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The comments are remarkably negative for a can-do crowd of entrepreneurial people. Success is built on a string of multiple failures. I'm rooting for this tea

The comments are remarkably negative for a can-do crowd of entrepreneurial people. Success is built on a string of multiple failures. I'm rooting for this team to succeed.

dingaling 10y ago
Much negativity results from 50 years of supersonic biz-jet daydreaming without anything progressing past airshow models. It's basically the original vapourware. Even experts like Dassault and Sukhoi, with more supersonic experience than any current company, have shied away. And Dassault is reknowned for its biz-jets; if anyone could do it I'd bet on them. Gulfstream looked at it from the other direction, potentially moving-up from big subsonic biz-jets to an even more exclusive and expensive aircraft. They too decided against it, even with Sukhoi's input into supersonic design. Beyond the big companies there have been a string of smaller dreamers. Jane's "All the World's Aircraft" from through the 1980s is testament to that. Can Boom do it? Possibly so, but given that they're building on the same technology as the rest of the aerospace industry then I don't see why they're any different. This isn't a problem that software can solve ( unlike Space-X ).
- Beltiras 10y ago
  This is a reasoned critique of Boom's plans. Much of what I was criticising was references to Concorde and the Tupalev failure.
arjie 10y ago
It's useful to remember that it's a bunch of people that don't know the industry. They're just googling and reading Wikipedia. That doesn't mean the project will be successful. It's just that there's zero information content to most comments that are on non-software topics. There are some things I know a little about that I haven't commented on here about, and I've seen where people are quite clearly googling and getting not the right answer but the answer that is most likely to show up on Google. Just something useful to keep in mind.
- propter_hoc 10y ago
  Glad to see this viewpoint. I work in energy and the hivemind on HN on this topic is quite subject to these fallacies. ("Solar energy can't be profitable" and "thorium is the answer" spring to mind.)
- notahacker 10y ago
  I don't think people that know the industry are systematically less sceptical of this project than those who don't (if anything it's the other way round; industry insiders are less likely to be sympathetic to the idea that a former Groupon exec with a PPL and a bunch of software investors might understand the demand for commercial aircraft and how to build a supersonic model aircraft for $13m plus salaries without existing infrastructure better than companies with enormous piles of cash for skunkworks projects and decades of experience in making and selling aircraft) Other industries have a much higher resistance to hype and estimates that sound like they're based on what people want to hear than software.

The comments are remarkably negative for a can-do crowd of entrepreneurial people. Success is built on a string of multiple failures. I'm rooting for this team to succeed.

dingaling 10y ago

Much negativity results from 50 years of supersonic biz-jet daydreaming without anything progressing past airshow models. It's basically the original vapourware. Even experts like Dassault and Sukhoi, with more supersonic experience than any current company, have shied away. And Dassault is reknowned for its biz-jets; if anyone could do it I'd bet on them. Gulfstream looked at it from the other direction, potentially moving-up from big subsonic biz-jets to an even more exclusive and expensive aircraft. They too decided against it, even with Sukhoi's input into supersonic design. Beyond the big companies there have been a string of smaller dreamers. Jane's "All the World's Aircraft" from through the 1980s is testament to that. Can Boom do it? Possibly so, but given that they're building on the same technology as the rest of the aerospace industry then I don't see why they're any different. This isn't a problem that software can solve ( unlike Space-X ).

Beltiras 10y ago
This is a reasoned critique of Boom's plans. Much of what I was criticising was references to Concorde and the Tupalev failure.

arjie 10y ago

It's useful to remember that it's a bunch of people that don't know the industry. They're just googling and reading Wikipedia. That doesn't mean the project will be successful. It's just that there's zero information content to most comments that are on non-software topics. There are some things I know a little about that I haven't commented on here about, and I've seen where people are quite clearly googling and getting not the right answer but the answer that is most likely to show up on Google. Just something useful to keep in mind.

propter_hoc 10y ago
Glad to see this viewpoint. I work in energy and the hivemind on HN on this topic is quite subject to these fallacies. ("Solar energy can't be profitable" and "thorium is the answer" spring to mind.)
notahacker 10y ago
I don't think people that know the industry are systematically less sceptical of this project than those who don't (if anything it's the other way round; industry insiders are less likely to be sympathetic to the idea that a former Groupon exec with a PPL and a bunch of software investors might understand the demand for commercial aircraft and how to build a supersonic model aircraft for $13m plus salaries without existing infrastructure better than companies with enormous piles of cash for skunkworks projects and decades of experience in making and selling aircraft) Other industries have a much higher resistance to hype and estimates that sound like they're based on what people want to hear than software.