Crosstalk

Crosstalk is Konaka's word for the phenomenon of when multiple voices can be heard having overlapping conversations at the same time. He states in a footnote of Scenario Experiments Lain that doing something like this is a big no-no in the broadcasting industry for normal dramas. Despite that, crosstalk scenes appear several times in Serial Experiments Lain, the first time being in Layer 03. They seem to be used to convey Lain's forays into the Wired, when she does research or eavesdrops on conversations.

An event that may be a foreshadowing of crosstalk occurs in Layer 01. When Lain is on the train, she hears muffled, jumbled-up voices, even though no one on the train appears to be talking. This suggests that the ability to hear net chatter is a passive ability of Lain's, brought to its full potential when she obtains the Psyche chip in Layer 03. (In the scenario for Layer 01, Konaka compares the voices to those heard by the main character of the 1981 film Scanners before he learns to control his telepathic powers.)

In Lain, crosstalk is usually accompanied by typographics.