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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?

#431

Post by pjc50 »

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #363

I don't know if this has a name, but... ICQ-like "searchable" instant messaging. Let me explain myself. In the late 90s, there was an IM client called ICQ. For starters, its UI was leaps and bounds ahead of anything to be seen in the next decade, and it had functionality like bots or groups, that has again become widespread a few years ago. But what I'm talking about is the fact that I could look for "female, age bet…

> "female, age between 16 and 20, who likes writing, RPGs and electronic music and is available for chat"

This is probably the reason it was abandoned.

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

#432

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

krylon wrote: post #356
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.

Many years ago, I heard a politician give a speech, and he used a phrase there (I am translating from German, so it might sound a little clumsy): The worst enemy of Good is Better. Over time, I have come to believe that the worst enemy of Better is "Good Enough".

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worse_is_better

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

#433

Post by Pranz »

dopkew wrote: post #313
johan_larson wrote: post #148

I'm disappointed none of the various constructed "universal" languages (like Esperanto) ever took off. Having a single common language spoken by everyone would be enormously useful. As it is, the closest we have is English, but it's a natural language and therefore complicated and difficult to learn.

For me it is Lojban. But I haven't gotten around to learning it.

ui. mi darsygau do nu cilre fi lo lojbo

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

#434

Post by GistNoesis »

narrator wrote: post #69
the_decider wrote: post #6

Semantic ontologies that would totally change the nature of search.

The problem with user supplied metadata is users lie. For example, the "keywords" meta field was mainly used for SEO spamming.

If you do the counting properly, this can be taken into account. Just like in poker, where you can bluff sometimes but if you do it always, people will call you upon. It's called Reification Done Right (in quadstore terminology), where you store metadata about the statement. Then it's just about building a reputation score for each statement. You can use simple bayesian updates like it's done in spam filters. Pretty quickly there is very little incentive to lying in an open book world.

Even more interestingly you can compute a score between author of the statement and viewer of the statement, basically telling you whether or not you can trust the information given your current belief system. For example if you are a flat-earther, you can get spaceX news filtered quite easily. From the computational point of view it's faster not to compute the whole matrix of score but use some lower dimensional embeddings so you do a matrix factorization, and that's how you get all the user recommendation systems ala Netflix.

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

#435

Post by ewjordan »

deepsun wrote: post #115
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…

Internally in Google it was really, really hard to get in the Wave team. So many people felt the opportunity to show what they can and get a career boost. So, presumably, they had best Google engineers working on that product. What I want to say is an obvious thing -- stellar team doesn't imply success.

The alternative facts: maybe the great team they had did maximize their chance of success, it was just one of those 90% of "startups" that don't hit the market.

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

#436

Post by inDigiNeous »

swyx wrote: post #187
phillc73 wrote: post #142

UDP for fast file transfer. Working in the television industry at the time and a few companies were making tools based on UDP, for sending large files across public networks. Smartjog, Aspera, Signiant. The companies are still around, but only operating in the B2B space as far as I know. I thought this technology was going to replace FTP. People wanting to punt bigger and bigger files around, they needed better tools…

that's interesting. Isn't UDP still in use today? (honestly i'm not too clear in what context, i just know that its used in some webapps)

Many games (if not most) use UDP for multiplayer functionality, as it's more bandwith efficient. UDP has no error recovery, packets are sent without any idea whether the receiver got them or not, and there is no handshaking the connection like with TCP, resulting in smaller latencies.

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

#437

Post by pjc50 »

swyx wrote: post #170
pimmen wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This really destroyed my day. I really have a big problem staying positive for at least a day now that you've eloquently expressed what I've had a creeping feeling of but just quite couldn't word in any discussion. As computers become "locked app collections" they become appliances, appliances business and government institutions can control and regulate. "Can you make the iPad just not do that thing?"

ok honestly i dont understand this fear. isn't the open web the antithesis of the locked appstore?

Not quite: the data is then locked away with the owner of the website, who can also surveil its usage and show you ads. Or ban you.

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

#438

Post by blattimwind »

IshKebab wrote: post #296
bsaul wrote: post #263

BeOS . That was the best os at the time by far, stellar performance, fantastic C++ api usable by a newbie, i still haven’t found a GUI as responsive as this one. DVD-audio. Great multi channel, high rate, high resolution audio. But it required the whole production chain to upgrade as well as new consumer equipement, and they competed with sony own format ( which was also a failure)... But it would have given the reco…

I'm not surprised DVD-Audio and co failed. Their quality is indistinguishable from CDs despite what audiophiles would have you believe, and by the time they came out MP3 was clearly the future.

I own a DVD audio copy of Linkin Parks' Reanimation and played on a proper 5.1 system it really is something, completely beyond any simple stereo CD.

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

#439

Post by icebraining »

natch wrote: post #144
celdon25 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm, have you heard of SingularityNET? There are plenty of projects being made that have real, valuable uses for blockchain tech. Marketplaces are one of them. If you want an app store that isn't controlled by one corporation that can force you play by their arbitrary rules, blockchain can allow this to happen. A centralized front-end is necessary, but that's all it is, a front-end. They have pretty much zero incenti…

“Arbitrary” rules? That’s flamebait... it’s already been explained here as nauseum that the rules help protect the privacy and security of end users.

Arbitrary (adj):

1. subject to individual will or judgment without restriction; contingent solely upon one's discretion.

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

#440

Post by anon1253 »

examancer wrote: post #179

Flying cars. I remember seeing prototypes in late 80s and early 90s, constantly showing up on Discovery Channel programs I watched as a kid like Beyond 2000 or Next Step. Over time it seemed increasingly far out, but, possible. Eventually I realized things like how catastrophic a break down or accident would be meant it will likely never happen. I and everyone else who thought flying cars were on the horizon were suc…

We have helicopters though, even quadcopters that can carry people, not to mention airplanes. But general purpose "flying cars" are a ridiculous idea: the failure mode is catastrophic (as you pointed out), the noise will be terrible (especially in cities), not to mention pollution (you might not care about CO2, but breathable air is still nice). And there's regulation, since there are no roads you need centralized control (e.g commercial/military flight control systems) which makes it almost impossible to scale and would mean sacrificing to great extend the benefits of cars: autonomy. And above that it solves a weird problem: congestion and capacity, but those are better tackled with self-driving cars and better public transit.
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