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Author: Greg Bear
Title: The Machineries of Joy
Original copyright year: 1984
Genre: short story
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THE   MACHINERIES   OF   JOY
© 1984 by Greg Bear. All rights reserved. 
Introduction:
In October of 1983, I traveled from San Diego to Los Angeles and San Francisco, 
researching a proposed article for OMNI Magazine. What I saw astonished me.... 
and influenced me heavily when I went on to write the novel-length Blood Music 
and Eon. Here was not the beginning of the computer graphics revolution, which 
had occurred decades earlier, but the beginning of the flowering of that 
revolution. I could hardly restrain my enthusiasm. I suspect the last few pages 
of this piece will date badly as time goes by, but they show my frame of mind. 
And the frames of mind of dozens of other authors, as well; the information age 
has taken science fiction by storm.
OMNI never used this piece, although they paid me for it. Nor did they use the 
hundreds of pictures I gathered, a selection from which would have accompanied 
it. Many people gave generously of their time, yet never saw their names or 
ideas in print. I hope this publication pays them back in some small measure. 
The circumstances described below have, of course, changed considerably. Digital 
Productions has changed hands and management; Robert Abel and Associates is no 
longer an independent company. The revolution has become even more stimulating 
and promising. Its effects are everywhere.
This article was completed in early 1984. 
 
THE   MACHINERIES   OF   JOY
"Dinosaurs!" The artist spreads his arms as if to embrace them. "I need the 
exact specifications--gridwork layouts of bones, muscles, scale patterns." The 
artist's office is covered with drawings of spaceships and alien beings, strange 
landscapes and mechanical diagrams. "If I have those, I can put them into the 
computer. We can program each muscle, make the skin ripple over the muscles. 
Tell the computer how they took a step, how they fought..." 
And once again, dinosaurs will walk and fight. The artist is living a childhood 
daydream: he has the power to bring dead creatures to life. Even more 
remarkable, he has the power-- with the aid of dozens of technicians, 
programmers and fellow artists--to film objects that have never existed in any 
material form and make them interact with live actors. 
But dinosaurs are a future project. The matter immediately at hand is a space 
battle. At night, within a stark white-walled enclave, the artist, director and 
technician sit before a video monitor, examining the progressive stages of a 
nonexistent spaceship's destruction. Highly detailed ships-- complete with 
crew--are dueling to the finish. One spaceship is destined not to survive; its 
hull is disassembled in the first of six boxes on the monitor. The early stages 
of an expanding blast are overlaid in subsequent boxes. 
The artist describes an explosion in space. "I'd like the whole screen to flash 
white for one frame. Next we see an opaque fireball--fuzzy at the 
edges--surrounding the debris." He demonstrates an expanding sphere with hand 
gestures. "Then we ramp it down to transparency as the fireball grows." (To 
"ramp" is to smoothly increase or decrease any function.) "When the shockwave 
passes, all the little stuff--gases and tiny fragments- -fly past and then we 
see the big scraps, a little slower, not as much energy." His grin is gleeful 
now. The director nods in agreement; this is, indeed, an explosion in space, not 
your usual smoke-and-fireworks exhibit. 
The stages of the explosion are being fed into powerful computers, isolated 
beyond glass walls at the opposite end of the studio in a pristine white-floored 
environment. Artist, director and technician are playing god games in an unreal 
universe.
Ultimately, it is all numbers, points charted in a space of three dimensions 
within a computer. Each number represents part of the position of a pixel, or 
picture element, millions of which go together to form a shape. It is the 
computer's duty to keep track of the numbers, and the shapes they represent. 
Perspective, color, shadow, motion, must all be processed with scrupulous 
accuracy or the apparent reality will collapse.
The numbers are then converted to signals which can be displayed on a monitor. 
The pixels assemble, and a spaceship is destroyed, frame by frame. When the 
result is printed onto film, it will be indistinguishable from very high-grade 
special effects accomplished with painstaking model work. 
It will look as real as anything else in the finished motion picture. The 
artist, director and technician are, of course, fictitious, and the scenario is 
a technological fantasy, not to be realized for years, perhaps decades to come-- 

And if you believe that, you haven't been keeping track of recent advances in 
the incredible field of computer graphics. 
