Yes, past presents, like the one with no audio recording devices, are hard to imagine now. Even weirder are past futures. One of my favourite books, for a number of reasons, is the old 1929 Sax Rohmer novel “The Emperor of America”. In it one of the main gimmicks is that the Evil Empire minions all have cell phones. In 1929, where even the cops have to run down the street for blocks to find a police call box before they can communicate with anyone, that’s enough to let you make a serious bid for World Domination. If one of the Good Guys recognises one of your guys out on the street from a Wanted poster the Good Guy can only go after him by himself or with a sidekick or two. If it’s the other way around the minion can get reinforcements by the truck load in minutes.
Another great example is the old “Man From U.N.C.L.E.” novels of the 60s. In them the Evil Empire of T.H.R.U.S.H. (the Technical Hierarchy for the Removal of Undesirables and the Subjugation of Humanity) has the Internet but no one else does. Thankfully at least the Good Guys here have the monopoly on cell phones. In the franchise’s TV show watch the civilian characters jaws drop to the floor when they realise that that guy over there can talk to any one in his organisation anywhere on the planet! If that’s possible then that changes everything!
