy, laughter, etc.). This will help you separate and process individual events (therefore not cling to past pains or wounds) and avoid becoming delusional. It will also help prevent you from creating bad experiences through the ‘self-fulfilling prophecy,’ where you’ve projected your brain’s imaginings of ‘bad data’ being linear (bad thing A happened, so bad thing B happens next) so concretely that you become convinced that those negative things ‘must’ be true.

When you’re actively trying to find parallels to past pain, that’s something different. It’s self-sabotaging; that’s not protection, that’s persecution, and your brain might stay stuck in victim mode if you don’t take a hold of it. If you’re not aware that your brain is doing this (trying to find parallels to past pain to go ‘aha! Fight or flight!’), then you will keep wondering why things ‘always happen to you.’ You have to be aware of what your brain is doing (trying to protect itself from harm), and then show it all of the evidence that the past experience is not actually happening all over again, even if there are similarities. The best way to heal from the pain of the past is to stop expecting it to happen again; this does not mean to ignore warning signs of bad behavior, but to separate it from other events and show the brain how now is different from then (or this is different than that). Eventually the brain will learn that this situation is not parallel to the previous one at all despite whatever superficial (paranoid) similarities it saw.

I’m not suggesting that you should ignore ‘red flags’ or dismiss things off as merely being paranoia. Fear and paranoia can help us, so long as they are looked at as a guideline rather than as gospel. Once those elements start to control us (instead of us controlling them), that is when we need to take action.

Now of course anyone who has a problem with not being able to just freely insult others whenever/whyever is showing their immature finery, but moreover they’re showing their hypocrisy. If they’re allowed to ‘do whatever they want,’ then why is the person being insulted not allowed to ‘do whatever they want’ (i.e., not be insulted)? Why can’t they ask for it to stop without it being ‘telling someone what to do’? That’s not curtailing free speech or stifling someone’s opinions, that’s preventing abuse. Responding (to an honest plea to stop abusing someone) with defensiveness and passive aggression is a problem. And telling someone that you can do whatever you want to, but that they have to do what you want (i.e., put up with their abuse because ‘they’re entitled to say it’) demeans and devalues another person and their needs. Should we not try to protect ourselves from those doing us harm just because they think it was okay? If we let it slide and just ‘get a thick skin,’ how far will it go? If you really believe someone is, say, crazy, is it appropriate or necessary to call them crazy, or should you not abuse them in case, well, they do have some sort of mental illness that you are provoking? And what happens when your comments have consequences, like in cyberbullying cases? People have lost lives over being called names. It’s not unreasonable to think that calling someone a psycho online would have an emotional impact on them, or that accusing them of doing things they didn’t do isn’t a serious case of libel. And even worse, glib comments about slapping or harming another person; can they ever be dismissed as just immature ramblings when you have no idea how unstable the person is who made them? It’s never good to be paranoid, but how is such a comment appropriate? What is gained from verbally assaulting others? Do we really think that it’s okay when we don’t even know the person, because then they’re not ‘real’ anyways?

I’m always saddened when I see anyone resort to personal attacks, name calling, and put-downs. And while I think people should always be able to speak freely and openly, there should also be consequences for doing so when those words and actions hurt another person. But what is a fair price for someone hurting you? I believe a sincere retraction and apology are appropriate, but how would the abuser gain the maturity to do so if they didn’t have it to avoid the action in the first place? I’m not much for people having rules that they ‘have’ to follow about what to do or say. I don’t believe in controlling people or suppressing their opinions. But the entitlement mindset, the people who think that they can do/say anything without listening to or respecting others… maybe we should look at declaring that a disease. If it is, I wouldn’t call them names; I’d just hope that they get the help they need for their sickness.

[Yes, this is based off of a true story of my ex, who felt it was appropriate to publicly ridicule me and call me 'crazy woman,' 'psycho,' and telling people that I'd harm and use a cat as some sort of pawn. Complete strangers called me a psycho and one offered to 'slap that bitch.' It's one thing to say 'sweep it under the rug,' but there's a point where we need to stop telling victims of abuse to just take it. I don't advocate emotional knee-jerk revenge tactics either, but sticking up for yourself when someone abuses you is the right thing to do.]

