Fritz Lang's dystopian film ?Metropolis? is well known and hailed by many as one of, if not the, most important films of the silent era. The initial cut was quite controversial at time of release, with much of the original footage cut out after the initial showing. Attempts to restore the film over the past several decades have proven slow, with much of the original footage having been destroyed. An original copy found in an Argentinian museum has allowed the film to be restored almost completely to its initial form, much to the delight of movie aficionados. In addition to its powerful story line and political messages, ?Metropolis? has always had a special regard among technology enthusiasts; it was incredibly accurate in predicting many inventions.

You look at ?Metropolis? and essentially see FaceTime being used, and this is in a film made in 1927. Unlike 1950s and 1960s jet packs and hover crafts, the props of ?Metropolis? came to fruition. Of course, we have seen other sci-fi props become reality through the years, and one thing that seems to be a trend is the simple downsizing of existing ideas. We know that today's laptop has more capabilities than a mainframe from several decades ago that needed several rooms to hold, and the trend of downsizing continues at an exponential pace. Digital storage has certainly played a huge part in this, and that continues with the release of mSATA and now SATA M.2 and SATA Express.