I think he was generally just excellent at getting near term predictions right and interesting. To pick a small one of many there's a moment in Heavy Weather where they have trouble with their PBX, and he mentions that it's basically a shrunk-to-digital 20th century phone company in a box, and so it requires negotiation, rebooting, kicking, etc. Love that take on modern software layers.

Yup. I noticed a line in Islands in the Net where one of the characters waits until evening to make a phone call when the rates are low. I had a chuckle, but it didn't detract from the rest of the story that was definitely good. Though I should talk to my offspring about making sure they only call me in the evenings so the long distance fees aren't exorbitant, just to see if they try to take away my car keys.