It is happening now.
The artist is veteran production designer Ron Cobb, (ALIEN, CONAN THE 
BARBARIAN); the director is Nick Castle (TAG, SKATETOWN U.S.A.) and the motion 
picture is THE LAST STARFIGHTER, a joint Universal-Lorimar production. Under the 
auspices of Los Angeles-based Digital Productions, headed by John Whitney Jr., 
all of the special effects for THE LAST STARFIGHTER are being done by digital 
scene simulation--computer graphics designed to match reality. Using two 
powerful Cray super-computers and a phalanx of other machines, Digital 
Productions is taking a gamble--some say a big gamble--by committing itself 
wholeheartedly to the future.
The future of computer graphics will be extraordinary. Most of the experts in 
the field--the best can still be numbered on two hands--agree that we are on the 
verge of a revolution perhaps more basic and disruptive than Gutenberg's movable 
type. Communications and education will be fundamentally reshaped. The 
entertainment industry will experience changes far more drastic than the 
transition from silent movies to talkies, and talkies to TV. 
The power that presently resides in the hands of a knowledgable few, will soon 
be available to all. 
But first, back to the numbers. 
The world of the computer is a very simple one. Everything is broken down into 
bits, a bit being the information required to answer any question with yes or 
no; in binary, yes equals 1, and no equals 0. Binary numbers consist of chains 
of ones and zeros. (In binary, 01 equals one, but 10 equals two.) More elaborate 
codes have been created to relate letters and symbols to certain numbers--thus 
allowing computers to display both numbers and text. Other codes relate the 
positions of glowing dots on a video screen using coordinates much like those on 
a map. A picture can be "digitized"--broken down into these numbered 
positions--and put into a computer, which can then manipulate the picture in a 
wide variety of ways. 
A picture can also be formed within the computer by charting key elements on a 
graph, feeding the computer coordinates and instructing it to draw lines or 
curves between the points. Mathematical equations which determine fixed 
geometric figures or curves can simplify the process; the computer can be 
instructed to draw a circle of a certain diameter around a point, or an ellipse; 
to trace out a square and expand it into a cube, and so on. 
In fact, a "space" is determined within the computer, having three or more 
dimensions, and any object can be described within that space, given 
sufficiently detailed coordinates. If the object is simple, like a cone, a 
"lathe" program can rotate a triangle around an axis to form a cone, or a circle 
can be turned around any diameter to create a sphere, much as a shape is spun 
from a block of wood on a lathe. More complex, irregular shapes take more 
complicated instructions, and much more time. Once the object is constructed in 
a simple line drawing, or "wireframe," additional programs can add a light 
source to give it highlight and cast a shadow. Colors and textures can be 
"mapped" on its surface. A point of view can be established, and what is not 
seen from that point of view--the back of the object--can be clipped, making it 
appear opaque and solid.
The process seems simple enough, but in reality the work involved in creating 
real-seeming objects on today's machines is extensive. The most complicated 
methods of creating objects in a computer--such as a technique called "ray 
tracing"-- can take weeks of computer time. Simpler techniques can reduce the 
time to fractions of a second, but with a corresponding loss of color, shadow 
and detail. 
Once the object's numbers have been fed into the computer, the computer knows 
what the object looks like from all sides, at any distance, in relation to any 
other object or perspective within the machine's memory. A nonexistent spaceship 
can be made to zoom past a simulated planet, approach a much larger "mother 
ship" and dock inside a highly detailed landing bay, all in perfect perspective. 

The computer can then display the objects in two dimensions on a video screen, 
or send signals to a printer to transfer images to film. Since the object has 
actually been mapped in more than two dimensions, the computer can be instructed 
to project two points of view, creating a parallax similar to that between our 
two eyes. The slightly separated images can be combined stereoscopically for a 
realistic feeling of depth. 
If the film image needs to be "squeezed" anamorphically onto 35mm stock for 
later projection on a wide screen, the computer can do that, as well. Any 
required lens can be simulated within the machine. In the 1950s, artists and 
programmers began to pioneer the techniques still being elaborated upon today. 
