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Back to the Future: Part 2
In "Back to the Future Part 2," our hero Marty McFly travels forward in time to save his children.
2015-10-21
The day Marty goes to — October 21, 2015 — is today.
And while "Back to the Future Part 2" slightly overestimated where we'd be in 2015 — flying cars and hover boards aren't readily available, after all — there's a surprising number of things the film predicted that either already exist or are close enough that in two years it wouldn't be surprising to see them be reality.
From fingerprint scanning to video games that don't require controllers, here's the technology the creators of "Back to the Future" correctly guessed in 1989.
Not only did the movie get wearable computing right, it even included devices that look like a mix of Google Glass and the Oculus Rift virtual-reality headset — though they didn't address the Google Glass backlash.
Back to the Future: Part 2
It's fair to say that when most people think of 1980s computers, the Macintosh is the first thing that comes to mind.
Back to the Future: Part 2
Computers that take orders via voice controls: Siri, anyone? And the new Apple TV emphasis on Siri integration makes it even weirder.
Back to the Future: Part 2
News footage being filmed by a drone. Drone footage is increasingly common, though they didn't quite foresee the explosion in the amateur drone market.
Back to the Future: Part 2
Super-thin advanced digital cameras? If anything, Doc Brown is a bit behind the times. Our phones are usually our cameras now, too.
Universal Pictures
While we might not watch six TV channels at once, Marty's son certainly has the same need for multiple streams of information as today's Millennials. We just prefer them in rapid succession, on our phones, or via a dual-monitor setup.
Back to the Future: Part 2
The only thing "Back to the Future" missed with its representation of video chat is the annoying sounds Skype makes when you start and end a call.
Back to the Future: Part 2
A mobile credit-card reader? So that's where Jack Dorsey got the idea for Square! Square announced its plans to IPO last week.
Back to the Future: Part 2
"You mean you have to use your hands? That's like a baby's toy!" In the "Back to the Future" universe, the Xbox's Kinect motion-sensing controller is a huge hit.
Back to the Future: Part 2
The movie correctly predicted the return of 3-D to blockbuster films ... though the CGI in 1989 wasn't quite ready to portray it. And does this look suspiciously like "Sharknado" to you?
Back to the Future: Part 2
The movie correctly predicted that fingerprint scanning would become a popular security feature. It first became an everyday technology when it was introduced in Apple's iPhone 5S.
Back to the Future Part II
BONUS: A special message from Doc Brown himself that came out today!
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Nathan is the media and advertising editor for Business Insider and was previously the entertainment editor, as well as an editor and reporter for the tech section.He runs BI's media business team, which primarily covers the creator economy and the business of social media, the evolution of streaming, and the future of advertising.He edits the CMO Insider newsletter, which features exclusive reporting on marketing and the creator space.He has overseen several award-winning projects at BI.He coedited Jason Guerrasio's feature on the rise and fall of MoviePass, which won a New York Press Club Award and a National Arts & Entertainment Journalism Award from the Los Angeles Press Club.BI's reporting on MoviePass served as the basis for the HBO documentary "MoviePass MovieCrash." Nathan is interviewed in the documentary and was a consultant during production.He's worked on other stories that have won or been finalists for NAEJ Awards from the LA Press Club.They include:
He mainly edits the work of reporters Lucia Moses, Lara O'Reilly, Dan Whateley, Sydney Bradley, and James Faris.Nathan graduated from Syracuse University's S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications with a master's degree in journalism in 2015, and from Columbia University in 2011.
