technology vs capitolism

[Lucas]

okay so i saw this commercial for the iphone thing where you can talk face to face. pretty cool. we all know we could have had this type of stuff out long ago, but it just wouldnt make as much money as it would to string people along with the release and implimentation of high tech.

so does this greedy money making aspect stem our technological advance as a species?

when the first cell phones came out they were crazy expensive. now you can get them for free. as things become common place they become affordable and then new tech is released for the next influx of mad money making.

wtf?

i know this is totally random but seeing that iphone thing made me think about:

remember when u were younger and they said we would have flying cars and a moon base by now?

maybe im way off base here, but how much do you think the almighty $$ keeps us held back from updating our common technology at a faster rate.

basically if the rate of technology dictated the rate of technology would we move faster rather than the rate at which we dole it out to the consumers?

am i retarded?

[David Jamieson]

video phones have been in use since the 70's. Skype gives video chat for free these days.

the iphone is making an attempt at ubiquity, but their failure is that they are not cross platform and they are not cooperating with other companies that can help them achieve this. all of them are working against each other and for something as ...well, "little" as a cell phone.

seriously, apple really hasn't innovated as much as they've stolen or merely resurrected.

The reason is simple as to why the market is in a constant battle.

"greed".

Greed is rampant in the world. It is sad because it is the pursuit of further unhappiness supported by illusion.

This is the height of how desire=suffering

2500 years after that message was relayed and still here we are...lol.

[SanHeChuan]

When cell phones or any new technology first comes out they are crazy expensive because you aren't just paying for the phone you're also paying for the entire infrastructure that went in to creating it. In the case of cell phones that’s not just factories to manufacture them, but also cell towers and satellites to make them work. Once those costs are recouped then the price is reduced. And the cost of “free” phones is recouped in the pricy-ness of the service plan.

But yes technology is a good deal driven by profitability. While a moon base is certainly currently possible it is not currently profitable, because the technology isn’t in place to make it cost effective. There are people currently working to change that, but this is a case of technological limits lagging behind innovation.

The reason cell phones didn’t have video chat before is not because they wanted to dole out technology slowly to make a bigger profit, but because it took time to build infrastructure capable of handling large enough data streams to make it useful enough for people to actually pay to use it. Although the technological knowhow was there 10 years ago the physical technology to support it wasn’t in place yet.

Flying cars, the good ones envisioned in the 1950 just aren’t possible. Our current flight technologies (jet engine or rotor) just aren’t practical for a car. Maybe when we figure out anti-gravity.

One case of greed limiting technology is the electric car, while profitable on its own, powerful interest who would stand to lose a lot of money have been suppressing the mass production of the technology. On the flip side think of the infrastructure need to support electric cars such as charging stations.

Your premise that companies withhold technologies so they can dole them out a piece at a time is a perception that really reflects how fast technology is progressing. Like with computer chips, by the time they get one ready for production they have already figured out how to make them better. If they were always waiting for the next best thing to come around the corner before putting out a product we'd only get a new computer chip when the technology finally stalls for a moment.