John Whitney Sr. was among the earliest, starting in the late 1940s. He later 
received the first IBM grant to study computer graphics in detail, and was 
installed in a ground-floor corner window of the IBM building in New York, 
displaying images for passers-by. 
Bill Fetter began exploring the possibilities of wireframe animation at Boeing 
in the late l950s, and assembled the first computer generated commercial in the 
late 1960s. 
In the early seventies, Ken Knowlton and Michael Noll came on the 
scene--Knowlton working for Bell Labs, and Noll arranging for the first gallery 
showing of computer art. Noll's specialty was simulating "clay paintings"--made 
with plasticine-- using computer images. Many viewers couldn't tell which were 
pictures of real clay paintings, and which were simulated. 
In the last ten years, the progress has been astonishing; around the world, 
computers are helping to create images for scientific research, education, fine 
art and entertainment. 
Sometimes the divisions between these categories are erased; the enchanting 
beauty of a moving computer image can turn a prosaic enterprise--such as stress 
analysis of pipe joins--into art. The most extensive use of computer animation 
has been in advertising. Already familiar to TV viewers are the plethora of 
"neon"-look commercials for banks, airlines and automobile manufacturers. 
Generically, computer animation relying on line graphics is known as "vector" 
animation. Using various animation techniques--inside and outside the 
computer--the lines of these "wireframe" drawings can be made to glow like neon 
tubes. This look has become so widespread that within the industry it is 
becoming a cliche, to be avoided if possible. Filling in a wireframe object with 
color, shadow and texture is called "raster graphics" or "raster" animation. 
This requires a more powerful computer, such as the Evans and Sutherland, or the 
Digital Equipment Corporation VAX machines commonly found in commercial studios. 
Some interesting effects can be obtained by fudging (not a technical term). The 
surface of an object to be vector- animated can be covered with 
"cross-thatching," using more lines instead of full raster graphics. This is 
known as "psuedo-raster" animation and can be charming, even though it falls in 
a middle range likely to be used less often as equipment and programming 
improve. 
Crude raster graphics can be judged by "aliasing"--the appearance of the 
"jaggies" along an object's edges. Each pixel stands out against a contrasting 
color, and when the object moves, the pixels can appear to march along the edge. 
These can be eliminated by coloring alternating edge pixels in shades that 
mediate between the contrasting colors. The border is softened slightly, and the 
graphics are said to be "anti-aliased." 
The most powerful computers available to animators-- the Cray series (the Cray 
1, an expanded version called the Cray XMP, and a much smaller, even faster Cray 
2) usually reside in defense establishments and major research laboratories. 
Digital Productions is the only private effects studio that owns Crays. The Cray 
corporation is reluctant to release the locations of all its machines, but it is 
well known that the Sandia Labs and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory have 
a number on hand. 
By time-sharing--having the computers process their work when not otherwise 
busy--researchers in several such establishments have done important work 
programming computers to "understand" and draw transparent objects, lenses and 
realistic landscapes. 
Two of the most prolific of these researchers are James F. Blinn at the Jet 
Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, and Nelson Max at Lawrence Livermore National 
Laboratories. Blinn's group at JPL animated the striking computer simulations of 
the Voyager probes' journeys to the outer planets, widely shown on network and 
public television in 1980-81. Nelson Max has worked largely on graphic 
representation of biological processes. Using his graphics programs, he has been 
able to predict how molecules will interact before lab tests have been made. Max 
has also investigated the effects of mutagens on DNA, and modeled the structure 
of very tiny viruses. 
After months or years of painstaking labor, computer artists display their wares 
at annual SIGGRAPH conventions. (SIGGRAPH stands for Special Interest Group, 
Graphics, a division of the Association of Computing Machinery, or ACM.) Private 
individuals, employees of giant research establishments and commercial film 
studios gather to compare notes and keep up on the latest developments. 
C.P. Snow's "Two Cultures" are inevitably wedded in computer graphics.
