ABSTRACT
Housed within an 18-story geodesic sphere, Disney’s Spaceship Earth “explores the history of human communications” by giving customers the opportunity to “Ride the Time Machine from the Dawn of Civilization to the Beginning of Our Tomorrow” (Walt Disney Co., “Spaceship Earth,” “Intercot”). A press release issued by the ride’s sponsor, AT&T, describes the ride’s function more baldly, asserting that “the new ride and an interactive communications exhibit area entertains [sic] visitors of all ages with the wonders of AT&T’s leading-edge technology.” The ride lasts just under 13 minutes. Beginning with a shamanic ritual in a Lascaux-like cave, we proceed through the invention of writing by the Egyptians (featuring “authentic recreations of actual graphics” [Walt Disney Co., “SE Fact Sheet”]), the invention of the alphabet by the Phoenicians, a Greek amphitheatre, and so on through communications history, eventually arriving at the “revolution” of the present. A teacher conducts classes by computer-screen; a mother puts her daughter to bed by video-phone; a scientist conducts a test by remote hologram. “Physical distance is no longer a barrier to communication,” intones the voice of Jeremy Irons. “We live in a truly Global Neighborhood.” Now a vast network of fiber-optic cables surrounds us, shooting beams of light back and forth along its strands. In a moment the network twists together above our heads and twines around a model of the geodesic sphere of Spaceship Earth, a mîse en abyme of the ride itself, placed next to a sign bearing the AT&T logo and reading “Bringing people together anytime, anywhere.”
