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Ask HN: What tech were you convinced would take the world by storm but didn't?

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Re: Ask HN: What tech were you convinced would take the world by storm but didn't?

#301

Post by IshKebab »

vortico wrote: post #141
grumblestumble wrote: post #108

E-Ink. It is the "correct" choice for display technology, and with enough research money put into it, it could replace these abominable light-emitting displays. But what we already have is "good enough", despite all of the hidden costs, and so we're stuck with it.

I'm out of date. Does E-ink still have ~500ms latency of refreshing the screen? If so, that's the #1 reason I believed it wouldn't be successful when I used them 6 years ago.

They're a lot faster than they used to be. Maybe 200ms? Still not as fast as video.

And I don't know why everyone seems to think they aren't successful. Amazon sells a ton of Kindles. They're very successful.

Re: Ask HN: What tech were you convinced would take the world by storm but didn't?

#302

Post by newsbinator »

kobeya wrote: post #53
bitwarrior wrote: post #21

Nanotubes. Seemed like it was all upside, the stuff we were going to be making starships out of.

It will be. When we're able to manufacture them in large quantities and with few imperfections. Give it time.

Also it would be nice if accidentally inhaling them (during the manufacturing process, or in the wild) didn't directly cause cancer.

Re: Ask HN: What tech were you convinced would take the world by storm but didn't?

#304

Post by wj »

Jtsummers wrote: post #17

I'm not sure I expected it to take the world "by storm", but I expected more from Google Wave. It was a great concept, by a major company, but it was too slow on release and the rollout killed it. In retrospect, it probably wouldn't have lasted anyways. Google was in the process of minimizing their federated communication services by that point, and that was another major selling point of Google Wave's initial propos…

They used invites for the Gmail rollout as well but maybe those immediately created accounts. I seem to remember invites being sold on eBay.

Re: Ask HN: What tech were you convinced would take the world by storm but didn't?

#305

Post by PeachPlum »

grahamburger wrote: post #134

3D printing. Turns out making little plastic shapes isn't all that useful. Seems obvious in hindsight.

Adidas breaks the mould with 3D-printed performance footwear

https://www.adidas-group.com/en/media/news-archive/press-rel...

And it's not all plastic

The patents for laser sintering are running out

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selective_laser_sintering

my colleague at my Uni 3D printing society showed me a fully working planetary gear unit about 30mm x 30mm x 30mm yesterday, made from titanium and printed in one pass with zero assembly.

It's coming

Re: Ask HN: What tech were you convinced would take the world by storm but didn't?

#306

Post by toyg »

netsharc wrote: post #289
toyg wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It had everything to do with recording. People wouldn’t mind people flaunting weird gadgetry, but the feeling of being recorded was too creepy. It didn’t help that a lot of early adopters were very creepy to start with. It could have revolutionised journalism, and I still think we will eventually get something like it once the tech is really invisible, but the social aspect will take ages to sort out.

Maybe in 15 years... toddlers nowadays have so many smartphone cameras being pointed at them for their mom's Instasnapbooktwit feed, they will probably grow up being used to have lenses pointed at them.

Tbh it looks like the opposite might be happening, exactly as a reaction to the invasive approach from their exhibitionist parents who grew up before the ‘00s (when exposure was valuable and scarce). Most kids I see are moving towards technologies where recording is managed very consciously (staged ala instagram or ephemeral ala snapchat). Camera awareness has gone up, hoodies have become everyday clothing... Rather than “I’ll be recorded, whatever”, the attitude I see emerging is “I need to know when I’ll be recorded because I know it can make or ruin me”. The revenge-porn laws imho are the first salvo in what will become a campaign to redraw the relationship we have with cameras, in the long run.

Re: Ask HN: What tech were you convinced would take the world by storm but didn't?

#308

Post by Nanite »

Simulacra wrote: post #175

Google Glass. I thought this would become standard, miniaturized, and used in all aspects of life. Perhaps I read Daemon too much, but I was sure Glass would fly

Google Glass's application and marketing was hijacked when Sergey Brinn was shown the prototypes and decided to go for the consumer market. It was originally intended as an enterprise product, with somewhat similar envisioned applications to what Microsoft's hololens is aimed at today.

Now that the hype over the original Glass release subsided, there are actually some promising developments for the enterprise market. Notably Augmedix, a company aimed at optimizing doctor-patient interaction uses it as a tool allowing for remote medical assistants (https://www.augmedix.com)

Re: Ask HN: What tech were you convinced would take the world by storm but didn't?

#309

Post by IshKebab »

grahamburger wrote: post #134

3D printing. Turns out making little plastic shapes isn't all that useful. Seems obvious in hindsight.

That's just because plastic trinkets aren't what they are useful for. For useful applications, like prototyping, repairs, bespoke items and so on they are going strong and still getting cheaper and better.

I'm hoping we'll have some affordable SLA printers fairly soon.

Re: Ask HN: What tech were you convinced would take the world by storm but didn't?

#310

Post by rebuilder »

Animats wrote: post #92

Virtual worlds. The "metaverse" of Snow Crash. "Snow Crash", the TV series, has been green-lighted by Amazon. That may drum up more interest. Second Life comes close. They've had a working system for over a decade and have with adequate solutions to most of the problems. But it's hard to use, and not that many people are interested.

I think maybe the virtual world metaphor has been taken too literally. The real point of "jacking in", to me, would be a vastly superior interface compared to the screen-and-keyboard systems we have now. Ideally, it'd be more like a subsystem for your brain, an extension of the way we think, but in fiction it's easier to depict that as a virtual space.

Letting people use their devices without looking at or touching them would be a huge improvement over what we have now. Input especially is terrible, I'm typing this on a phone and a part of me hates every second of it. Someone, anyone, fix this crap!

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