a way of life, it's the spirit of the country that will be lost. the decision is ours. ♪ we have intelligent machines creeping into our lives. >> the popularity of these video game sz nothing short of a phenomenons. >> automatic cameras, mobile telephones. >> a major moment in the history of flight. >> experts tell us, all of this is just the tip of the iceberg of what's to come. >> there's literally a hyperculture that's forming, virtually a cult. >> we're no longer on the merge of a revelation, we're right in

the midst of it. ♪ ♪ the average family home, cory practices her violin. christian plays with his cars, and mike and carol worry over the bills. >> we went into the 1980s in pretty much the same technology that's been in place for a couple decades.

typewriter. calculators, tv, oven. a car. you listen to music on a big old stereo system with a turn table. maybe you had a digital watch, and that was the only thing that was going to be digital that you actually owned. >> hello? i'm not here now, but my faithful machine is. >> there was a handful of technology at that time. one was the telephone answering machine. you'd be drive home, and you'd say, i can't wait to check my messages. you know, it had become part of the day, honey, i'm checking my messages. from the noisy streets of new york to the laid-back tranquility of california. americans are tuning out and tuning in. >> when i think of technology in the 1980s, i think of the walkman. the walkman was huge. >> it's the latest fad. tiny stereo cassette players with featherweight headphones. >> it's like carrying your stereo with you, you know, on your head.

>> the walkman took listening to music from a fixed location in your home to mobile. >> you are witnessing the ultimate miniaturization of the cassette player. never has so much genius been coaxed into so little space. >> in all the great bursts of innovation, there is always some kind of scientific break through that has to happen first. and none of this stuff could have happened in the 1980s without the transistor being invented in the 1940s. and japan in particular understood that they could make things smaller, more versatile. sony was brand name that really mattered in the 1980s in technology. >> i'll take the sony! >> the original sown eye walkman was so solid. it was a pleasure to hold. it had density, heft. >> pop it in, close it. a very satisfying sound. it was gorgeous, gorgeous machine.

it provided you with the sound track to your life. >> transformers and cabbage patch dolls may be the two top sellers this year, but for adults there's only one hot item, the vcr. >> christmas shoppers have made the videorecorder one of the hottest sellers, but it's a lot more than a christmas gift, an invention that some say is changing the whole idea of television. >> there are so many inventions where you can track the success back to the smashing of a limitation, and the vcr smashed thlimitationtime. >> most people usecrs for what they call time shifting. let's say this sunday is your parents' 50th wedding anniversary, but you can't miss the steelers. pop in a tape and watch the steelers when you get home. >> it changed the paradigm of television. >> the makers of tv programs and movies shown on television claim their films lose their rerun value when they're recorded on home videotape recorders and

played later. the studios said this violated copyright laws and sued for instigating wide-spread in the home law breaking. >> you cannot have high-class entertainment if 50 million taping machines are out there in an unauthorized fashion with no compensation to owners, taking from them what rightfully belongs to them. >> the supreme court today answered a multi-billion dollar business question, affecting the wallets of millions of americans and one of the nation's fast east growing forms of recreation. home videotaping. they ruled that using the machine to tape programs is legal and violates no copyright law. >> not only did the movie industry lose that one but they were totally wrong. the vcr turns us into a generation of movie nuts. >> it may be the fastest growing industry in america. the sale of tapes to that people

buy or rent to play at home. >> more than 34,000 retail outlets across america now rent or sell tapes of all kinds. >> you go to a store and pick out something you missed. if the old days if you missed a movie, you missed the movie >> and it's not restricted to blockbuster films. jane fonda with workout tapes have shown you can make money with a product geared specifically to the home market. >> not just taking movies home but making them at home and anywhere else you happen to go. >> i was the kid who had a camcorder. it was the size of kentucky, and it had to be, because it played vhs cassettes. >> the setup can be used by just about anybody. it's about to revolutionize the industry. >> there's no developing. you can rewind and record over it if you didn't like the take. that is an enormous shift. >> marecons buy billions of

dollars of electronic equipment, but just when you think you've bought the latest in audio and video, there's a new generation of gear which has clearer pictures and better sound. >> this camera using the simple little tape like that ♪ you know how painful heartburn can be. for fast-acting, long-lasting relief, try doctor recommended gaviscon. it quickly neutralizes stomach acid and helps keep acid down for hours. relieve heartburn with fast- acting, long-lasting gaviscon. anyone can get you ready, holiday inn express gets you the readiest.