One theme that keeps surfacing in the responses I’ve gotten is that this ordeal was/is a test of character. When we evaluate someone’s character, we have to look at many factors; if a person is dependable, if they are true to their word, if they back their words up with actions, if they are willing to make an effort to make things better rather than try to place blame or use guilt trips, if they give others the benefit of the doubt, if they don’t feel a need to control things but prefer to try to empower you and lift you up, to be on your side. It’s not conditional; there are no criteria someone needs to meet beforehand. Someone that cares about you is there for you, through good and bad. They give you the benefit of the doubt on the days when you’re not your best self and appreciate you – and show that appreciation through words, through actions, and through just being there. But some people are just not capable or equipped to handle hardships and change. They can’t process someone else’s grief, so instead they shift everything to an internal focus; everything is about them. They may constantly feel looked down on, ganged up on, treated unfairly, etc.; so long as the focus remains on themselves. Unfortunately, when you are going through a severe hardship, people like this tend to not only be un-supportive, but make things worse. Sometimes a person’s true colors are revealed only in times of great stress and strain; so long as things can be about them or are going well, they’re happy. That’s what I had to deal with, in addition to everything else.

And sometimes people are just ill-equipped to deal with handling a stressful situation. When my mother fell ill, my stepfather didn’t know that her stubborn refusal for help was, deep down, her fear and her need for reassurance (that she could trust and depend on him). He took what she said while she was sick literally, and let her piss herself for two days before she died on the toilet. It was hard for me to reconcile a lot of the emotions I had about that; on the one hand, my mother was a horrible, bitter woman, and in a way her death was a relief. But she didn’t deserve to die like that; it was neglect. My stepfather wasn’t sitting around feeling sorry for himself or turning it into something about him, though; he just had no education or knowledge of how to deal with that kind of illness. It wasn’t a lack of empathy on his part, just of understanding. Was he responsible for her death? Mostly; if she had received medical treatment, she would not have died.

When he died a few years later, it was truly a case of the ugliest side of human nature emerging. He had remarried in order to obtain health benefits, and had a pre-nup with his new bride. Over a year past his death, we’re still dealing with her lies, her thievery, and her true lack of character or decency. It’s disgusting to see what money and things bring out in people. [I'm not entirely unconvinced that she didn't kill him, which is a disturbing and frightening thought. How could it be so easy to get away with murder?] She felt entitled to things that he specifically said she wasn’t entitled to (which she’d agreed to), so she took them anyway. There is a lot of ugliness in people, and it really does shine when people think they deserve something (whether earned/justified or not). I think a big part of character is what people (try to) justify, what they feel they are entitled to. The more we assume people are ‘supposed’ to do things for us or that we ‘deserve’ something, the less focus is on the needs of others and the more self-absorbed we become. But there are exceptions to that; when we are suffering, when we have needs, the people that care about us are supposed to be there for us, and we do deserve to be treated with dignity, respect, and compassion. We have to be willing and able to reciprocate that, though. People are never perfect, but integrity is not supposed to be rare.

It’s a shame that someone’s character can disintegrate so rapidly when you need them. But it’s amazing how much good character there is out there when you reach out for help. It restores a lot of my faith, and enables me to see that I am the one who passed the test of character, and he failed.