Not since Leonardo da Vinci have so many technical disciplines been required of 
working artists. Not only must they have basic drawing and drafting skills, but 
they must know at least the rudiments of programming. They must understand how 
light reflects, refracts and diffuses--and be able to translate their knowledge 
into terms the computer can digest. The artist can no longer stand aloof from 
science and math. New techniques can take him to the frontiers of theory. Recent 
work in the texturing of surfaces has used fractals, mathematical entities 
capable of generating very complex patterns. Perhaps the most familiar example 
of computer animation with fractal-generated landscapes is the "Genesis" 
sequence from STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KHAN, made for Paramount Pictures by 
Sprockets, the computer division of Lucasfilm's Industrial Light and Magic. 
One of the focal points for computer animators was the Walt Disney production of 
TRON. Information International, Inc., (known as triple-I), Mathematical 
Applications Group, Inc. (MAGI) Robert Abel and Associates and Digital Effects 
all contributed their expertise; yet TRON contained only ten to fifteen minutes 
of full computer animation. The rest was accomplished with conventional special 
effects and animation techniques. 
A great many of the people who worked on TRON have now moved on to positions in 
companies around the country. A few, such as Richard Taylor, are still involved 
with feature-length motion pictures. Taylor is reportedly hard at work on a film 
called DREAMER for Paramount. In advertising, two of the biggest film companies 
have made a major commitment to computer graphics. Robert Abel in 
Hollywood--long renowned for the beautiful combinations of live action and 
back-lit animation in his Levi's and Seven-Up commercials--assembled a computer 
graphics division while assigned to do special effects for STAR TREK: THE MOTION 
PICTURE. Unlike Digital Productions, however, Abel kept all his other special 
effects techniques, considering computer graphics as another tool, not an end in 
itself. "A lot of the stuff we do is combination," Abel explains, "where we 
combine miniatures and live action with computer images." Pure computer 
animation, at present, is more expensive than many other techniques, and in 
Abel's view, flexibility and variety are necessary to the production of 
commercial advertising films. 
Bo Gehring, in charge of Bo Gehring Associates in Venice, California, originally 
came to the west coast to do computer animation tests for Steven Spielberg's 
CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND. The tests proved unsatisfactory but Gehring 
stayed on to found his own company--again, with a complete spectrum of 
techniques at his disposal. Unlike Abel, who began as a documentary film maker, 
Gehring's roots are in computer graphics, but he agrees with Abel that 
commitment to one technique is risky. As for getting involved in feature films: 
"Ninety million dollars is spent each day on advertising in the United States," 
Gehring says. "Feature films can't begin to match that level of financing. I'm 
secure where I am." 
Both Gehring and Abel believe that computer graphics is still in its infancy, 
and will probably have a major effect on all forms of visual communication. For 
the moment, however, neither is willing to make the leap of faith required for 
an operation such as that being conducted at Digital Productions. And 
truthfully, Gehring admits that his financial backing is not equal to Digital 
Productions', which is supported by Ramtek, a major computer company. "I am a 
bit envious of what John Whitney Jr. and Gary Demos have come into at 
Digital--all that [computing] power. But I'm happy with my situation, and just 
can't see taking that kind of risk right now." 
Gehring also expresses an interest in digital sound synthesis. "I'm one of those 
people who has to pull off the road when something really intriguing comes on 
the car radio. I firmly believe that sound is at least the equal of sight in 
bandwidth-- complexity of information--and synthetic sound is a fascinating area 
that's barely been explored." Another of the Big Three companies, R. Greenberg 
in New York, is rapidly building its computer graphics division. 
Computers have revolutionized the film industry in many more ways than computer 
graphics. Virtually all commercial studios, whether producing advertising or 
feature films, use computers to control complex camera movements or integrate 
different elements of photography. At Robert Abel, slit-scan photography is a 
staple item. The process was originally developed by Con Pedersen and Douglas 
Trumbull while working for Stanley Kubrick on 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY. Pedersen 
now works at Abel, where he supervises other aspects of special effects 
production, including computer graphics. (Trumbull, interestingly, seems to 
eschew full computer animation. In his recent film BRAINSTORM, even sequences 
which appeared to be computer-generated were done using other techniques.) 