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it's free for everyone? do hawks use the stars to navigate? i don't know. aw, i thought you did. i don't know either. either way it's free for everyone. cool. what's in your wallet? like them or not, video games are the youth phenomenon of our day. quarter by quarter, $6 billion got fed into video game slots last year. that's double what americans

spent to go to the movies. >> people flock to them, because the arcade game could afford expensive hardware at the time. and the hardware had enough power to do things we'd never seen before. >> there was essentially an arcade in every mall or in ery street corner. the lunch money was not sa if there was an arcade around. >> arcade games at the time were the first machine that we could really interact with. we could cause a world to do something. so we'd grab a joystick and move a character around or fire something at a spaceship. we've never had experience like that before. >> the popularity of these video games is nothing short of a social phenomenon. pac man is seemingly everywhere. retailers can't keep the home version stocked. one dealer describes the demand. >> phenomenal. telephones ringing every five minutes. it's pac man mania.

>> my big memory of the '80s was my best friend got this $300 console that connected to your tv. you just play this thing forever, and it was the first time anybody had ever seen anything but tv on a tv. and i thought, wow, this is technology. >> the imaginary rockets are controlled by the same chips the u.s. army used in their defense programs. the significance of the chip does not only lie in gadgets. her whole future will be changed by the silicon chip business. >> it was discovered that you could actually etch a whole lot of transistors onto a piece of of silicon, which was a cheap substance that could be manufactured. >> these chips can control the flow of electrical current that in effect enables them to store and remember zillions of bits of information on a surface just a little bit thicker than an eggshell and smaller than a fingernail. >> this silicon chip splies the brainpower for 1001 electronic gadgets from

wristwatches to microwave ovens. >> it gives birth to a new high-tech cult and a place called silicon valley. >> the magic part of silicon valley is that there was this boiling pot of people who were involved in technology, involved in science. >> silicon valley was hp, sri, xerox park and the university. that was a hell of a powerful combination. >> there were these two cultures engineered with ph.d.s and hobbyists. >> there was a lot of counter culture people. so you had cheap semi-conductors. people that would look at things differently than what the conventional person was, and that's what the technology needed then. >> one of the things that was really hard about making a computer was now on a chip. so all of a sudden, people who had a thirst for this stuff could go out and buy a home brew computer.

you could make them yourself. >> there were a lot of people into the changes in technology and how we a part of it, even at our companies we were the fringe element. we had the jeans. and we're not the managers and the loaders. a clever design on its own had value. >> you had these guys like bill gates and steve wozniak. but no one in corporate america and no one in most of the homes of america thought that the personal computer was anything that would ever have, would ever even happen, let alone have any relevance to them. >> for all of us, the computer revolution was really exciting. it was like, wow, this is wide open. >> it was a group of people who want to make a change in the world. and eventually, the two forces in silicon valley, the hobbyists and the button-down business guys ended up coming together when the chip makers realized the things that the hobbyists

were doing could lead to a new product called the personal computer. >> it was at a club where they displayed the computer they'd been working on, and it caused a sensation. >> we had absolutely no idea what people were going to do with these things when we started out. as a matter of fact, the two people who it was designed for was woz and myself, because we couldn't afford to buy a computer kit on the market. we got it working and showed it to our friends and everybody wanted one. >> woz was the technical genius and jobs was the marketing genius, and you needed both of those kinds of mind-sets to make this new technology work and create this company out of thin air, called apple. >> since the apple computer company was founded five years ago, its sales have sky rocketed from $100,000 to $100 million. with the most popular type write sized computer on the market. steven jobs 26 years old and sees his computer's future as the future of man kind. >> how many calculators do you have? >> two maybe. >> and you use the automatic teller machines? >> sure.

