History Main / LongRunnerTechMarchesOn

* ''Franchise/{{Superman}}'':

* ''Comicbook/{{Supergirl}}'' was created in the late Fifties. In one of her modern adventures a group of super-villains used a mobile app to track her location.
* ''ComicBook/ArchieComics''. The characters don't age, but the technology is always up-to-date. It's not something that's just quietly slipped in either; a strip in the late 80s saw Veronica replacing her record collection with CD's, and in a later one Archie's parents reminisced about the days of dial-up. The ultimate example (for a while) was Archie's AllegedCar, which for the first four decades of publication was the same beat-up red [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Model_T Ford Model T]]- literally the very first affordable consumer car ever made, and so old it had a ''hand crank start.'' [[ICallItVera He named it "Betsy."]] In the 40s it was reasonable he'd be driving one of those if he was driving at all, since at that point the Model T still held the record for most units sold. In 1972, though, it was dethroned by the VW Beetle, and as the years went on it started looking more-and-more out of place among the other characters' contemporary rides. Eventually in 1983 Betsy was put out to pasture and replaced by a [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Mustang_(first_generation) mid-60s Mustang,]] which solved the problem for a while- but lately that car has ''also'' become a bit of a historical relic. Poor Archie can't catch a break.
* The ComicBook/DisneyMouseAndDuckComics. While [[RetroUniverse aesthetically with many bygone elements]], the level of technology is always assumed to be contemporary ([[ReedRichardsIsUseless not counting]] Gyro Gearloose and other inventors occasionally [[SerialEscalation pushing it well beyond that]]), so that cell phones or desktop computers may crop up in more recent stories. A notable exception are the stories by Creator/DonRosa (active from 1987 to 2005) which are always either set in the timeframe "late forties [[TheFifties to]] [[TheSixties early sixties]]" (the time in which Creator/CarlBarks created his classic stories), or are [[Comicbook/TheLifeAndTimesOfScroogeMcDuck prequels taking place at very specific dates in history]].
* ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'': At the start of his career, a radio small enough to fit in Batman's belt buckle that could be used to send Morse code was bleeding-edge. Nowadays he has his own satellite network. Modern stories set in Batman's past tend to fuzz technological details by avoiding showing specific tech. Fortunately a [[TalkToTheFist punch to the face]] has always been a punch to the face.
* The Franchise/MarvelUniverse is actually more prone to this than DC, which {{Cosmic Retcon}}s its continuity every couple of years nowadays, making it so that whatever 1940s Batman or Superman stories that currently still count might have happened last year. Marvel has it particularly bad with those characters -- [[ComicBook/SpiderMan Peter Parker]], [[ComicBook/IronMan Tony Stark]], [[ComicBook/FantasticFour Reed Richards]] -- who work with fantastic technology, the earliest issues of whose comics involved technology which often wasn't so fantastic 10 years ago or so, when the ComicBook/FantasticFour took their ill-fated space flight to the Moon (to beat the Russians), and contemporary Marvel continuity began. A prime example? Reading the original Iron Man appearance, one might be amused to discover that the secret to his suit's power was "highly miniaturized transistors", and he had a phone built into the suit... with a rotary dial on the chest.
** In one flashback to the original Avengers team (published in the sixties but, due to ComicBookTime, will always be "ten years ago" in universe), Captain America refers to Rick Jones using shortwave radio (which he was in the original story), and Iron Man corrects him that it's social media.
* Cerebro, the mutant-detecting computer from ComicBook/XMen, first appeared in the '60s using punch-cards and tape drives. It has wildly fluctuated in both appearance and capabilities throughout the years before everyone just went with the device's portrayal in the movies, a hollow ball-shaped room.
* In ''Comicbook/{{Shazam}}'', Billy Batson's broadcast career went from radio to TV and finally to podcasting (that last also a turn towards realism due to the much lower barrier to entry) and Freddy Freeman's mobility aids have come in for some updates.
* ''ComicBook/JanJansEnDeKinderen'': The comic has run since 1970, and firmly uses tropes like ComicBookTime and NotAllowedToGrowUp to keep the characters at the same age, but since it's always set in "the present" social and technological changes have been introduced over the years, such as the internet, cellphones, laptop computers etc.
* When ''Franchise/WonderWoman'' [[ComicBook/WonderWoman1942 first started out]] her invisible robot plane had a very advanced auto-pilot and, despite being a SpacePlane, was propeller driven. She and the Amazons also used "mental radios", which functioned like bulky transportable {{Video Phone}}s. The plane has been jet propelled for decades now and the mental radios were written out even before cell phones became so common that nearly everyone has a sleek VideoPhone in their pocket these days.

