You're familiar with the Law of Unintended Consequences, right?
Think about the following...
Critics: Broadband plan doesn't go far enough - Tech and gadgets- msnbc.com
Crippled Mars rover is chilled, but still alive - Mars- msnbc.com
Enthusiasts revive Polaroid film, plan to sell it - Tech and gadgets- msnbc.com
Now, I don't see much in the way of POSITIVE consequences coming from getting government involved in broadband - except a massive increase in costs with little to no increase in capacity. (Competition drives improvement - if government mandates a certain mb/second rate, at a certain cost - then that's what'll we'll get, even if better may be available.)
Another thing that's not taken into account when someone goes "Well, THEY have this, why can't WE?" is that the examples used are geographically limited and/or heavily subsidized. It costs a lot more for to provide a service, hardware and maintenance infrastructure to cover a few million square miles, for example, than an area the size of South Korea, Taiwan, or Sweden.
So what could possibly go wrong? (Yeah, silly question, right?)
Now, in the case of the Mars Rovers - unintended consequences have been VERY beneficial. The Pathfinder probe was the first attempt at 'soft' landing by means of airbag, and lasted quite a while. Lessons from THAT one went into the making of the Mars Rovers - and THAT pair have lasted a LOT longer than ever expected, despite (or perhaps?) being made as cheaply as possible. ('Cheap' being very relative, of course.)
The third one - that's interesting. It's not often you see an 'obsolete' technology ressurected like this. The advent of digital photography has really, really caused a lot of trouble for the traditional film makers - and in some cases (like Kodak and Fuji) they've managed to transition from providing film-based services as a mainstay to mainly digital cameras and services with film as a minor sideline. So what will the unanticipated side effects or benefits be on this product? Will we be seeing more 'obsolete' tech pop back up in the future?
Ah, such interesting times!
J.
Comments (3)
Actually, most (I would say all, but there may be a few which allow digital) jurisdictions require crime scene and evidence photographs to be taken on film, as physical negatives are much harder to manipulate than digital files (NOT impossible, but very difficult, and expensive). One of Jim Streeter's prize students from a few years ago uses an Olympus XA camera I gave her as her primary camera in her job as a crime scene photographer; it has an excellent lens and fits in a pocket (she has a gadget bag with an SLR with all the trimmings, but mostly it stays in her car). That was why I didn't think too highly of the episode of CSI: Miami which revolved around someone getting the SD card out of a CSI camera and editing the files thereon; if the photos were on film, there simply wouldn't have been a story (and AFTER that event, I would be shocked if they didn't go back to film photography). Of course, you don't get DNA analysis results in a couple of hours, either...
Posted by John C. | March 23, 2010 7:09 PM
Posted on March 23, 2010 19:09
Haven't stopped by in a while.
Re: broadband, I think the idea is that we have transformed ourselves into a society that is or soon will by totally reliant on high-speed internet for basic aspects of life. So, like water and electricity, it's become a utility.
The goal is to provide utilitarian (not the fastest, but fast enough) to everybody. We tech junkies can always pay for faster, just like we already are.
Re: the rover, I love it. Although I feel compelled to snarkily note that it is the product of a government program :)
Posted by Jason | March 25, 2010 5:28 PM
Posted on March 25, 2010 17:28
Jason! Glad to see you, man - how's it going for you?
Re the rover - True, it's a product of a government program... but one that's been regularly dissed, starved, and seriously underfunded (IMHO) to a ridiculous extent, AND the particular projects were designed to be as inexpensive as possible (For relative values of 'inexpensive' to be sure...) and so required a lot more innovative thinking. We're talking duct tape and bailing-wire cheap, though admittedly high-grade.
Seriously though, how many jobs would be generated by, say, an extra guaranteed $10 billion a year in the NASA budget for the next 20 years?
My feeling is it'd be more than have been generated by the 'Stimulus' will accomplish for less than a quarter of the amount.
Re broadband - most of the country has SOME sort of internet access, if there's a cable system of some sort. For instance, let's look at three smallish towns.
Las Cruces, NM (pop 95,000 in the area) has 11 different broadband providers.
Deming, NM (pop about 15k) has between 5 and 7 broadband ISP providers.
Beatty, NV has about 1100 people, and 2 broadband providers. (Possibly more...)
They may not be 20MB up/down, but they're on-line.
So - when I see some big push by the government to stick their nose into broadband on the premise that 'people need it' - I'm a bit skeptical about just WHY they're so eager to grab onto that.
And what the side effects would be.
J.
Posted by JLawson | March 25, 2010 7:37 PM
Posted on March 25, 2010 19:37