Do you know what is an electric eye?
Not the famous song by Judas Priest!
That “Electric Eye” of course was an allusion to the book Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell, in the use of the name of the pseudo-omniscient camera that watches over the community at all times.
In the novel which is so popular now because of its so called predictions which are true; you have a camera that can ‘see’ people who rebel against the goverment or the ruler and they conveniently ‘disappear’!
This is not that electric eye though it may be closer than you think!
How about Iconoscope? No! It is not an iconic scope!
Well, how about electric telescope? Then again many advanced telescopes now are electronic only! They can see stuff so far and well miss out a few of them much closer to home!
How about radio vision? A radio with a vision!?
Well, now you are getting close!
This is a device which has made you an idiot! One of the most iconic inventions of the century which when first invented was predicted to be a big failure!
In fact as mentioned by Bill Bryson; it was dismissed as a fad!
Now there is no house which does not have this invention! Some have one in each room! Mobile is a close and calculated guess but it is the grandfather of the phone!
Then again it itself is the son or the grandson of the radio!
Though apparently it has been in vogue along with the radio albeit in a limited way. The issue was of course hardware! Now you may not imagine even a single day without this ‘iconic scope!’
In case you still have not go it; I am referring to the Television! or the TV!
Radio was also an iconic invention which took the world by storm! There was no house without one in the olden days since TV signals and reception was not available everywhere! Of course now you see the people on TV presenting news are always well dressed and groomed; but there was a time when even those who presented news on the radio wore a Tuxedo!
Now of course the TV is also slowly getting replaced by the Phone and other ‘screens’! The day of usual TV broadcasting and programs such as the days of the DD are numbered. Enjoy the idiot box before that!
Or maybe the radio! Of course that’s been replaced by Electric EAR! Which is either Alexa or Siri Then you can listen to songs penned by Vairamuthu!
Shubh ratri!
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