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00:00How's it going, my dudes? This video's brought to you by Squarespace today.
00:03You know them as that cool little thing, what sits in your hand, and you can check the internet and
00:09everything on the-
00:09No, I'm kidding, it's of course not your smartphone, it's the Tricorder.
00:13It's been around in Star Trek since 1966, and you might be a bit surprised to find out where the
00:19idea for the Tricorder originally came from.
00:22Thank you so much to the wonderful Jack Kiley for writing the original article upon which this is based.
00:27I'm Sean Ferdick for TrekCulture, and here are 10 things you didn't know about Tricorders.
00:33Number 10, a brief history of the ones that occasionally explode.
00:36The world's most famous scanning device has a threefold name, but the story of its creation is twofold.
00:41The original impetus for the idea came from Gene Roddenberry as a way to expand the role of the yeoman.
00:46In a memo to Robert H. Justman from the 14th of April 1966, as cited in The Mating of Star
00:52Trek, Roddenberry noted,
00:53it has been suggested that she, meaning the Captain's Yeoman, carry, as part of her regular equipment,
00:58some sort of neat, over-the-shoulder recorder electronic camera,
01:01haven't given much creative thought to what this would look like.
01:04Such thought went to Oscar-winning artist, designer, and sculptor Hua Ming Chang.
01:09As brilliant as he was prolific, Chang had already designed the Talosian heads for the cage,
01:13and later created the M113 salt creatures, the Balok effigy, the Gorn, the Tribbles, the Vulcan loot,
01:20the Romulan bird of prey, the classic flip communicator, and built the phaser props based on Matt Jeffery's design.
01:26For his tricorder design and build, Chang charged Desilu Studios a mere $275 a piece.
01:32His initial sketch that can be found in Inside Star Trek The Real Story is both elegantly simple and finely
01:39detailed,
01:39featuring the familiar screen, information disks, top pivot, and push buttons that make the device iconic,
01:46with or without a certain tendency to explode.
01:48Number 9. Naming magic.
01:50According to the Starfleet Medical Reference Manual,
01:53tricorders are, in practice, a small sensor computer recorder, or a tri-function recorder.
01:58The fact that the meaning of the name has never been discussed explicitly on screen,
02:03gets the Star Trek Lower Decks treatment in the soon to be released USS Cerritos Crew Handbook.
02:08As Ensign Rutherford states, good old tri-key, they call it a tricorder,
02:12because it cords so many more than three things.
02:14In Star Trek Enterprise, they were just called hand scanners, of course, simpler times.
02:18What it does cord, as a matter of advanced future science fact,
02:21does just as well to be mostly indistinguishable from magic, a handy device to move the plot along.
02:27We're never actually shown the tricorder operations manual.
02:30Occasionally, TV magic also clashes with in-world practicalities.
02:34Just how did Voyager get those tricorder upgrades in Season 2?
02:37If you believe Rick Sternbach, they had them in the cargo bay all along.
02:39The original series era tricorders weren't given a model number,
02:43until perhaps most recently in Those Old Scientists,
02:46when Boimler suggested that TS-122 might be the model's true name,
02:51with the TS-120 being a predecessor.
02:54Trek's following century then gave us a whole new series of names for a brand new series of tricorders.
03:00Number 8, Next Gens.
03:01From Star Trek The Next Generation onwards, we've had the TR5-66,
03:06the TR5-87, the TR5-90-10 and 11,
03:10the Admiral Janeway Future Erased ones,
03:13the relatively slimline ones, TR8-90-15,
03:18those Nemesis Pam pilot ones and the purple stripe ones, amongst other tricorders.
03:23The farthest far future of scanning is all about what you can cram into a tricom badge,
03:28and in Star Trek Insurrection, we also got the sneakiest of peeks at the wrist tricorder.
03:32Wearable tech? That'll never catch you on.
03:34It is sadly not true that Martin Cooper's original mobile phone was inspired by Star Trek,
03:40but Motorola did give a knowing nod to the original series communicator,
03:44when they named their first clamshell phone the StarTac in 1996.
03:49Art imitated life imitated art when the 25th century tricorders got a very 21st century upgrade
03:55in Star Trek Picard's Season 2. They were Samsung Z flip phones in a case.
04:00A medical version with a detachable hand scanner was also seen in Picard's Season 3.
04:05All the flip tricorder designs in The Next Generation, Voyager and Deep Space Nine,
04:09were the work of senior production illustrator and designer Rick Sternbach,
04:12who also co-designed Deep Space Nine, the Intrepid and Prometheus class,
04:16the Runabouts and the Delta Flyer.
