What I found interesting today…

… is the similarity of Elon Musk’s hyperloop challenge, won yesterday by the WARR team from Munich, to the Darpa autonomous driving challenge from 2004.
If you haven’t heard already: Students from Munich constructed and operated the fastest pod in a competition to prove the hyperloop concept. Yesterday, in the competition’s third round they broke the 200 mph barrier as they shot their pod through the narrow vacuum tube.
This technological feat is worth many articles by itself, yet what I found interesting today is that Elon Musk/SpaceX announced to have another challenge next year. All in order to advance the development of the necessary technology.
This announcement sounds to me like the Darpa announcing their repeat of their 2004 autonomous driving challenge. Albeit the multiple fails of technology and equipment in 2004, the following challenge proved to be more successful and showed promising advancements. Nobody can deny that autonomous driving has come a long way since then. And so will hyperloop.
There has been criticism regarding Musk’s concept of high speed transportation in near-vacuum, just as there are voices that seem doubtful to the concept, its feasibility, and business value. Yet, there have also been people sceptical to the idea of having self-driving vehicles, and there still are. Those people can, on the other hand, not deny that there have been major advancements in the field of autonomous cars and that there clearly is a market. Critical voices have shifted and focussed on different aspects as visionaries, scientists and engineers have proven them wrong. And this is what I expect to happen in the next few years.
We will have a shift of opinion and criticism as Elon Musk and his disciples keep in developing their technology. But at the same time, technology will change and advance further, along with perfecting concepts and developing markets.
What I found interesting today is that the first steps to an new industry and a new future have been taken. I also found interesting, that the challenges set by visionaries can directly promote, facilitate and perpetuate technological development.