In slit-scan, a camera is mounted at the end of a long track, at the opposite 
end of which a piece of flat artwork is masked to reveal only a narrow 
horizontal slit. As the camera moves forward very slowly, a computer coordinates 
the motion of the slit up or down on the artwork. The result is a drawn-out 
image of the artwork, stretched in perspective by the camera's approach. 
Computers are also responsible for the many forms of motion-control used to 
photograph space battles at Lucasfilm and elsewhere. Signals from a camera mount 
are fed into a computer, which memorizes the camera positions and can then 
control the camera for repeated passes. Different models, mattes and other 
special effects elements can be added with great precision. 
Computers are even involved in stop-motion puppet animation at Industrial Light 
and Magic. The "Go-Motion" computerized system was used in DRAGONSLAYER to 
memorize the motions of an armatured miniature dragon as it was manually "walked 
through" its sequences. 
All these elaborations--from slit-scan to Go-Motion puppet animation--are likely 
to become passe, before the end of the century. Whatever the risks, Digital 
Productions is obviously where the field is moving. But computers have one major 
hurdle to leap before they dominate. Character animation--whether it be the 
fluid motions of a Disney cel-animated deer, or a human being--is still very 
difficult for computers. Computers are happiest when dealing with shapes defined 
by simple mathematics--planes in perspective, spheres, cones, polygons and 
polyhedrons. Humans (not to mention Bambi or dragons) are not composed of these 
objects, at least not at first glance. Living characters are lumpy, bumpy and in 
constant motion--all parts of them. Muscles shift beneath skin and skeletal 
angles change. Facial expression is a nightmare of complexity, with hundreds of 
muscles providing a bewildering variety of shapes--all of them familiar to the 
viewer, and therefore difficult to fake convincingly. 
For the artist, years of study are required to convincingly replicate human and 
animal shapes. The human mind is enormously more complicated than any modern 
computer, with millions of "algorithms" all smoothly blending in unconscious 
processes. How can a computer hope to match the work of a skilled cartoon 
animator, much less the reality of a human being? 
Tim Heidmann, at R&B EFX in Glendale, believes character animation is the 
stumbling block of computer graphics. "When you think of all the expertise 
required to get a Disney- type character on film--including the distortion of 
reality, stretching characters to add life, exaggerating expressions--the 
problem seems insurmountable." Heidmann does computer graphics for R&B EFX using 
a much smaller Hewlett-Packard business computer. The HP manipulates wireframe 
images which are then photographed and enhanced by hand in R&B's own small 
animation studio. The entire system cost under $25,000, "What computers do 
best," he explains, "is what human animators do with the most 
difficulty--changing perspective, drawing geometric shapes. And what humans do 
best is most difficult for computers--especially a small system like ours: 
coloring, shading, characters." R&B combines the two with ingenuity instead of 
massive number- crunching. 
Digital Productions is hard at work using both ingenuity and brute computing 
power to overcome the difficulties of animating characters in a computer. Most 
of this work is under tight wraps of security, but it appears they are building 
up human and human-like figures by creating "intelligent shapes" which will 
mimic muscles on fixed skeletal frames. These "intelligent shapes" will be 
programmed to interact with other shapes--other muscles--around a skeleton, 
within the constraints of skin.
Motion studies of animals and humans are programmed into their machines to give 
them parameters within which to work. Ron Cobb explains: "A computer doesn't 
know where to stop. If you have a character's arm swinging, the arm in the 
machine isn't real. It doesn't have an elbow or a shoulder to stop it. It just 
keeps swinging in a circle until you tell it what the limits are. Then it has 
the limits in memory, but you have to be very specific, very careful." 
The computer cannot intuit anything. It is literal. Everything must be described 
in detail. Consequently, the computing capacity and time required to control 
these figures will be enormous--at first. But the cost of the early stages in 
labor and money can be compared to research and development costs in any 
industry. The initial outlay is always greater than the cost of later work. 
