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Supersonic jets flying routes all over the US were once considered inevitable. There was once a time that skyscraper height increases were considered inevitabl

Supersonic jets flying routes all over the US were once considered inevitable. There was once a time that skyscraper height increases were considered inevitable. Bigger ones were put up all the time. Audio quality on phones was once an area where improvements were constant. Now I'm surprised if people even mention call quality in phone reviews, except to say that it dropped fewer calls. My point? What seems inevitable today can often seem like a concern of a bygone era.

spc476 16y ago
The points you make are economic in nature. Supersonic flight is just too uneconomical to really be worth it at this point in time---regular jet service is "good enough" (just a side note---some thirty miles west of Miami a two-mile long runway was built for supersonic flights; it's now used for training. You can see it here: http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&ll=25.861695,-80.871048&spn=0.28515,0.392075&t=h&z=12 http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&ll=25.861695,-80.871048&...) A friend of mine, an architect, says that it's technically feasible to build a skyscraper a mile high (not to say it wouldn't be technically challenging; just that it is possible). But they aren't not because it's not worth the money to build (hard to rend out the office/hotel/living space where there aren't windows). And for phone quality, mobility and convenience of use has trumped quality for most people, so again, it's economic in nature.
- kenjackson 16y ago
  The points you make are economic in nature. Indeed. And so is bandwidth to the home.
  - rsheridan6 16y ago
    But there's a killer app for fast bandwidth - high definition, low latency videos. What Netflix is talking about. When consumers see that, they'll want it and they'll pay for it in a way that they would not pay for a supersonic jet flight.
    - evgen 16y ago
      The problem is that this need is already served well by cable and satellite service. If video is the only killer app you have for this bandwidth then it will never get built.

spc476 16y ago

The points you make are economic in nature. Supersonic flight is just too uneconomical to really be worth it at this point in time---regular jet service is "good enough" (just a side note---some thirty miles west of Miami a two-mile long runway was built for supersonic flights; it's now used for training. You can see it here: http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&ll=25.861695,-80.871048&spn=0.28515,0.392075&t=h&z=12 http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&ll=25.861695,-80.871048&...) A friend of mine, an architect, says that it's technically feasible to build a skyscraper a mile high (not to say it wouldn't be technically challenging; just that it is possible). But they aren't not because it's not worth the money to build (hard to rend out the office/hotel/living space where there aren't windows). And for phone quality, mobility and convenience of use has trumped quality for most people, so again, it's economic in nature.

kenjackson 16y ago
The points you make are economic in nature. Indeed. And so is bandwidth to the home.
- rsheridan6 16y ago
  But there's a killer app for fast bandwidth - high definition, low latency videos. What Netflix is talking about. When consumers see that, they'll want it and they'll pay for it in a way that they would not pay for a supersonic jet flight.
  - evgen 16y ago
    The problem is that this need is already served well by cable and satellite service. If video is the only killer app you have for this bandwidth then it will never get built.