the.com/autocue
The confidence trick that lets politicians make eye contact with a lie they're reading live.
means A device that displays scrolling text near a camera lens so a speaker can read a script while appearing to look directly at the audience.
from A trademark-turned-generic term built from Greek 'autos' (self) plus 'cue' (a theatrical prompt), coined for a device invented in the 1950s to help television presenters and actors deliver lines without scripts in hand — the US rival brand 'TelePrompTer' became the more common name in America, while 'autocue' stuck in Britain.
- real name
- Autocue is a brand, like Hoover for teleprompters
- invented by
- a soap opera actor, Hubert Schlafly, in 1948
- the glass trick
- text reflects on clear glass so eyes never drop
- speed control
- operator scrolls live, matching the speaker's stumbles