One small hint of the coming revolution is provided by the locations of two 
major companies relying on computer graphics. Cranston-Csuri, founded by pioneer 
computer artist Charles A. Csuri, is located in Columbus, Ohio. Computer 
Creations takes pride in being based in South Bend, Indiana--far from the 
advertising capitols of New York and Los Angeles. Electronics can deliver 
messages and products around the world; in the future, location will be less and 
less important. 
Size will also become less important. With computers, a commercial studio can 
begin operations with only a handful of creative people. Pacific Data Images, in 
Sunnyvale, California, has only four employees, yet has already landed major 
advertising and promotional contracts. With initial costs of less than a million 
dollars, entrepreneurs like PDI's Carl Rosendahl are already taking advantage of 
the built-in flexibility of the computer. Costs are dropping, and software is 
improving, albeit more slowly than hardware. Within ten years, the big 
advertising companies will be surrounded by smaller, tougher firms with equal 
capabilities. The bottom line will then be not money, but creativity. There is 
no lack of creativity. The computer images and motion pictures produced by 
artists around the world are dizzying in variety and quantity. California's 
David Em is well known for his architectural fantasies and abstractions. Paul 
Allen Newell has animated M.C. Escher-inspired tesselated designs that transform 
with enchanting smoothness and precision. 
Nancy Burson of New York (profiled in OMNI, "The Arts," June 1983) uses 
computers to digitally combine photographic images of people and animals. She 
was responsible for the portrait of Big Brother commissioned for CBS's tribute 
to Orwell's 1984. By digitizing and melding the portraits of the twentieth 
century's worst tyrants, she came up with a hauntingly familiar, somehow 
benevolent and yet very unsettling hybrid. Much more charming is her mix of 
woman and cat. 
Em, Burson and Newell highlight the successes and problems of presenting 
computer graphics on the printed page. Em's and Burson's images are static, 
suitable for magazine reproduction, but the charm of Newell's work lies in 
motion. 
Even more difficult to convey is the wonder of a live computer art performance, 
where performer and audience are one. Ed Tannenbaum of Raster Master in San 
Francisco has installed a performance art center in his city's public-access 
science center, Exploratorium. A video camera photographs people in a room as 
they move about and then feeds their images to a computer. The result is 
projected in real-time (that is, live) on a large screen, allowing infinite 
varieties of human-machine artwork. Children can dance and paint with their 
bodies, becoming their own kaleidoscopes. 
Educators inevitably become more involved with computer graphics as classroom 
computers proliferate. Simple graphics programs can teach even very young 
children how to work (and play) with computers. Today's youngsters will find 
computers and computer art a part of their lives. This is where the revolution 
truly becomes powerful. 
In one or two decades, at the present rate of progress, computers cheap enough 
for home use will be capable of graphics even more sophisticated than those 
being produced by today's major studios. Graphics buffs will be creating, 
trading and selling programs to generate different kinds of images--including 
images of realistic characters. 
Eventually, perhaps by the end of this century, a kind of visual typewriter will 
be possible. Any scene the programmer/artist/writer can imagine, will be brought 
to life using computer animation. As software and hardware advance and become 
cheaper, and as information and image networks expand, virtually anybody can 
become a Cecil B. De Mille. The major requirements will be time and talent--not 
money. 
The greatest handicap to cinema at the moment is the dominance of accounting 
over creativity. Faced with budgets of tens of millions of dollars, studio 
executives are justifiably concerned that their products should appeal to large 
numbers of people. The result is often pabulum. Primary creativity is endlessly 
ignored or second-guessed. 
Commercial television networks are even more handicapped; to satisfy 
advertisers, incredible numbers of people must tune in to their programs. Few 
artists or writers have ever made anything worthwhile by pandering to the lowest 
common denominator, yet this is the current state of most of network television. 

The printed word allows more freedom. A pencil and a piece of paper are all that 
is required for expression in print. The production of a book is measured in 
tens of thousands of dollars for an average press run, not millions. 
Publishing--for the moment--still allows a great many writers to create personal 
works. A writer can establish a reputation with only a few hundred or a few 
thousand steady readers. 
