Luigi Russolo was a futurist painter, experimental composer, and instrument builder. In his 1913 manifesto "The Art of Noises" he declaimed the death of traditional Western music and foresaw the dawning of a new music based on the grinding, screeching, moaning, crackling and buzzing of mechanical instruments. He and his assistant Ugo Piatti built the Intonarumori to bring these new sounds - "the palpitation of valves, the coming and going of pistons, the howl of mechanical saws, the jolting of a tram on its rails, the cracking of whips, the flapping of curtains and flags" - to life. Listen to them, then and now.
posted by fire&wings on Oct 28, 2009 - 10 comments

In the bright and shiny future, we all live in cities under giant domes, green and warm all the year round - a sort of Logan’s Run, but without the forced euthanasia. It almost happened in, of all places, in Winooski, an old mill town in northern Vermont. [more inside]
posted by daniel_charms on Oct 6, 2009 - 33 comments

David Byrne's Perfect City Osaka's robot-run parking lots mixed with the Minneapolis lakefront; a musician's fantasy metropolis [more inside]
posted by kliuless on Sep 13, 2009 - 18 comments

Choose your own apocalypse! Futurists discuss: How is America going to end?
posted by desjardins on Aug 3, 2009 - 71 comments

Peak Oil, 1925. In 2000, 20% of new buildings will be solar equipped. By the late 1990s, 90% of the world's energy will be nuclear-generated. These and other erroneous projections are being collected as part of the Forecast Project on the website Inventing Green: The Lost History of Alternative Energy in America.
posted by Miko on Jul 27, 2009 - 65 comments

The Millennial Project is a comprehensive plan for space development, beginning with the terrestrial cultivation of an environmentally sustainable civilization and Post-Industrial culture and culminating, far in the future, in the colonization of our immediate stellar neighborhood. The TMP2 project is specifically a project of the Living Universe Foundation community to continually update and revise the content of the original plan as described by Marshal T. Savage in his book The Millennial Project. [more inside]
posted by Joe Beese on Jun 12, 2009 - 8 comments

What is the future of capitalism?
a) 3.0
b) Canada* ([1],[2])
c) 'smart growth' (viz.)
d) none of the above** [more inside]
posted by kliuless on Feb 15, 2009 - 86 comments

Future Imperfect. David Friedman gives a wonderfully discursive talk on future technology and the law at Google.
posted by empath on Jan 15, 2009 - 3 comments

H+ Magazine is an online quarterly publication focusing on transhumanism, a product of the futurist movement that supports science and technology to enhance the mental and physical capacities of the human being. Sometimes referred to as posthumanism, Francis Fukuyama calls it one of the world's most dangerous ideas. If you feel like you're lagging behind, George Dvorsky is kind enough to inform us ~>H's of the must-know transhumanist terms for today's intelligentsia. [more inside]
posted by ageispolis on Dec 19, 2008 - 107 comments

German TV show Paris Aktuell's mesmerizing space-age futuristic fashion in 1970, in 1969 (2), and in 1968. [MLYT] [more inside]
posted by cashman on Dec 14, 2008 - 18 comments

One Pill Makes You Autistic -- And One Pill Changes You Back. It might also lead to recreational autism, where people who want to take a break from having messy emotions about other people decide to unplug and enter a state where human relationships are no more important than inanimate objects. [more inside]
posted by nickyskye on Aug 18, 2008 - 67 comments

For years, Wired magazine has tapped a bevy of designers and artists in the tech field to craft detailed visions of futuristic objects for a monthly showcase at the close of each issue. Now, after hinting as much in the July edition, it is clear that that the tradition of FOUND has been brought to an end. What better way to say goodbye to this whimsical feature than by taking a look back at the full archived run of the series? [more inside]
posted by Rhaomi on Jul 22, 2008 - 29 comments

"I began to realize that "robots"-- in all their various forms-- can really be seen as a symbol of a larger relationship between people and technology." In 1988, Frederick Schodt wrote about the Japanese fascination and use of robots in his book Inside the Robot Kingdom, curious by the disparities between American and Japanese manufacturing processes . In 1988, the American public wasn't ready for the book, or for robots. Today, Japan still has embraced robotic automation in a way that arguably no other country has. For more similar topics, Mangobot is a column that reports on Asian futurism.
posted by artifarce on Jun 22, 2008 - 22 comments

City of the Future, Taiwan 1960s
posted by socalsamba on May 27, 2008 - 13 comments

In 1963, General Dynamics Astronautics asked politicians, scientists, and military commanders to speculate on the potential state of the world in 2063, recording all these speculations in a book, and sealing it in a time capsule that was lost during the demolition of the General Dynamics Astronautics building. Thankfully, the entirety of the book is available as a download thanks to the fine folks at Paleo-Future. Found Via.
posted by jonson on Apr 14, 2008 - 10 comments

