Monday, December 14, 2015

How do I avoid tech/social errors in near-future fiction?


Not long ago I read a novel set in the near future (mid-21st century). My suspension of disbelief was totally fine with time travel, an implanted "universal translator" of sorts, major medical advances... but balked at plot points that depended on people being limited to land-lines (no mobile communication devices, and no "tech failure" that eliminated them). The novel was written in 1992, just a few years before cell phones hit the consumer market.


As a writer, what can I do to help my near-future stories age well? Do I just need to be a great visionary (or settle for getting it wrong, since I'm probabably not), or are there things I can do to track "up and coming, society-changing" trends?




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