Orange Cone

(from Engadget)

Not quite using magic as a metaphor, but more traditional stage magic (i.e. a technological assist for what's a sleight of hand deception), Casio's magic watch assists in doing five different magic tricks. Stage magic and technology have a long history of supporting each other. The two movies about magicians this last fall, The Illusionist and The Prestige were, to some extent, about late 19th century society coming to terms with the burst of technology appearing on the scene. Some of the questions at the core of the characters lives (in The Prestige at least), are questions about reality and technology's ability to change it. And if films are like society's dreams, reflecting its concerns back to itself, but obliquely and in coded language, then these films reflect a current set of concerns about what technology is capable of, and what it's not. This watch, although a minor footnote at best, is part of that dialog, part of the grey area.