04:18Number 7. Uses, Misuses and Abuses
04:21There's a big red bit labelled Emerge EMRG on the TR560, 580 and 590 tricorder modules.
04:29You might think that this was to send a distress call,
04:32but according to The Next Generation Technical Manual,
04:34it's actually the emergency dump everything to the ship button.
04:37Pressing it will send the tricorder's entire memory up to a range of 40,000 kilometers,
04:43disabling all scanning functions for about 0.875 seconds and draining half the power as well.
04:49Aside from ensuring Starfleet has all your data before you die,
04:52there are plenty of things you can do with a standard tricorder.
04:55Packed full of mechanical, electromagnetic and subspace sensors,
04:58all tricorders from the start of The Next Generation to at least Star Trek Nemesis,
05:02had three input settings, geo or geological, bio, biological and met as in meteorological,
05:09for all your scanning needs.
05:11Tricorders can't detect neutrino emissions however, so connect to a visor instead.
05:15The Star Trek Voyager technical manual gives a rather blunt description of how to use your tricorder,
05:19simply point it at whatever it is you want to study.
05:21If you're after exact detail on how to use one to cause localized seismic disruptions or anesthetize a
05:27patient, then check out The Starfleet Survival Guide.
05:30Note that to really mess with the tricorder, you'll need a Thoron generator.
05:34Number 6. Medical tricorder.
05:36We have Beverly Crusher, or rather Gates McFadden, to thank in part for the gloriously detailed
05:41TNG-era tricorder technical information available to us.
05:44McFadden, a stickler for getting medical procedure as accurate as possible,
05:49as they put it in the Star Trek The Next Generation technical manual,
05:52requested a set of consistent operating guidelines that were then devised by designer Rick Sternbach.
05:57From the manuals we know that the Next Generation Era medical tricorder is basically a standard
06:02tricorder with a specialized medical peripheral on top. This attachment adds 86 electromagnetic
06:08devices designed for medical use, the removable hand sensor has 15 high resolution devices capable
06:14of active and passive scans of the entire body, internal organs, infectious microorganisms and more.
06:20The TR-590 tricorder X, introduced in Star Trek Deep Space Nine and Voyager, had the detachable
06:26hand scanner in the back. The original series medical tricorder was also a standard tricorder
06:31with benefits. According to the Starfleet medical reference manual, the medical tricorder was outwardly
06:37similar to other modules but came equipped with a diagnose, analyze and record modes as well as the remote
06:43scanner. Larger than its 24th century counterparts, the TOS medical tricorder had the handy advantage of a lower
06:49compartment with emergency surgical kit. Number five, Klingons have Hukra Mei too. So focused are we on
06:56our favorite Starfleet models, we often forget that other alien species in Trek have their own
07:01versions of the tricorder. Even the warrior race needs to scan things, or they're better to batleth you
07:06in the end. The first time we saw a Klingon tricorder, Hukra singular in the language, on screen was in
07:11Star Trek 3 The Search for Spock, when Krooge whipped one out on the Genesis planet. The piece was designed
07:17by
07:17Industrial Light and Magic, who also created the Klingon Bird of Prey, Communicator, Daktag Knife and
07:22the updated Starfleet tricorder for the film. The reference book The Art of Star Trek has the
07:27preliminary sketch of the Klingon tricorder with spring-loaded on mechanism as well as practical
07:33lights and a note stating will have one or two lights in the back as well. The first Romulan tricorder
07:39to be named as such in dialogue appeared in Star Trek Generations and was designed by John
07:44Eves. Eves also designed the distinctly less hefty Jem'Hadar Dominion tricorder for the Star Trek
07:50Deep Space Nine episode Hippocratic Oath. His original concept art showing the tricorder with
07:54Velcro prop attachments for a Jem'Hadar forearm was auctioned for $200 by iCollector.com.
08:01Number four, toys and tape recorders. If you grew up in the 1970s you probably had your eye on the
08:07Mego
08:07Corporation's first ever Star Trek action figures and accompanying Enterprise Bridge playset with
08:13spin-around transporter and a whole two stools. Did the Spock figurine talk to you in a dream?
