Communicator (Star Trek)
From Biocrawler, the free encyclopedia.
Communicators are devices in the Star Trek fictional universe which are used for voice communication between two people.
Although many people assume that current cell phone technology has reach or even surpass the Star Trek communicator, especially the ones in the Original Series, the communicator in the Star Trek universe is vastly more powerful because it allowed crew members to contact starships in orbit, without any artificial satellite to carry the signal.
Development of communicators
In the Star Trek: Enterprise and Star Trek: The Original Series era, communication on-ship is done via communicator panels on the walls. When on an away mission, the crew carry hand-held communicators which "flip open"
In Star Trek: The Motion Picture we see wrist-worn communicators.
In Star Trek: The Next Generation and later series the crew wear communicator badges (combadges), small badges which are activated with a light tap. There have been 2 versions of the combadge. The original badge was used in the first 2 seasons of Deep Space Nine and the entire Next Generation series. The second was used in later seasons of Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager and three of The Next Generation films.