>> so life is seducing you into learning this stuff. it's certainly not a 1984 tradition. it's going to be very human and very gradual and seduce you into how to use it. >> random access memory is internal memory built inside of this computer. >> these new computers were rough, ugly, difficult to use inventions when they first came out. >> it would crash and you would have to figure out what to do. it would not always create the right results t did take a mind-set of someone willing to cut it some slack. >> don't take big steps. >> everybody kind of agreed their could be the next big thing after the printing press if we do did right. it's not just having a machine. the world needed to be made better. those are the things that actually can lift a society into a new way of thinking. >> industry experts say we're no longer on the verge of the personal computer revolution. we're right in the midst of it

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daily life a guessing game. and bloating made will i have pain and bloating today? my doctor recommended ibgardo manage my ibs. take control. ask your doctor about nonprescription ibgard. in the early part of the '80s, the general image of the computer was always this giant machine with little things all over it.

the mind-set was the computer as the brain. and it was a threatening concept. >> 1980s is a period of time when the big, giant, impersonal machine that lives in a huge, air conditioned room someplace suddenly becomes something that sits on your desk. >> something is happening out there, something that's expanding your world. small computers are happening. >> as soon as we have intelligent machines creeping into our daily lives, into our hospitals, into our businesses, then it's going to be a new world out there. >> computer stores have become the neighborhood soda shops of the by nary generation. the disciples, young and old of smart machines. >> companies that were starting to build personal computers, companies like atari, tandy, commodore, began to see them as a public market. >> personal computers have been the business of at least 25 companies, with radio shack and

commodore grabbing three quarters othmarket. this personal computer costs about $1400 and fits nicely on a desk corner. duplicating its performance five years ago would have cost $75,000 and required a unit the size of a large refrigerator. >> when the average american saw a computer, they thought of ibm. it made these mainframe computers that ran pretty much everything. >> ibm was one of the most powerful corporations in america. and in technology, it was "the" most powerful company that had ever existed in technology. >> because of this activity in personal computers it started to make ibm look like they were behind the eight ball. >> they look at the apple ii and say, huh, we could build one of those. we built computers that put men on the moon. >> ibm has entered the small computer market for the first time.

>> the idea has become so big that the giant of computer companies, ibm, is busy marketing its new small computer. >> it will, they say, give credibility to home computers. they'll no longer be just another new gadget. >> ibm has set an objective to build the office of the future. >> before ibm came in, companies would not think about buying personal computers, but suddenly, when ibm's selling one it becomes a safer decision. >> it is designed for office, school or home use, aimed at exactly the same market as its competitors. >> when ibm started developing the m pc, it needed an operating system. and this young guy named bill gates had started this little company called microsoft. >> bill gates was that unusual combination of a tech guy who was as good as the best tech guys but had a business sense, and a business vision. >> at the time, everyone was making it up as they went along. there was nothing that came before it. there was no personal computer

industry. so when gates said to ibm, how about this? we'll write you're operating system for your pc, and we'll get a cut of every machine you sell, and in addition, he made sure it wasn't an exclusive license, that he was going to be able to sell the software to ibm, but he was also going to be able to sell the same software to other people, because gates intuited that there would be people build knockoffs of ibm in the pc clones. >> it was a genius move who was still in his 20s. and you've got these guys at ibm in blue shirts and dark ties looking at this company microsoft and saying, who cares? software? we build big machines. >> ibm did not realize it was essentially handing all this power to this little nerd. >> if you had stayed at harvard a few more years, would this computer revolution pass you by? >> perhaps. things me very quickly in the

industry and it was an urgency to get out there and be the first one to put a basic on the micro computer that caused me to drop out. >> if you don't have one, you will be amazed what these little gadgets can do. >> the idea was that ordinary people might have a use for computers. now it took a while to figure out what those uses might be. >> the mane thing was spreadsheets and word processing. the computer was the best typewriter you could ever have. it gave you a new way to write. you could change thing around. and check your spelling. it would always look perfect. >> bottom line numbers. >> my dad had the large ledger sheets, done them all by hand. and i remember taking a computer to show him a spreadsheet. and suddenly, he understood the value of a personal computer. >> there was a drastic mind-set change in the whole country about what a computer was. and happened over a very short period of time. >> gather around and we'll tell you a lit bit more about the system. >> here at the west coast computer fair, it is so great that each fair outdates the