08:18As well as getting your transporter in a twist you might have spent 1976 begging your parents
08:23for the Mego Star Trek tricorder. Essentially a jazzed up tape recorder with a microphone,
08:27the Mego tricorder did have a flip-top lid and a relatively recognizable rotating moiré display
08:34screen. It also came with a cassette that on one side played 30 minutes of audio from The Menagerie
08:40parts one and two the other side was left blank allowing children overgrown or otherwise to
08:44tape their own adventures as a commercial from the time put it. Why was it blue? Dabba dee dabba damned
08:50if
08:50I know. The design of toy replica tricorders has certainly improved over the years, the Playmates
08:56and Diamond Select varieties certainly look the part and the technology is keeping up too. The Wand
09:01company is set to release a functional original series style tricorder with actual sensors and sound
09:07recorder, a working display screen and interchangeable data disks. Number three, whatever happened to the
09:13Psycho tricorder? This isn't the name of a bloodthirsty, sentient tricorder that will stab you in the shower,
09:18it's an offshoot of the medical model that only ever featured in one episode of the original series,
09:23Wolf and the Fold. The Psycho tricorder as seen in that episode was also just a standard tricorder prop,
09:29capable of scanning and recording memories and of psychological examination more generally,
09:34the Psycho tricorder could be operated by a medical technician although they might get killed by Jack
09:39the Ripper before they can get to the bottom of any hysterical amnesia. The Psycho tricorder has
09:43appeared in a smattering of beta canon works. In the original series Mudd's Angels short story,
09:48the business as usual during altercations, we even get a Psycho historian with a Psycho tricorder,
09:54but that's about it. It is possible that the functions of the Psycho tricorder were later incorporated
09:59into the standard medical tricorder or made redundant by other techniques. In the Star Trek
10:04Voyager episode Night, the doctor uses a medical tricorder to help diagnose Neelix's anxiety attacks
10:10as Nylophobia, the fear of nothingness. Number two, Raspberry Pi in the Sky. Back in the day you could
10:15transform your Palm Pilot or Pocket PC, remember those, I'm so old, into a rudimentary tricorder. Then
10:23there was naturally an app for that, although not without a few cease and desist from CBS. Taking full
10:28advantage of the miniaturized computer power of the Raspberry Pi, fans have also built their own
10:33impressive multi-functional models, neatly nicknamed Pi quarters. Chris Detective Zero Barrett or
10:40Obso1337 on YouTube is one such fan who took a Diamond Select TOS Science tricorder and turned it
10:46into much more. Barrett disassembled the toy, added in the Raspberry Pi, a display screen, battery and a
10:52Sense Hat board, originally developed for use on the ISS, equipped with an accelerometer,
10:57sensor, magnetometer, gyroscope, barometer and temperature and humidity sensors. Not only does
11:03Barrett's TOS tri-pi-corder TR108 in his naming system look like the real thing, it works like one
11:09too, capable of recording sensor data from the environment and translating it on screen as close
11:14to the original series graphics as possible. And if that weren't extraordinary enough, his next project,
11:19the Pi Corder 2 TR109 was based on the next generation TR566 model with functional buttons,
11:27a display screen, lights, a thermal camera and an environmental sensor package. This guy's awesome
11:33and I would like to be his friend. Number one, take your sci-fi art, scan a broken heart. What
11:38medical
11:38professionals do today by employing an array of tests, techniques and technologies has been pretty much
11:43scaled down to the one belt clippable or over the shoulder carryable in Star Trek. The vision of
11:49such diagnostic ease has inspired many to translate the on-screen dream of the medical tricorder into
11:54a real life lifesaver. In 2012 the XPRIZE Foundation, a non-profit that does its best to promote a Gene
12:01Roddenberry-esque equitable and hopeful future of abundance for all, launched the Qualcomm Tricorder XPRIZE.
12:07Teams were challenged to create a tricorder-like device that could accurately diagnose 10 core
12:13medical conditions such as atrial fibrillation and abnormal heart rhythm, diabetes or stroke and
12:19three elective conditions including hypertension, monocleosis, glandular fever and HIV. The device
12:26also had to be capable of monitoring five vital signs in real time. Five years later no participant had
12:32met all of the criteria for the 10 million dollar grand prize but the trekly named Final Frontier
12:38Medical Devices won the first prize of 2.6 million dollars for D-X-T-E-R, an at-home
12:45medical instrument
12:46kit with AI diagnostic app. Voyager's EMH Robert Picardo even opened the awards ceremony with the required
12:53please state the nature of the medical emergency. Dudes it's your favorite risey and meteorologist Chad
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13:39for our list. This has been one of the most fascinating ones I've recorded in a while so
13:44thank you so much to Jack Kiley for the original article on which this is based. Thank you as well
13:48to Mel Braun for editing this into the beautiful video you have just seen. Folks don't forget to go and
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14:03Make sure that you live long and prosper. Make sure that you look after yourselves. Give yourself a scan
14:07every so often to make sure that everything is going okay for you. Thanks a million and I'll talk to
14:12you soon. Bye.
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