Paging Philip K. Dick:

In August 2007, software giant Microsoft filed a patent application for a system that would allow it to access thoughts. The patent describes pattern-recognition techniques that can be applied to electroencephalograph (EEG) signals – a measure of electrical activity in the brain – to determine what cognitive state the subject is in.

And you thought that Zune ad we used to have on this blog was annoying…wait until those fuckers can get in your MIND, brah! It’ll be like that shitty Tom Cruise movie a few years ago, Minority Report, where the billboards talked to you and knew your name and all that. Maybe we’ll all get lucky and Apple will figure it out first. At least then shit will be tasteful. A gentle mindfuck, if you will.

(note: Spoiler Warning. Be forewarned. And I may ramble on a bit. Again, be forewarned )

I remember how excited I was when I first heard of A Scanner Darkly’s impending release on the big screen. I, along with at least 200 other people, eagerly anticipated the film adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s drug-mired future dystopia. (The film ended up grossing $391,672 its opening weekend….not stellar numbers by any means).

While a great number of the film’s enthusiasts got on board because of their appreciation for Philip K. Dick’s writings, I was not among them. Like every nerd, science fiction holds a dear place in my heart, but over the last decade I’ve not cracked open a science fiction novel, save rereading a few classic favorites (you can’t front on Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land or Burgess’ A Clockwork Orange). My nerdliness taking a shift towards music & art rather than Dungeons & Dragons, and never being a particular fan of Dick’s writing in the first place, I was on board because of a particular name attached to the film. And this name was not a part of A Scanner Darkly’s leading cast — all in their real lives inextricably linked to delinquency and drug-usage (Robert Downey Jr., Woody Harrelson and Winona Ryder) or, failing that, dumb-as-dirt-ness (Keanu Reeves) — but instead, the film’s director and screenwriter, Richard Linklater.

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