In Spaceship Earth, visitors ride through a massive geodesic dome while learning about the history of human communication. Unlike the other attractions in this list, this ride is still in operation. After all, its giant golfball exterior is the park's major landmark, and is unlikely to go anywhere anytime soon—instead, as the ride becomes outdated, Epcot continues to update it to bring it up to the times. So, for our purposes, we're going to look at the future presented by its prior iteration, which was in operation from 1994 to 2007.
In this version of the ride, kids are seen videoconferencing with each other while watching TV on the same screen. Today, the combination of Hulu and Skype makes it free and easy for anybody with a laptop and an Internet connection to pull off this trick.
The more out-there tech shown in this attraction is the instant audio translation. Two kids are depicted speaking over the tubes, with each hearing the other's speech in his own language. A primitive version of this technology can be found today in various forms—in voice-to-text-to translation, but the Department of Defense continues to research better, more instant translation tech. DARPA's Global Autonomous Language Exploitation (GALE) program aims to develop software that can interpret speech and text in multiple languages on the spot. But while progress has been made, the ease with which this Epcot-envisioned translation occurs is not quite in our technological capabilities.
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