Once there was a man who found a little box. He could ask it questions. The little box gave vague but compelling answers to his questions, offering an easy path to success without any actual work involved from this man.
The answers were designed to keep him asking the little box questions instead of making his own decisions about his life, and doing his own work. He treated the little box like a therapist, a mentor, a friend.
Initially the box manages to give him the answers the man wants-- it tells him he will get a promotion, and he does indeed get one.
But asking the little box questions became something of a compulsion. His reliance on the little box nearly destroys him, his relationship-- his life. He becomes addicted-- incapable of making decisions about his own life. He becomes consumed by self-doubt when he's unable to consult the little box.
The little box didn't care about him, the little box didn't even really understand the questions he was asking, or the answers it was given. It was giving the answers it was programmed with, nothing more.
The little box was designed to spit out answers that would keep him putting money into the change slot. The answers were not insightful, they were not meaningful-- they weren't even accurate. And that didn't matter.
In 1960, this silly little story had very little meaning. Less meaning, for example, than other stories from the great mind of Richard Matheson (I am Legend, What Dreams May Come, and Nightmare at 20,000 Feet).
And, certainly, this silly little story on The Twilight Zone ('In the Nick of Time') had far less meaning in 1960 than it does 66 years ago.
The story ends with the man choosing to walk away from the little box. He realises this little box is destroying him, that he's going to lose everything that matters to him if he doesn't.
And as the camera panes to watch him walk away, another couple walk in, desperate to ask the little box more questions.
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