Yet only ten to twenty percent of Americans regularly read books. Newspapers and 
magazines fare better--but less than half of all Americans receive any of their 
information from the printed word. What we have is a colossal failure of a 
communications medium--print--to reach the masses. 
For many people, print is difficult to assimilate. It has many uses and 
advantages, but often it cannot convey information as quickly and efficiently as 
other media. 
The dilemma is clear. Print offers diversity and individual expression--as well 
as the active participation of the reader, in imagining and fleshing out what 
the words convey--but cannot reach as many people as television or motion 
pictures. 
Television and motion pictures appeal to the masses, but more often than not 
spoon-feed pabulum to a barely conscious viewer. 
By combining both print and vision, computers will break the money monopoly and 
allow many more people to work with "pictorial narratives," a catch-all phrase 
for the multitude of art forms which will inevitably develop. 
Robert Abel sees a future society with individuals becoming more and more 
isolated, physically, as the electronics revolution allows them to work at home. 
With increasingly sophisticated entertainment forms, there will be less need to 
leave home for recreation. With more leisure time, the public will demand more 
entertainment. And with more artists able to produce complicated pictorial 
narratives, the demand could well be met with an explosion of creativity--if the 
audience isn't already conditioned to textureless drivel. If it isn't too late 
even now... 
Take a deep breath. 
We're going to enter a possible future, and it will take some effort to get used 
to it. 



You're on a street. A woman approaches you. She appears to be wearing a jungle. 
You stare in amazement as she passes; to a distance of about six inches, all 
around her, you can see gnarled trees, vines and creepers, exotic birds, even a 
leopard lying in wait. 
She walks along a wall and the building suddenly smiles at her--the entire wall 
one massive pair of lips in three dimensions. "Good morning, Miss Andrews," it 
says. "How may we serve you today? Shopping for apparel, or just out for a 
stroll?" AdWalls are formal and slightly stodgy by design. Virtually everyone is 
known, on sight, by ad companies who use computers to target not just groups of 
consumers but individuals. 
The woman pays no attention and continues on. The smile disintegrates into a 
flight of wildly colored butterflies as you approach. 
"Distinguished sir," the AdWall says. Butterflies flitter around you. "I don't 
have your name in memory at this moment. How may Freepic serve you today?" 
You mumble something about wanting to find a computer store. 
"Chips'n'discs, the city's oldest computer store, lies but two blocks away." A 
map appears in front of your face, then transforms into a speeded-up visual 
tour. You see yourself walking two blocks south, turning left, and entering the 
store. The image ends with a large-scale projection of the storefront. Symbols 
conveying hours of business, product lines available, and even clerk's faces are 
overlaid on each side of the map. 
You make your way through parti-robed citizens and find the store. Inside, you 
marvel at the systems available. There are computers for computing, and for just 
about anything else imaginable. You can rent information networks, even gain 
access to a world-wide library system for a low monthly fee. ("Less than one 
percent of the average household income!" a display enthuses. There are two 
billion subscribers.) 
Your domicile can be turned into any environment you wish, complete with sounds 
and smells. You can even create your own environment, using the Apple 89 
Worldmaker. 
"Occupation?" the clerk asks. The clerk grins and fades to transparency, then 
opacifies again, as required by law in the first few minutes of service. You 
realize you are being served by a very realistic hologram. 
"Writer," you say. 
"Oh, then you need a minezeye." It takes you a few minutes to realize the clerk 
means "Mind's Eye." The unit is quite small, the size of a cigarette case, and 
comes complete with plugs to hook directly into the cerebral cortex. 
"The Mind's Eye is a Hair Trigger unit, taking instruction in basic Brainwave, 
spoken language or even Touchcode, rather like typing. If you wish, it has a 
translator which can turn a videotext into a visual experience. Plug the Mind's 
Eye into a Page Turner and you can interactively turn your favorite classic into 
a motion picture, just a you visualize it; you coordinate the action through the 
cerebral cortex plugs. Some training required," the clerk informs you 
cheerfully. Videotext combines visual and aural information with high-density 
symbols--symbols which both inform and trigger intellectual and emotional cues 
in the adept viewer. Some videotexts compress a hundred flashing signals within 
a few seconds' time. The symbols are distant relatives of Egyptian 
heiroglyphs--and modern road signs. Some are based on the logos of famous 
businesses. Some are as stylish as Japanese calligraphy. 
