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Movie Director: How was it?

Major Motoko Kusanagi: I certainly wouldn’t say it was a bad movie.

But no matter what kind of entertainment it is… it should be temporary. With no beginning or ending, the audience is bewitched into not letting go of a movie like this.

I don’t think there’s anything wonderful about that. In fact, it’s rather harmful.

Director: Oh, harsh. You’re trying to say that we should return to reality, right?

Major: That’s right.

Director: There are people in this audience who have unhappy things waiting for them if they return. If you take away the audience’s dreams, will you also take on their responsibilities?

Major: No, I won’t. Dreams only have meaning because we struggle in the waking world. Just projecting yourself into other people’s dreams is the same as being dead.

Director: A realist, eh?

Major: If you call someone who runs away from reality a romantic.

Director: Such a strong girl. Call me when you’ve made your beliefs reality. We’ll come out of this theater when that time comes.

Bob represents the domestication of the personal computer, in the pejorative sense of the word, turning the miraculous shape-shifting capacities of these machines into a dulled repetition of everyday, household reality.

The real magic of graphic computers derives from the fact that they’re not tied to the old, analog world of objects. They can mimic much of that world of course, but they’re also capable of adopting new identities and performing new tasks that have no real-world equivalent whatsoever. People who get hooked on computers get hooked for this reason. They don’t become high-tech junkies because their machines remind them of their Rolodexes; they’re junkies because their machines do things they never thought possible. Interface design should reflect this newness, this range of possibility.