* ''Film/MissionImpossibleFilmSeries'': The first ''[[Film/MissionImpossible1996 Mission: Impossible]]'' (1996) featured the then-current computer technology of the mid-90s. As the franchise went on, computer technology upgraded with it, such as ''Film/MissionImpossibleGhostProtocol'' (2011) and ''Film/MissionImpossibleRogueNation'' (2015) prominently featuring tablet [=PCs=] and other smart devices. ''[[Film/MissionImpossibleDeadReckoningPartOne Dead Reckoning]]'' takes a step further into ScienceFiction territory with a [[GrewBeyondTheirProgramming rogue]] [[AIIsACrapshoot artificial]] [[ArtificialIntelligence intelligence]] as BigBad.

* Played with in ''Anime/HisCooolSehaGirls'': [[UsefulNotes/SegaDreamcast Dreamcast]] can connect to the Internet wherever and whenever she wants, but can use only sluggish dial-up (in an age where Wifi and broadband are the norm). She also prefers to connect only during certain times to avoid running a fee, on account of [[MythologyGag being from a poor family]].

* In the first ''Literature/AlexRider'' book (2000), the protagonist is given a spy gadget disguised as a UsefulNotes/{{Game Boy}}. In the ninth book (2011), he uses an iPhone 3GS, despite it being set only a year later.

* In most ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' games, the latest Nintendo console will be featured in the player character's house. The only main exception to this is in the remakes ''[[VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen]]'', which feature an UsefulNotes/{{N|intendoEntertainmentSystem}}ES (as opposed to the original games which featured a UsefulNotes/{{S|uperNintendoEntertainmentSystem}}NES). This happens despite the remakes taking place at the same time the originals did (for instance, ''VideoGame/PokemonGoldAndSilver'' feature the UsefulNotes/Nintendo64 but the remakes feature the UsefulNotes/{{Wii}}). In the case of ''VideoGame/PokemonRubyAndSapphire'', it took place chronologically ''before Gold'' and ''Silver'', yet had a newer console (the UsefulNotes/NintendoGameCube). ''VideoGame/PokemonSunAndMoon'' had a UsefulNotes/WiiU in the player's bedroom and the follow-up games ''VideoGame/PokemonUltraSunAndUltraMoon'', which were set the same year but in a different timeline, replaced it with a UsefulNotes/NintendoSwitch.

* WordOfGod on ''Webcomic/DumbingOfAge'' is that it'll roll with this, in order to avoid 'slowly becoming a period piece'. Other than an early oopsie of many of the students listing modern movies as their favorites in a gender studies class (Willis laments in a decade that'll seem weird that so many 18-year-olds would be into classic movies), the pop culture references tend to try to stay as generic as possible. The UsefulNotes/NintendoDS/[[UsefulNotes/Nintendo3DS 3DS]] may be replaced, but playing a version of ''VideoGame/MarioKart'' on a handheld device will probably be A Thing for the foreseeable future, for instance. Amber's MMORPG is most likely ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'' but never named directly, and ''Franchise/{{Transformers}}'' references are kept as generic as possible, IE "Optimus Prime" and "Bumblebee" being safe choices for future generations.