Quote:
Originally Posted by jammies
I think the point of the comparison with Kodak is that technology isn't always incrementally improved within one paradigm, sometimes one utterly dominant technological solution is completely replaced by another in a short period of time. It's also apt because this quick replacement is much more likely if the technology in question has large support costs to use, as the cost of film and developing did for cameras, and gas and maintenance do for ICE-based cars.
If you can reduce the cost of ownership of a car by a few hundred a month with an electric, almost everyone will change over, and you could indeed have a large majority of electrics on the road by 2030. This is especially likely as the operation of an electric is pretty much like a combustion-engined car; you press one pedal to make it go, you press another to make it stop, and you turn the wheel to steer it. Despite it being utterly different technology underneath, it operates the same way for the end user - again, much like anyone who could operate a film camera could operate a digital one.
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Yes of course, if the technology presents a better mouse trap, the better mouse trap will be adopted. No one (at least no one who is rational) is disputing that.
That is not what happened with Kodak. They arrogantly believed that they had the power to stand in the way of progress. And it was their doom.
That's not what is happening with ICEs. There are countless participants with a full spectrum of goals and an obscene amount of potential profits available. The technological change is coming. The only question that is being debated is: how quickly?
And so far, that technological change is still mostly hope and expectation.
But yes, a game-changing advancement would, well, change the game.