Could digital technology potentially exist in Westeros?

[Shawaeh]

I know that fantasy worlds usually get stuck in middle ages. But let's say that it's very slowly evolving and eventually Westeros will look kind of like Europe looked in more recent history.

I guess it's safe to say that many inventions like bookpress or gunpowder would not feel out of place, but what about radio, TV, computers, internet? Do you think it would prove pointless in a world where magic is present more from day to day? (But still, something like dracarys powered electricity could work) Or what if all magic is exterminated and people get fed up with communicating through ravens and travelling on horses? It kind of works now, but if the times change and people are given more power and possibilites than they had before, everything will need to be faster. (Or maybe the political situation will never change and the society will be forever constited of a few kings and large groups of peasants.) What I mean by this is that it's technologically possible, they have the same materials as we do on Earth and they will possibly begin to have the same needs.

Are you a fan of this idea?

[BreastplateWithNipples]

Go ahead and make a novel out of that idea. I can't imagine what it would be like but it would be something new! :)

[Inquisitor Glokta]

Just imagine:

-some Targaryen kings sitting on the IT, making their daily 'Crown podcast'.

-LC of the Nightswatch writing his blog with 5 annual visitors

-Jof getting called on his cell by Cersei during the battle of Blackwater and ordered back home right away

-Tyrion playing d&d with Aemon at the Wall

-Sam's weapons training at the Watch being put on Ser Alliser's youtube channel

-Joff's & Ramsay's facebook wall

-How many hidden cams & mics the Red Keep would have Oo

[Ryjil83]

It would be great. They could "resurrect" the mad king with digital technology. 2pac has got nothing on King Areys.

[thecryptile]

Ramsays Facebook wall lol "Ser Gregor Clegane likes this"

[Don Roberto]

There certainly could be, they seem to have plenty of copper to make wires, rivers to build dams and whatnot. And engineer from our world and age being teleported to the times of the novels (or perhaps before the all-out war) could accomplish a lot with their resources and manpower.

Having said that, it's a world that's been pretty much stagnant, science-wise, for thousands of years. It's also a world much more ripe for innovation - more populous, interconnected and prosperous - than our middle ages. And yet, for some reason it seems stuck in a perpetual era of ravens and oxcarts and sheepskin parchments. One can argue the presence of magic, but magic has been pretty much gone from Westeros for hundreds of years, and the main source of knowledge, the Citadel, repudiates it. Yet, the current world seems no different from the one in the Dunk and Egg stories almost a century before.