Zeerust/Quotes

"The future ain't what it used to be."

—Yogi Berra, Meat Loaf, and others

"It would be any old boring rumpus room, really, but that lamp just says Tomorrow! And nothing says 'yesterday' like something that said 'tomorrow!'"

—James Lileks, Interior Desecrators

"That's me; both hands on the keyboard, one foot in the Swing Age. If I could afford it, I'd drive a car with tail fins."

—Ben "Gryphon" Hutchins, Gods Willing II: We'll Always Have Boston

"You can tell when a Hollywood historical film was made by looking at the eye makeup of their leading ladies, and you can tell the date of an old science fiction novel by every word on the page. Nothing dates harder and faster and more strangely than the future."

—Neil Gaiman

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."

—Thomas J Watson, CEO of IBM [attributed], 1943

"Everything is chrome in the future!"

—Spongetron, SpongeBob SquarePants episode SB-129

"No wonder that people are becoming passive sponges -- absorbing but never creating. Did you know that the average viewing time per person is now three hours a day? Soon people won't be living their own lives any more."

—Arthur C. Clarke, Childhood's End (1953). (As of 2007, the average American watches 2.6 hours of television per day.)

"Comic books and space films share the concept that the future will look like the Bauhaus gone berserk, all straight lines and no color"

—Judith Martin

"The human race, to which so many of my readers belong, has been playing at children's games from the beginning, and will probably do it till the end, which is a nuisance for the few people who grow up. And one of the games to which it is most attached is called, 'Keep tomorrow dark,' and which is also named (by the rustics in Shropshire, I have no doubt) 'Cheat the Prophet.' The players listen very carefully and respectfully to all that the clever men have to say about what is to happen in the next generation. The players then wait until all the clever men are dead, and bury them nicely. Then they go and do something else. That is all. For a race of simple tastes, however, it is great fun."

—G. K. Chesterton, The Napoleon of Notting Hill

Cpt. Webb: Log entry: March 16th, 1980...

Crow: Oh, our old future.

—Mystery Science Theater 3000, "The Phantom Planet"

Bill: It's the future of the past!

—Riff Trax, Plan 9 from Outer Space