previous one. >> it is lower prices that has helped the tremendous boom. in home computer sales. about one home in ten will have a computer by the end of this year, by 1990, the number could be two out of three. >> we knew it was getting serious when the competition started. because when you have competition, innovation gets stimulated. >> compaq. >> in is the one. >> higher resolution. great other expandability than ibm's pc. >> ibm's entry heated up an already volatile market. osborne computer was forced into bankruptcy last month. and apple, the industry's number one had to concede it was now number two, behind ibm. >> all of a sudden, you were in an old-fashioned competitive business in which you really have to be better than the other guy. >> there are 150 micro computer businesses, and all of them want 10% of a the market and that

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pg&e learned a tragic lesson we can never forget. this gas pipeline ruptured in san bruno. the explosion and fire killed eight people. pg&e was convicted of six felony charges including five violations of the u.s. pipeline safety act and obstructing an ntsb investigation. pg&e was fined, placed under an outside monitor, given five years of probation, and required to perform 10,000 hours of community service. we are deeply sorry. we failed our customers in san bruno. while an alogy alone wl never be enough, actions can make pg&e safer.

and that's why we've replaced hundreds of miles of gas pipeline, adopted new leak detection technology that is one-thousand times more sensitive, and built a state-of-the-art gas operations center. we can never forget what happened in san bruno. that's why we're working every day to make pg&e the safest energy company in the nation. this is the newest kind of office in america. and this is the telephone which will ring in it. >> the big thing was the phone in the car, which was like, we are now officially in the modern era. and the first thing you always said was, hey, i'm calling from the car. >> when these things started to

pop up in the mid 1980s, the customers were people who had a business reason for having these things or a super rich dude who just wanted to show off. the big break through idea was the idea of cellular systems. >> it's called cellular because your telephone is tied in to different transmitters, called a cell, and as your car travels, the signal goes from cell to cell. if you don't have one you probably will have one in a decade say the makers. >> there were people who understood even in the early days that being trapped in a car was not freedom. people are fundamentally, naturally, mobile. >> i like to say the technology will go from a phone in the car to a phone in the briefcase to >> and this is it. your pocket. this is a portable cellular phone. you will be able to take this to any american city and call virtually any place in the world, and its maker, motorola says a smaller version than this will be on the market next year.

>> first cell phones look like soviet army field telephones, these huge lunch boxes you hold up to your head. >> this is just the birth of this industry. all inventions start out in a very rough state. whether it's computers or cell phones. it took a while to refine them and make them into something that we'd all use. >> you look at the bottom of the screen. it says please type return. >> the computer has become a national mania, and we're told, miss the electronic boat and you're sunk. >> in the future, everything's probably i going to be computerized. so you're going to have to know how to use computers. >> my son just took a class in school, and he's only 8 years old.

i figure i just as soon be as smart as he is. >> they aren't friendly except for playing pac man. >> a small snag in computer marketing is called techno phobia. fear of these bloodless little wizards. manufacturers are trying to overcome it by making them what they call user-friendly. >> isn't that pretty? now what do i do? >> making computers easy enough to use for a beginner, it wasn't always true. people had never encountered this stuff. >> hold down shift and press -- >> so there was a great disconnect between the ambitions of the apples and microsofts and the realities of people trying to use these tngs for the first time. >> right now, if you buy a computer system and you want to solve one of your problems, we immediately throw a big problem right in the middle of you and your problem, which is learning how to use the computer. substantial problem to overcome. once you overcome that, it's a phenomenal tool. >> steve jobs thought that a computer should require no technical skill. he thought that it should be capable of generating artistic endeavors and not just number-crunching business things.