The Pointless Museum [via mefi projects] [more inside]
posted by Item on Mar 18, 2008 - 21 comments

Bruce Sterling's State of the World: an interactive discussion on the Well with the noted sci-fi author and futurist. "The political and economic landscape in 2008 is full of spinning, tottering Chinese plates poised on tall pool-cues." [An MP3 of his State of the World 2006 from SXSW was previously linked here.]
posted by digaman on Jan 3, 2008 - 26 comments

MOMA has around 400 images from its collection of illustrated books available online. It's heavy on the works of the early 20th Century European avant-garde, especially the Russian Futurists, though it extends into the present day. Here are a few of the images that I liked: Aleksei Krucenykh and Kirill Zdanevich, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Olga Rozanova, Ekaterina Turova, El Lissitzky, Max Ernst, Raymond Pettibon, Vasily Kandinsky and Natalia Goncharova. [more inside]
posted by Kattullus on Dec 13, 2007 - 11 comments

This link goes to an discussion with 'Future Noir' author Paul Sammon... then this one goes to a Q&A with 'BR' director Ridley Scott, talking about the upcoming re-release.
posted by Rajamadan on Dec 8, 2007 - 12 comments

Owen Hatherley, has three blogs where he expounds on culture and architecture from an English Leftist perspective, sit down man, you're a bloody tragedy, The Measures Taken (which has longer essays than the previous blog) and the group film blog kino fist. To give you an idea of the range of subjects he covers, here's a sampling of his blogposts: Towards a Communist Couture? Sartorial Socialism from Huey P Newton to Honecker, Zuckendes Fleischer (on pre-WWII American cartoons), Industrial Island Machine - Vorticism and the absence of an English Avant-Garde, Hurrah for the Black Box Recorder (on songwriter Luke Haines and The Daily Mail), The Children’s Book as a Revolutionary Object (with a bunch of pictures from Soviet avant-garde children's books), Architectural Drawings of the 1960s, Art is a branch of Mathematics (Taylorism and Russian SF classic We), Brechtian Productivism in an age of Mechanical Stagnation and Notes towards an attempted refutation of the 'Associational Fallacy' (on architecture). All of the blogs are heavily adorned with pretty pictures, some not safe for work. [more inside]
posted by Kattullus on Nov 13, 2007 - 7 comments

Piggybacking the opening of the Rome Film Fest, a group of self-styled cultural "terrorists" struck Rome yesterday, dyeing the Trevi fountain red. In an elaborate manifesto, the previously unknown group Azione Futurista is claiming to represent "precarious workers, the unemployed, the elderly, the ill, the student body and workers alike", and have announced that "we are coming with our vermilion to colour the grey of your everyday" - "a blob of colour will bury you all." [more inside]
posted by progosk on Oct 20, 2007 - 37 comments

Old enough to remember those AT&T "You Will" ads from 1993? via Barry Ritholz's The Big Picture blog.
posted by Heywood Mogroot on Aug 26, 2007 - 72 comments

The book is an account of the battle of Adrianopolis (Turkey) in 1912 in which the author volunteered as a Futurist-soldier.
Futurism (1909-1944) was perhaps the first movement in the history of art to be engineered and managed like a business.
posted by Meatbomb on Aug 2, 2007 - 14 comments

Why science fiction is hard. Inspired by reports of a creative new, Rube-Goldberg spamming technique in World of Warcraft, MetaFilter's own Charlie Stross imagines trying to explain gold farming to someone from 1977. (Previously: 1, 2, 3)
posted by straight on Jul 20, 2007 - 61 comments

The British Ministry of Defence has been thinking about the future , and 2037 looks like it'll be a doozy. Others have been thinking about it too, and they believe they'll be mainly hot, sweaty, dirty and confusing. Of course, if you're the Canadian military, you get a science fiction author to write your future for you.
posted by Happy Dave on Apr 24, 2007 - 17 comments

Expo 67 photography
posted by Blazecock Pileon on Dec 4, 2006 - 23 comments

The Long Tomorrow is a short, twelve page, comic by Moebius produced in 1956-76 which tells the noir story of a private detective hired to pick up a parcel for a sultry dame. The art and the world it depicted was visionary; a world that is one giant, teeming, vertical metropolis. [via]
posted by dhruva on Dec 3, 2006 - 37 comments

grafedia: words written anywhere, then linked to images, video or sound files online. via
posted by Tlogmer on May 4, 2005 - 42 comments

It is more likely than not that most of America’s enemies in the near future will continue to be at least as awkwardly and inconveniently asymmetrical as they have been over the past 15 years. However, it would be grossly imprudent to assume that they will all be led by politicians as incompetent at grand strategy as Saddam Hussein or Slobodan Milosevic. There is probably a General Aideed lurking out there, not to mention a General Giap. A no-less-troubling thought is recognition of the certainty that America’s strategic future will witness enemies initially of the second-rate, and eventually of the first... One may choose to recall the old aphorism that “unless you have fought the Germans, you don’t really know war.” That thought, though one hopes not its precise national example, holds for the future.