So, I had a miscarriage. It’s one of those things that happens all of the time but no one really talks about. At my almost-40 age, it’s not uncommon, and there isn’t anything I could have done to save it. But people process grief in different ways. Some people choose to take their anger out on people around them, to blame them for what goes wrong. Some try to internalize everything until they explode. Some turn to others for support and help, while others try to be a rock and deal with it themselves. There’s no right way or wrong way; people just have different styles. If you care about someone, understand their style. I’m usually the rock. But my finacé – ex-fiancé – was a volcano, penting up anger, letting trivial things blow up into Big Issues, and ultimately exploding at me the day after I was in the ER (which happened to be Mother’s Day). Somehow he expected to be treated in a way that was not on par with what he was willing to give. I could go on and give my one-sided account of what went on, but it wouldn’t matter. Suffice to say, he blew up at me and left. Yes, left, the day after I was in the ER in so much pain I couldn’t move. I’m usually one to suck up pain, so even admitting I hurt was a Big Deal to me and a big showing of how much faith and trust I had in him. Wounded people are not fun people to be around. Grieving people are not fun to be around. I dated a guy once who dumped me when my mother died because he ‘couldn’t deal with change.’ After reconciling, he dumped me again when I had pneumonia. So was I so horrible and vile a wounded creature, lashing out at some poor victim? No. But I was hurt and needed support and reassurance. This is why we share things with those we trust; we expect them to have compassion and understanding, to give us the benefit of the doubt and ultimately to believe in us and help us. So what happens when you share and that trust is broken? What happens when pain turns into a pissing contest of ‘who has more of a right to be hurt’ and whose feelings and needs are more important? What happens when you try to express your feelings and it boomerangs back into ‘oh yeah, well what about me?’ I don’t know. But not sharing is unhealthy, and sometimes we go to such great lengths to keep life contained that being human, having pain and faults and personal experiences, is seen as a flaw, a weakness, a taboo. We can tell people on Twitter what we eat, but not how we feel. Now, I am a Rational and not really effusive or knee-jerk emotional. I don’t let people into my life easily and choose the image I want to portray. But sometimes we disconnect from how human people are, how much hardship they endure – and how much harder it is to heal without the support of others. Sharing is a step towards healing oneself, but also may help others know and see that being human is okay.

First of all, I think one thing that’s important to point out is what happened in 2007. I was at MacWorld that year (no, that’s not the important part) when they announced the iPhone. But they also announced something else that rarely gets mentioned: the new company name. Apple Computer Inc. was now Apple Inc. They dropped the ‘computer’ because their company was no longer focused on just computers, going into the mobile space and other areas.

The reason I think that’s important is to see that Apple doesn’t view their mobile platforms (iPhones, iPads, iPods – ‘iProducts’) as computers. They don’t expect or want these machines to be robust, configurable computer systems. They want streamlined, controlled devices. There are lots of devices that have little OSs running them that are single or limited use systems: remote controls, video consoles, eReaders, slingboxes, DVRs… etc. Most of these systems can, if you void their warranty and therefore give up any support, be hacked to do things they weren’t designed to do. So can the iProducts. But all of these devices are designed to function a specific way and are ‘locked down’ because of that. Yet people view the iProducts differently, blurring them into the category of computer when they’re not really made to be as such.

“But!” the developers cry out. “It runs browsers! It runs apps! I should be able to see any Web site perfectly on it, and put any apps on it that I want!” Well, to an extent you can do the latter. If you void your warranty and any claim to support on your device, you can create your own apps and put them on there. “But!” they cry again. “I have to use Apple’s tools to make apps for it, I can’t use any tool I want!” Well, I think that speaks for the intentions of Apple vs. the intentions of developers. The intentions of Apple are to have apps on their platform that do all of the cool things unique to that platform; to take advantage of accelerometers, location detection, etc. so that the apps are so cool and so unique they compel people to buy the device. Developers want to make apps that they can ‘code once, and deploy everywhere,’ to get the most bang for their development buck. While both are ultimately about the almighty dollar, they’re both at odds with each other. Apple doesn’t want a bunch of generic apps that are available everywhere; at the very least it wants the ones on its platform to take full advantage of all of the features it can. And, pragmatically, Apple doesn’t want to support a bunch of custom-configured devices that are running anything and everything the end user hacks into it. That’s been part of their computer model for a while now, and it’s carried over to their device philosophy too. You may not agree with that model, but Apple builds things for people who want to ‘drive’ the device more than for those who want to modify the engine. Really, that model is great in certain environments/situations and not so great in others; and I don’t see anything wrong with that.