>> is there anything you'd like to see? >> we'd love to have it in a book right now, you know, about this size, but that's technically impossible. >> steve's like, i want to make a friendly computer, a computer that comes from a different kind of place, that owes its inspiration to people who are thoughtful and creative and human and humane. >> this is an experimental office system of the xerox research center in palo alto, california. >> flowers, my anniversary. i forgot. >> xerox in the 1980s was one of the most exciting companies in america. they had a booming business. it wasn't a computer company. but it was the palo alto research center. >> xerox park was xerox's think tank. they were working on all these crazy, out-there ideas which included the mouse, overlapping windows, fonts and graphics on a computer screen just to see if they could do did.

steve jobs hears about some of this work going on at this lab and wants a look. >> jobs park was an invention place, xerox bark was a renovation place. >> it was different and more communicative than anything he'd seen before. owe knew it was effective, because it was affecting him. >> jobs realizes, this is the future of computing. this is a whole different kind of computer to be built. famously, a computer for the rest of us. >> 1984. the ridley scott commercial for the mcintosh. >> it depicted a scary 1984 leader on a big screen. saying that this tiny little company, apple, is going to destroy the reigning power. >> we shall -- >> on january 24, apple computer will introduce mcintosh.

[ applause ] >> personal computer war heated up today. apple computer officially unveiled its new mcintosh. >> i'll let my mcintosh speak for itself. >> hello, i'm mcintosh. >> the introduction to mac was an event. steve jobs really did think of the mac as a thing that would change the world. >> apple is betting $100 million and admittedly, its future to make inroads against ibm. >> apple felt like a rock band. they had the same kind of spirit. they seemed to be going up against the man in ibm. >> it is aimed at a largely untapped market of managers, professionals and students. less than 5% now use computers, mostly because of their complexity. mcintosh is designed for simplicity. using a palm-sized unit called a mouse.

>> it was the first time that a machine was versatile. it was simple. it was friendly. >> it took the computer out of the exclusive domain of geeks and nerds and people who had memorized the commands and put it on the desk of everything. untrained, non-technical people. >> stores around the country put them on sale today, and analyst say it's a good bet that mcintosh could soon be the biggest apple of the industry's eye. >> it's got its form, eventually i want to be able to carry my mac around with me, walk around with it in my pocket. >> you really like that mac. would you trade it for an ibm? >> are you kiddin'? >> as material sciences progress, more and more circuitry keeps getting put on smaller and smaller chips, circuit boards. so the closer together elements on a chip are, the fashion of motion of signals between them. there's something called moore's

law, named for gordon moore. one who worked add intel. they are getting to the place where they can doublthe computing power of a computing chip every 18 months or so. and this is what really made the power explode. every 18 months these things were getting twice as good. >> you could get the whole computer on a chip. it was less expensive to manufacture. you had smaller which led to faster which led to cheaper. >> under any other field of products things get more expensive over time, houses, refrigerators, milk. but not technology. one of the striking things about the development of hardware during the 1980s was the fact that it was getting so much powerful so rapidly that developed a strong tendency on people who were go to buy a computer, should i buy a computer today? no, if i wait six months i can get twice the computer. >> the reason we are attracted,

it is a power tool that gives me power that i feel i should have had but nature left me without. and i can now exploit more of my potential with a computer. whoa! you're not taking these. hey, hey, hey! you're not taking those. whoa, whoa! you're not taking that. come with me. you're not taking that. you're not taking that. you're not taking that. mom, i'm taking the subaru.

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if all goes according to plan, columbia, this nation's first space shuttle will fly like a skylark next march. >> if the shuttle program works like it's supposed to work, it will be a tech nulogical marvel like that of the moon. >> a space shuttle. new systems, new technology. fly by wear system. you don't have pulleys and cables, all done by electronics, all by commands coming through a computer. >> built as the world's first reusable spaceship, carrying satellites and scientists. >> the most important thing was the digital revolution of faster, more powerful computers with complex software. >> computers are absolutely necessary to fly a spacecraft like the shuttle. it's the most sophisticated, most complex system that has been put into space yet.

