Wireless telephoneMusic in Cyberspace John Logie BairdFootballTV / Games TV / GAMES Was England's third goal in the 1966 World Cup Final really a goal? Or did the ball bounce down off the crossbar and not cross the goal line before rebounding clear. Back then the referee awarded the goal and England went on to win their only World Cup. The decision that decided the 1966 World Cup Final Nowadays an armchair viewer with digital TV would have no need of doubts. Through the use of coaxial cable or fixer optic cable, or modified use of the existing telephone system, two-way communication can take place between a home computer terminal and a central facility that provides viewer choice and facilities never available before. A viewer can choose the camera angles he wants to watch and change them at any time. If he likes to get an overview of the whole game by using a camera from the blimp hovering overhead he can. If he likes to watch cricket from the perspective of the stump camera that is possible too. Who would want to be the ref if he gets it wrong? Television has changed the way we watch events whether it be local sports games national politics or breaking global news. It has moved us from sharing experiences with groups of people to being able to customise our own personal viewing pleasure. TV technology has been transformed by the arrival of digital. Much is made of the improved picture quality but it is the size and thickness of the screen that will make the most impact. Once flat screens can be incorporated into walls - just as Bill Gates has in his £30 million mansion in Medina outside Seattle [link to Homes site] but much cheaper! - TV will become literally part of the wallpaper rather than that ungainly black box sitting in the corner. As video cameras get smaller and the quality of their pictures increases so news gathering and documentary programmes will become more intimate. The three-man TV crew will become a single person operating a camera the size of a miner's head torch. The filming quality of You've Been Framed will also improve dramatically. Just as we can already take a happy snap, scan it into a computer, remove those red eyes, a few unsightly spots and stretch our stumpy legs three inches before emailing it to friends, we will be able to do that with home videos. Everybody can become a film maker or a chat show host. The 360 degree TV invented by Frank Gibshaw of ESP Electronics was first shown at the international Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in 1998. The set displays exactly the same images shown on normal TVs but viewers can watch them from all sides. If the pictures can be improved to give a 3D effect the arrival of the hologram performer (a real life version of the virtual doctor in Star Trek: Voyager) will not be far behind. Computer games have developed from crude Space Invaders to the hand created worlds of Myst and MediEvil with their highly complex puzzles set in beautifully crafted and 3-D animated landscapes. At the same time virtual reality has developed to the extent that we can tour computer generated houses and by moving a hand encased in a giant gauntlet appear to pick objects up. One of the side effects of the Human Genome Project and other researches into bio-engineering [link Genetic engineering] is that it will soon become possible to artificially stimulate the senses of touch, taste and smell. Aldous Huxley's Brave New World of the "feelies" will become reality not a fictional construct. In a world where leisure is the fastest growing business the first people to explore the commercial potential of these different disciplines will be the Games masters. Once they can incorporate those missing senses and add Virtual Reality into computer games the games environment will envelop and stimulate all the senses. It will be entertaining but like the world of the movie Matrix may appear so real as to become dangerous to its players. Futurologists already talk of future generations having telephones and jack plug sockets surgically installed in the back of the neck allowing our brains direct connection into the Net or games consoles. That will give a new meaning to the term couch potato.