How Has War Changed Since the End of the Cold War?  The answer seems to be not that much at all: The truth of the matter is that war is not changing its character, let alone miraculously accomplishing the impossible and changing its nature.
posted by y2karl on Mar 15, 2005 - 8 comments

Alan Moore and the Graphic Novel's Link to the Fourth Dimension is an academic text discussing the works of Alan Moore in terms of cubism, futurism, and the fourth dimension. Much mention is made of Guernica and the work of Will Eisner.
posted by grapefruitmoon on Feb 19, 2005 - 23 comments

Fritz Lang's last silent film, Woman in the Moon, has just been released by Kino Video in a lovingly restored and remastered edition, expanded to its original running time of 169 minutes. (Prior releases of the film in the US had as much as half of the original footage removed, with altered title cards that completely changed the storyline.) Woman in the Moon is considered to be the first real attempt to depict a flight to the moon in film that wasn't completely fantastic, thanks to the technical input of Hermann Oberth, who later went on play a key role in the development of the German V-2 rocket. As a piece of futurism, Woman in the Moon gets a few things wrong (the Moon of the film has a breathable atmosphere, for one thing), but it's also surprisingly prescient as well (the rocketship that voyages to the moon has multiple stages). Its most significant contribution to popular culture is the reverse countdown to blastoff, which was invented by the filmmakers as a dramatic device.
posted by Prospero on Dec 19, 2004 - 10 comments

A Vision of a (possible) future of the blogo-news-web-sphere. Or something.
posted by mmahaffie on Nov 22, 2004 - 32 comments

The Glorious Revolution: A Look Back, by Jeff Greenfield (CNN), is one of 16 What if Bush Wins? essays in the September edition of The Washington Monthly.
posted by mmahaffie on Sep 22, 2004 - 11 comments

Gates talks about our future. Bill gates shows a side that is rarely seen by computer users. Love him or hate him, I just want to know why he doesn't want me to have one of these some time in the next 15 years too.
posted by sourbrew on Jul 13, 2004 - 25 comments

The Futuro House - designed in 1968 by Finnish architect Matti Suuronen, this funky place is an example of space age utopian architecture. Made largely of plastic, the oil crisis nipped the design in the bud. Should you decide to build along these lines, here's some ideas for '70s decor.
posted by madamjujujive on Dec 22, 2003 - 16 comments

Science fiction writers on Arnold Schwarzenegger's election as California gov. (more inside)
posted by Tlogmer on Oct 11, 2003 - 22 comments

So you know all those worms that have been circulating recently? Well, turns out that they mean that the Internet has failed. (via the Obscure Store)
posted by Johnny Assay on Aug 27, 2003 - 35 comments

Futurism and the Futurists is a comprehensive (but oddly self-promotional) website showcasing the ideas, biographies, and works of the Italian Futurists. Enjoy the painting, poetry, the fabulous theatre "sentesi," and of course, all those lovely manifestos.
posted by Pinwheel on Dec 20, 2002 - 15 comments

Is E-Commerce dead, past its prime, or just resting? This journal special issue has some interesting thoughts about the future of E-Commerce. I especially liked the paper by Peffers. The conventional wisdom at this point is that B2C E-Commerce is viable only for certain types of products or contexts. Others (e.g. Andy Grove, Michael Porter) seem to think that in the future, all commerce will be E-Commerce and will be integrated with physical companies. Then there is the M-Commerce angle- e.g. DoCoMo. What do you make of all of this? How will we be shopping and communicating in the future?
posted by SandeepKrishnamurthy on Dec 11, 2001 - 13 comments

The IDEO identity card project. I'm fascinated by the micro-genre of busness cards. There's something about that tiny space that seems to get people's creative energy going in ways that even the big wide-open spaces of the web don't (not always in good ways). These designers are pushing the envelope in every direction: DNA, Bluetooth, plastic bags, incinerators, cameras, anonymity, you name it.
posted by rodii on Jan 13, 2001 - 11 comments

VR Pioneer Jaron Lanier trashes AI and futurists and makes a case that software designers that engage in this groupthink produce user-unfriendly software.
posted by skallas on Oct 3, 2000 - 4 comments