>> first time i saw columbia and got close to it, my whole thought was, oh, my god, it's big. and this is going to go 17,500 miles per hour? >> more than 500,000 people crowded the beaches to witness the first space shuttle launch. >> t-minus 10, 9, 8, 7. wrsterer >> we added the largest pop bottle rockets on the planet. when you light that puppy, it's going somewhere. >> america's first space shuttle. and the shuttle has cleared the tower. >> columbia, houston, you're going 40. >> in the mission control center, it's only after the fact that you get into orbit that

your mouth drops and you calm down. you go, wow. that's amazing. >> and the vehicle is performing like a champ, like all of us who have worked so long on it knew that she would. i think we've got something that's really going to mean something to the company and the world. >> the astronauts have about 14 more hours in space before they tohdtomorrow in the mojave desert. >> we were il.a. and heard the sonic boom. >> that was it, that was it! it's coming down. >> there it is. >> putting that all together in a technology to make it fly and then landing is remarkable. nothing like it had ever been done. >> touchdown. >> they're down. >> i said, it worked. the damn thing worked. >> the day will come, according to nasa, that a launch will be so routine that the press and television won't even bother to cover it. >> 30 weeks later, after columbia had been returned to the kennedy space center, astronauts flew columbia into

space again. >> the space shuttle was like a large truck that could deploy satellites, and it had a robotic arm so that you can repair and upgrade spacecraft. >> and liftoff of the orbiter challenger and the sixth flight of the space shuttle. >> this was the birth of space travel, not just space missions. we're talking about setting a laboratory. almost like a university in space. it started feeling like anybody could be an astronaut. >> the countdown is under way tonight at cape canaveral towards the liftoff of challenger, it will carry america's first teacher into space. >> still doesn't seem real that i'm going to be able to go with these guys. i'm excited. >>? the ice wasleed away and and challenger shod be g oing away very soon. let's go down to the kennedy space cent and take a look at challenger sitting on the pad as they continue the countdown. >> the challenger was the 25th

flight of the space shuttle but an especially notable one, because hundreds of thousands of school kids around the country were tuned in to the launch. >> it was the first mission i wasn't in the mission control center. i was outside, standing next to the families. >> t-minus 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3,2, 1, liftoff of the 25th space shuttle mission, and it has cleared the tower. >> roger roll, challenger. good roll, flight. >> my responsibilities i was spaceflight communicator, i was the one actually communicating with the crew. >> throttling up. >> challenger, go with throttle up. >> i was looking at my screen,

and i turned and looked. and i did not understand or recognize what i saw. it didn't make sense to me, because it was this fiery mess. >> we've had negative contact. >> there was this angry, red glow. and this wail. from the hearts of the family, because they knew what i knew. that challenger crew was gone. >> today is a day for mourning and remembering. the future doesn't belong to the faint hearted. it belongs to the brave. the challenger crew was pulling us into the future, and we'll continue to follow them.

there will be more shuttle flights and more shuttle crews, and yes, more volunteers, more civilians, more teachers in space. nothing ends here. our hopes and our journeys continue. >> to honor our fallen, we have to find this and fix it and fly it again. >> within a matter of days we knew it was a solid o-ring that had failed. it led to the loss of the challenger. >> during the 30 months since the accident, there have been hundreds of hardware changes to not only the booster but to the orbiter and the large liquid rocket fuel tank. numerous software changes had been implemented. all had been tested exhaustively.

>> i wanted the opportunity to fly on that first return flight, i just went, thank god. and we continued on into orbit. >> let us remember the challenger crew. we can say mike, judy and the kristen blake. dear friends, we have resumed the journey that we promise to continue for you. ♪ you know how painful heartburn can be. for fast-acting, long-lasting relief, try doctor recommended gaviscon.

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♪ this is topo, created by androbot in san jose. manufacturers predict that within a few years robots like these will liberate us from mundane and time-consuming household chores. >> he'll guard your house. he wl be your companion. he will bring you a soft drink out of the refrigerator. >> you under no circumstances mean to tell us this is a necessary piece of equipment. this is just a fun item. >> well, things always start out, whether you're talking about telephones or whatever, they always start out as a luxury. then they turn into a necessity.