Realtime units will soon be available. If you think it takes too long to imagine 
a scene, Realtime can supplement your brainwaves. If a jungle is required, 
Realtime has seventy different jungles in memory, and soon will have cable 
connections with real jungles, which can be digitized and reshaped at will. 
All computers in Chips'n'discs are, of course, Child Easy. In fact, the 1-Thru-5 
unit is designed to be used by an infant. It comes complete with Sensual Crib 
and access to the Sesame Net. 
If you're a fiction writer, you can peddle your creation on the Lie Wire 
(stet!). If you're a philosopher, your works can find their audience (for a fee, 
of course) on the Mindbender cable. Historians frequently sell to the Pasttime 
Cable. 
On any of these networks, you can start out on the Low Rung and gradually, 
through jury selection or User Acceptance (the ratings, that is) move up step by 
step to the very height of success. A single work might reach as many people as, 
say, the Britannica Visual. 
Peripherals include MovieLife, a chip which can be dropped into your home 
computer to turn any 20th century film into a living experience for you and your 
family. If you'd prefer to see Humphrey Bogart star in THE MAN WHO WOULD BE 
KING, instead of Michael Caine, that can be arranged. If you'd like to see an 
enhanced color version of the original KING KONG, with synthesized stereo sound, 
MovieLife will oblige. Live actors are still in great demand. They frequently 
license their images for computer generation, making a substantial second 
income--but virtually everyone acknowledges that a real actor is better than a 
simulation. Some actors have ruined promising careers by selling rights to less 
reputable retailers, who place their personas in all sorts of compromising 
products. 
But be warned--if you get too involved in all this, and happen to Drop 
Out--leave the real world and zip along the underground nets, where all sorts of 
unsavory stimulations are available--the Bug Police are tapping the wires every 
day. There are many legitimate adult services, such as FantaFem and Woman of 
Your Dreams, but many more balance precariously on the borders of the law, or 
fall completely offsides. "Bookstores?" The clerk responds to your question with 
some surprise. "We've heard of a few shops catering to the collector's 
market--and of course, there's always the Winston Smith Society. It meets once a 
month to trade crumbling paperbacks." 
You look around the shop, at the profusion of systems that serve more to 
supplement or replace creativity than enhance it. "Don't you have anything for 
someone who just wants to tell his own story, with his own images?" you ask, 
frowning. 
"Sir," the clerk says indignantly, "that's where this all begins. Not everyone 
is as privileged as you must be, however." 
You are reminded of electronic music instruments, decades in the past. Some 
became so elaborate that you barely had to touch a key to produce a tune. 
Distasteful to the concert pianist, perhaps, but a great deal of fun for the 
dabbler. 
"Come with me," the clerk says, taking you in his ghostly hand. "Let me show you 
some basic models. For the person who wants to create, rather than simply 
consume." 
You are led into a simply and tastefully furnished room. A boy and girl, no 
older than ten, are sitting before an extensive keyboard. Colors and vague 
shapes flicker in a cleared area beyond the machine. "Did we get all the numbers 
right this time?" the girl asks. "We want it to be as accurate as possible." 
"They're right," the boy assures her. 
"Let's see it, then." 
The boy pushes a display key. 
In the cleared area, a tyrannosaurus rex appears in horrible, fascinating 
detail, tail swishing back and forth, walking on its six clawed toes. It opens 
its mouth and emits a curious, bird-like squawk. "Oh, they didn't sound like 
that," the girl says, shaking her head vigorously. 
"How do you know?" the boy asks. 
"Let's make it roar." 
With a few nimble keyboard touches, they make the beast change its tune and 
roar. 
"Don't you just love dinosaurs?" the girl asks, clapping her hands. 
Your fingers twitch. Where was this kind of machine when you were a child? You 
step forward and politely ask, "Here. May I play with that? "I've always fancied 
sea monsters, myself..." 



The Machineries of Joy, Redux