So. Flash. It is odd for Apple to just downright decree that they’d strip away a technology so prevalent on the Web when their devices have Web browsers. Steve Jobs himself published a brief missive on the logic behind that decision… but since a lot of people are blinded by their emotions and their biases, they misread it, pick out chunks out of context, distort things to fit their agenda… just like 95% of every tech or political ‘discussion.’ It’s easy to blindly hate, to pass judgment without facts, to assume motives, to simplify… and people like easy. Oddly enough, that’s also why Apple makes devices that are designed to just be easy. The bottom line is that Apple has its reasons to exclude it, good or bad. Frankly, I think it’s a mixture of both. But the retorts I see are really not helping. Apple is doing it because Flash’d hurt App Store sales? Really? There are tons of free games online that works fine; having more games would increase device sales, which are a greater revenue stream, and therefore support more apps/money, not less. Because of iAds? Maybe, but that’s more of a long-term goal than short-term, and showing how much ‘better’ iAds are than Flash would help the iAd platform. Because Apple hates Adobe and is an evil monopoly dictatorship bent on controlling the world? That’s too silly to even counter. Because Apple is a hypocrite about open standards and wants to make a profit? As a shareholder, I damn sure hope they want to make a profit, but encouraging closed systems and open Web standards isn’t really hypocritical. Keep in mind that historically Apple has seen ‘open apps/systems’ as being paramount to a support nightmare and basically ‘crap,’ and needs to be shown they’re wrong, not told that they are. Adobe has the ability to whine about it or to prove those reasons invalid. If Adobe comes out with a great mobile implementation of Flash, then other devices start coming out with compelling apps that drive people to the devices using them, Apple will take notice. If developers create amazing apps with Flash that do cool things, Apple will take notice. It just needs to happen before minds will be changed, so make it happen!

I’ve been looking over reports from CES (the Consumer Electronics Show) for a few days now (as I do every year at this time), and as always there are some interesting devices that have emerged. But the comments and criticisms all mirror the same sentiments, no matter what the device: this won’t fit my needs, won’t fit in my living room, won’t work for me, so it’s crap and not worth producing. As George Harrison wrote, “I me my.” This isn’t a particularly new phenomenon of course, but it’s becoming increasingly prevalent in becoming a basis for financial decisions that can make or break adoption of technology that may in fact be critical for our advancement. If investors and the public can’t see the ‘everyone use,’ then our lack of imagining the possibilities of application of a technology and/or not caring about technology that is not specifically useful to us as-is becomes a deterrent to progress.

Take, for instance, Apple’s upcoming ‘MacBook Tablet.’ Rumors and speculation have been flying around about the device for months now (as is the case every year in January, but people seem to have a collective amnesia about this. It’s clockwork, but every year the same cycles of rumors, reveals, and rhetoric emerge). This time, however, the conversation isn’t as much about what features it will have as it is about ‘do I personally want/need a tablet?’ and not about ‘there is a market for a device like this, even if it’s not for me.’ Apple used to be allowed to make systems for a (more or less) niche market, and that was a good thing – but with the successes of the iPod and the iPhone, now they are under constant scrutiny whenever they make anything that is not for the entirety of the masses. We need a tech company that’s allowed to go down the rabbit holes, and increasingly the ‘big tech’ companies are too fearful to do that kind of R&D anymore.

And it’s incredibly hard –and stupid– to keep creating one-size-fits-all electronics. I’m a full-fledged gadget lover, but CES makes my head spin… so much of what’s shown from there seems to be attempting to appeal to too broad of a customer base (after all, everyone is a ‘consumer’), and that’s just not going to get us to the next stage of technology. We need more specialized tech, less ‘everyone should find something to do with it’ devices. The great thing about the iPhone (or iPod Touch) is that it is a platform that can be easily customized to turn into specialty devices; hopefully the tablet can too. ‘Specialized tech’ does not mean ‘a device that only does one thing’ like 3D TVs and eBook readers; specialized tech means we start to build solutions for specific usage, for function and efficiency – within the consumer and small business space. Big business, healthcare, government, military – there are a lot of verticals that have their own needs and evolve their technology accordingly. But the rest of us are stuck in this odd ‘everyone needs a log’ limbo where the technology has migrated from making our lives easier to making us frustrated & overwhelmed trying to make sense of it all. We’ve shifted from proprietary, closed, singular-function devices to these great big swiss-army-knife solutions, but we swung 180 degrees when we needed to only go 90. And worst of all, we care less and less about what we ‘should’ do and just try and build what we ‘can’ make. A TV with an integrated printer? That’s a solution looking for a problem. A combination light bulb/wireless speaker? Well, that has some practical use for a certain market, and that’s the kind of innovation we need more of.