>> i did a robotics company that failed, damn it. but i always believe if you can envision it in science fiction and you can do it of course we're going to have robots running around the house. >> why is somebody going to buy this thing? one of the problems was the engineering mentality, we're going to build it because we can. >> watch out, some items have more functions than you might dream, like this samsung microwave oven color tv security system. originally they invented microwaves to get you out of the kitchen. now you never have to leave. >> this is the first in-dash portable car video system. >> for the car? >> for the car, right. >> in the big picture it's really frustrating and exhilarating to watch the way technology's evolved. >> the home minder has a memo pad and it will beep -- >> we're going to spend the rest of our lives hanging around a television set. >> right. >> almost nobody would say we are going to take technology to this point.

it's much more chaotic. things rise, bubble and fall back. great ideas come out but nobody can find a use for it so it fulz away. it is a confluence of developments that are all happening at the same time. >> small and portable are the watch words for the '90s for manufacturers showing their wares in chicago this week. sony has a new ccorder that fits into your hand and a combination tv/vcr that fits into your purse or briefcase. >> if you have one of these and one of these but you don't have one of these you are missing half the fun of owning a computer. this is a modem, and with it you can turn your computer into a window on the world. >> i remember the first time i went online with compew serve on my trs-80. as slow as it was. but it was like the first time i scuba dived. there is this whole world out there. >> we can type a message like hi. it comes down at the bottom and simply press return and it will be broadcast to everybody in the room. >> does anybody say anything meaningful or useful?

>> there's a lot of social banter. it really is an area for people to meet friends and talk about whatever their interests are. >> we're learning about people falling in love and getting married online. >> absolutely. >> i remember the first time, eee-eee, the modem dialing, and here's a chat room with 12 other people typing in real time from wherever they happened to be. blew me away. >> there is tremendous demand. if you look at all the online services, bulletin board, user groups, various things, there is literally a hyper culture developing, almost a cult. >> those early information services greatly multiplied the computer was. a personal >> since they joined prodigy, a computer service accessed by telephone, they do everything from checking the weather map to shopping online for christmas gifts. they even buy and sell stocks. the experts tell us all of this is just the tip of the iceberg of what's to come. >> there were all kind of crazy ideas that really foreshadowed

the next explosion of technology. >> a human being drives through aspen by touching the tv screen. >> is it reasonable to assume that our children will have such devices? >> i think it's reasonable to assume you will have all these things in your home in a short amount of time. >> the thing about decades is they don't often actually arrive on time. but when it comes to the world of technology it really did. the world fundamentally changed in the 1980s and the world we live in was born in some ways. >> this was the decade in which technology in general made our personal lives just that much richer and seaser than they had been before. at least those of us who could figure out which button to push. >> we went from invention to innovation. innovation is taking a idea into a product. >> these concepts of digital, random access, mobile, portable and cheap started to catch on. >> different ways to run a

business. different ways to communicate with your friends. different ways to experience virtual worlds. i don't think we've ever seen a decade like that frankly. >> there was realization this kind of technology was going to be part of our lives, it's where our work and entertainment and all of that is going to reside. >> i believe that what is happening today is truly a revolution in the deepest sense of the word that 30 or 40 years from now it's going to be hard technoly can ke ourife live. beer. and technology means that anything's possible. >> it is a fascinating future, but one which computer scientists themselves are beginning to question. for example, with free flow of information, can someone tap into my home computer and invade my privacy? will electronic mail eventually lead to electronic junk mail? will the stores as we know them today eventually disappear? and don't many shoppers really like squeezing the tomatoes?

will we wind up with a cashless paperless society? and do we really want one? these are the kinds of social questions which the scientists questions which the scientists say society should answer. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com it's a time of enormous turmoil. >> shut up in there. >> the 60s are over, dad. >> shot on the foul line. >> we intend to cover all the news all the time. we won't be signing off. >> isn't that special? >> any tool for human expression will bring out both the best and the worst in us. and television has been that. >> they don't pay me enough to deal with animals like this. >> people are no longer embarrassed to admit they watch television. >> we have seen the news, and it is us.