Past Perfect, Future Misleading

kevin wrote:

In article ,
says...

Concorde -never- cut it. It's a perfect example of creating a service
without looking into the market for it.


Concorde *did* show an operational profit for many years. People were
willing to pay for speed, service, and snob-appeal.

R&D expenses had to be written-off. It was expensive to design and
build. That's not uncommon in systems that advance the state of the art.

It took a while to learn how to operate and market Concorde effectively.
Changing times ended her career. But in between, she flew profitably.
Did it ever make back it's initial development investment?
Was it a Rah-Rah we beat the US, screw the UK and French taxpayers?
Jim Davis

John Ordover wrote:

There is no demand or need for suborbital mail service. The major
limiting factor on mail delivery is getting it from the airport to the
recipient, not the flight time.



Although warnings on packages could now include "Do not exceed five G
acceleration!" along with "Fragile!" and "This side up!"...and the
stamps would be very cool also- one with an eagle shooting fire out of
it's arse and "Via Rocket Mail" on it.... in the amount of a five
hundred dollars per ounce.

In article ,
Joann Evans wrote:
John Ordover wrote:

Concorde -never- cut it. It's a perfect example of creating a service
without looking into the market for it.

Now, it's entirely possible that Concorde *still* might have been an
economic failure, but more than economics were involved. We know people
want to fly the routes it did (and could have) flown, but it wasn't just
a matter of how much more they would pay for more speed.

Concorde was making an operating profit; it's been shut down basically
because the planes seem to be breaking down often enough that they're
not really safe for a commercial airline. I don't believe that there
were governmental subsidies to the operation of Concorde, though writing
off the development cost hardly hurt.

You can make quite a profit, even with three times the fuel cost of a
normal airliner, if you sell 100 seats on every flight at double the
cost of a normal first-class flight LHR-NYC.

Tom

It was limited by matters outside of market forces:

The unacceptability of sonic booms over inhabited areas.


And that could not have been forseen? Seems like a no-brainer.

Fuel efficency/consumption that was acceptable when designed, but
suffering, post 1973.

Making operations unprofitable without a redesign they didn't do and
couldn't afford.


Engine noise that was acceptable when designed, but suffering under
new rules.


Again, could be coped with by a redesign they couldnt' afford.


Now, it's entirely possible that Concorde *still* might have been an
economic failure, but more than economics were involved. We know people
want to fly the routes it did (and could have) flown, but it wasn't just
a matter of how much more they would pay for more speed.


All those considerations are part of the economic picture you have to
get a handle on before starting in business. I mean, if you come up
with a great new inexpensive way to make shoes, the only problem being
that it makes so much noise that neighbors five miles away complain,
then you don't have an effective system to put in a city.

"John Ordover" wrote in message
om...
There have been a multitude of reports on the huge store of energy
in the deep sea methane hydrate deposits, with returns as large as the
biggest oil fields, but it's too hard to get to and nobody with any
money will bother to exploit it.
What makes space any different?
IMHO: I'm afraid that space is useless as a source of product or
services.
Jim Davis

Even I am more optimistic than that - I think there probably is a way
to exploit space to make a bundle that no one has thought of yet.

And that way will only be found by people looking for and working
on answers, not someone that simply collects negatives.

John Ordover wrote:

It was limited by matters outside of market forces:

The unacceptability of sonic booms over inhabited areas.

And that could not have been forseen? Seems like a no-brainer.

Fuel efficency/consumption that was acceptable when designed, but
suffering, post 1973.

Making operations unprofitable without a redesign they didn't do and
couldn't afford.

Engine noise that was acceptable when designed, but suffering under
new rules.

Again, could be coped with by a redesign they couldnt' afford.


Now, it's entirely possible that Concorde *still* might have been an
economic failure, but more than economics were involved. We know people
want to fly the routes it did (and could have) flown, but it wasn't just
a matter of how much more they would pay for more speed.

All those considerations are part of the economic picture you have to
get a handle on before starting in business. I mean, if you come up
with a great new inexpensive way to make shoes, the only problem being
that it makes so much noise that neighbors five miles away complain,
then you don't have an effective system to put in a city.

The sonic boom issue was questionable all along, yes. But it was not
clear just how much people would put up with. Now we think we know.

However, if you're required to forsee fuel price increases, or new
engine noise rules, when your design was about as loud as its operating
contemporaries, then all new businesses and projects must hire a
psychic, yes?

"Dholmes" wrote in message
...

"John Ordover" wrote in message
om...
You just can not go from Kitty Hawk to passenger flights crossing the
Atlantic with the added bonuses of needing to go to Moscow in one
leap.
I
say lets get mail service going first.

There is no demand or need for suborbital mail service. The major
limiting factor on mail delivery is getting it from the airport to the
recipient, not the flight time.


How could you misread that so completely?

He's got a knack for it.


Mail service as written was clearly not literal.
Probably the closest thing today are the cargo runs to ISS.
Weekly deliveries of less then a ton or monthly deliveries of 3 to 4
tonsof
supplies to ISS would start a whole new market by starting volume
production
and launch of rockets driving down costs.

In sci.space.policy John Ordover wrote:
It was limited by matters outside of market forces:

The unacceptability of sonic booms over inhabited areas.


And that could not have been forseen? Seems like a no-brainer.

Have you ever actually heard one? If a plane goes supersonic at
a realtively low altitude, yes, the noise is loud, will rattle
the windows, etc. At the heights Conorde flies, it would be
at most slightly annoying. So no, it is not something they could
have foreseen.


--
Sander

+++ Out of cheese error +++

In article ,
Sander Vesik wrote:
In sci.space.policy John Ordover wrote:
It was limited by matters outside of market forces:
The unacceptability of sonic booms over inhabited areas.

And that could not have been forseen? Seems like a no-brainer.

Have you ever actually heard one? If a plane goes supersonic at
a realtively low altitude, yes, the noise is loud, will rattle
the windows, etc. At the heights Conorde flies, it would be
at most slightly annoying. So no, it is not something they could
have foreseen.

There's a not-so-unbelievable theory that holds
that the reason supersonic flights over major
territory were banned was simply that the US,
after cancelling the SST project, didn't want the
competition to succeed either. So this might have
been forseen, but it needed a different crystal
ball. There is absolutely no credible reason for
banning supersonic Concorde flights over central
Australia, for example.

Greg.
--
Greg Rose INTERNET:
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Level 3, 230 Victoria Road, http://people.qualcomm.com/ggr/
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Even I am more optimistic than that - I think there probably is a way
to exploit space to make a bundle that no one has thought of yet.

And that way will only be found by people looking for and working
on answers, not someone that simply collects negatives.

Assuming they are actually working on it, rather than deluding
themselves with dreams of asteroid mining, joyrides, and other such
dead ends.