My fear is that big companies will keep the status quo – copying each other, buying out perceived threats, and trying to become the biggest fish in the pond – and they’ll stop innovating. In the meantime, investors will become less interested in niche devices/applications and only want to find ‘the next Google’ or ‘the next facebook,’ stuff that they think has mass appeal. Somewhere in that mix, brilliant ideas are falling flat from the lack of funding. The problems that technology solves will have to be big enough to get attention, and in the meantime, the people working in their garages, making the little gizmos that could very well have made someone’s life better and simpler (maybe not yours), will just be lost in the twitter streams and blog posts about crappy headphones and remotes.

So, even with infinite possibilities of the future, we tend to shelter our visions of it within comfortable, safe, and predictable paradigms. Science fiction isn’t as much about fear and the vast unknown anymore; it’s about cool, it’s about gadgets and explosions and one-liners. It’s gone from Rod Serling to Michael Bay; from drama to melodrama. Science fiction does not equal effects and chases; it can be more than just old war/western movies set in space (or a blue-tinged Earth). And this is what Doctor Who sometimes gets wrong, but sometimes gets really right. Like so much sci-fi these days, it was given a reboot treatment to ‘freshen’ it up, to try to shake the stigma of its previous low-budget visuals and attract a new audience. This is a show that’s supposed to be fun, light, and not preachy about the Doom that Will Occur if You Don’t Change Your Ways Now, yet that doesn’t mean it can’t have engaging stories and elements of suspense, mystery, fear, and wonder. While I barely remember anything of the older episodes I used to watch as a kid, I was very excited about the new series, as it is a concept that can, rather literally, do just about anything – go anywhere, at any time – and, best of all, it does so from the viewpoint of a tourist, with ordinary people along for the ride. It’s a show you can enjoy if you don’t care about the Science part of sci-fi, yet isn’t as stupid in this department as some other shows are. But in a way, its strengths are also its weaknesses; different writers and an open invitation to take the character any place and/or time can lead to some amazing stories, but it’s inconsistent. While The Twilight Zone had an open slate in terms of characters, Doctor Who is really about one central man. And like so much modern fare, it does tend to resort to chases and explosions and effects at times, cheapening it a bit. Don’t get me wrong; I love explosions and effects most of the time, but episodes like Midnight and Blink really prove you can do a show like Doctor Who without it all revolving around How Cool the Planet Looks.

So, suffice to say I’ve been a fan of the new show – not all episodes are strong or even good, but there are so many gems in there it makes the whole series brilliant. And while Christopher Eccleston was fun and a great Doctor in his own right, David Tennant has raised the bar so high that his departure really feels more like the end of the show than the end of his turn; it’s almost more of an era ending than the new year was. I’m afraid for the new season; I keep having nightmares of blue filters and lens flares and Matt Smith becoming Emo Doctor. Maybe part of that is that it’s hard to swallow being ten years older than a 900+year-old man; at least I’m only 3 months and 3 days older than David Tennant. Maybe part of that is cynicism about committees trying to make the show ‘cooler’ and hoping to get the Twilight audience/dollars. Whatever it is, I’ll hold off on the new Doctor for a bit and let all of the stages of loss pass first. So hello, 2010, and goodbye Doctor. It was a fun run, but I’m hoping that there’ll be something out there this year without a bunch of lens flares and sparkles and blue filters, and I’m not yet convinced that it’ll be you.

(*I think we’ve seen what would happen if aliens really did land today; videos would be on YouTube, a bunch of people would write blogs about how the videos are fake, a bunch of other people would write blogs talking about how much they love the aliens & how they totally relate to them cos they’re, like, so misunderstood and Team Aliens 4evr! <3!)