Big Brother is watching you...

[ffutures]

Weinbaum's The Black Flame describes a future city where every home is monitored by the authorities via tiny cameras and microphones, and everyone knows that they are there. He died in 1935 - did he originate the idea, or was someone else there earlier?

Comments

[were-gopher.livejournal.com]

We by Yevgeny Zamyatin was completed in 1921. Don't know if it is earlier than The Black Flame but it certainly features a lot of surveilance including transparent walls that can only be darkened if you have a permission slip for sex.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_(novel)

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

The oldest version of the idea was the "Panoptikon" -- but that was meant to be a prison!

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Definitely earlier - TBF was published posthumously.

[beamjockey.livejournal.com]

Surveillance is not part of "The Machine Stops" (1909) as far as I can recall-- am I right? But it came to mind. It's a much earlier story in which video cameras are present in every home. Wouldn't be surprised if ffutures had it memorized already.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I know of it, and I've read it (and saw the BBC play in the sixties or seventies), but I don't think of it as a surveillance society.