One thing I’ve been doing with Theadia is playing around with the terminology of things. Considering it takes place at some unknown point in the far future, I’ve decided that I’m going to experiment with some technological terms so that perhaps some of it is anachronistic while other terms are more generalized.
Computers, for example will rarely be referred to as ‘computers’ (the term just feels so 80s in my head even though it’s universal these days) but rather as things like databases, tablets and monitors. The same with phones; the tech has changed just enough in my story that I don’t see them using cell phones as we know them, but more like mini-tablets as we do know them. They don’t take a call but answer hails. My terminology is supposed to hint at familiar devices that have slightly different names and appearances than what we’re normally familiar with. And to be more nerdy: the internets are less about websites and social media (though they do exist here) and more about useful connection points to what you want or need to do at that moment. And yes, that does in fact include reading social sites and reading news feeds. The same, just slightly different. [Part of this is to underscore the way our two heroes view their work and what will happen to them in this story; the tl;dr is that their jobs are such that they understand what’s under the hood here and see their tech in that way.]
Do I really need to do this? Well, not exactly, but it’s part of my worldbuilding that I enjoy playing around with. I did the same with the Bridgetown Trilogy — there were cars (‘transports’) but there were also driverless lorries and such. It’s just part of the background color that makes the story a bit more real and intriguing.
Welcome to Bridgetown 