31–40 of 173 posts
Another plus - the software stack would have been far smaller. You wouldn't need a 32 Gig phone just to install some apps. All processing would have been done in the cloud, on the mainframe. The apps would all have been dumb and only screen viewers for the mainframe.
:)
this article is just made to justify the phone's price.
Frankly though modern houses, automobiles, indoor plumbing, central heat, washing machines, vaccines, 50's era medicine, were a vastly larger jump in living standards than smart phones.
this article is just made to justify the phone's price.
Honestly, who cares. A ton of modern inventions would've cost way more money in 1956. I'm not gonna go to the store and say, wow this microwave would've cost millions in the 50s, that's a super reasonable price. Compare 2017 phone prices to other 2017 phones.
It is a little but amusing and gives some perspective.
Comparisons like that always assume the that price is constant with increased demand even when world GDP is spent on something. What would likely happen is first the price would go up and later down as the world manufacturing would shift to vacuum tubes production.
Yes if a government started buying trillions of vacuum tubes, companies would quickly get much more efficient at producing then and there would be a huge investment into researching alternatives. But that brings up the question, what tech could we be subsidizing today so we can get it faster?
Trying to answer the following might be fun as well: How much is a 1000 USD from today in that era in terms of purchasing power? What could you have bought with the equivalent amount of money, and how many people could have afforded the iPhone equivalent then?
http://www.thepeoplehistory.com/50selectrical.html 1000USD today would be around 100USD in the 50s.
Or, you could assume an average rate of inflation and calculate this using the rule of 72. I like to keep that formula in my pocket for things like this.
Comparisons like that always assume the that price is constant with increased demand even when world GDP is spent on something. What would likely happen is first the price would go up and later down as the world manufacturing would shift to vacuum tubes production.
Yes if a government started buying trillions of vacuum tubes, companies would quickly get much more efficient at producing then and there would be a huge investment into researching alternatives. But that brings up the question, what tech could we be subsidizing today so we can get it faster?
As an American, I’d say internet deployment and infrastructure upgrades, but multiple government entities have tried that and the ISPs end up doing nothing.