Elon Musk to outline 'Hyperloop' idea | Hacker News Reader

Elon Musk to outline 'Hyperloop' idea

bbc.co.uk

76 pointsmorphics40 comments

No upvote from me... tired of seeing articles like this. You're too busy to actually tell us what it is.. but you're not too busy to tweet, debunk others theories, or give comments teasing people with small details.

I'm worn out.. don't care anymore. You keep it.

Agreed about tired of hearing speculation but he has only mentioned it a handful of times and said he would publish a paper/plans in August of this year (now).

It's pretty amazing that a vague futuristic concept can generate so much publicity.

It's not just a vague futuristic concept, it's 'a vague futuristic concept of a genius engineer'. There are so many other concepts that don't generate publicity like this.

Remember how the Segway was going to be bigger than the internet?

That said, I think the hype bubble for the HLoop has a small radius. Very much concentrated in tech circles. None of my non-tech friends (we fondly refer to them as normies) have heard about the Hyperloop.

Exactly. Even my intelligent but not super nerdy friends had no idea what the hyperloop was when I mentioned it, Elon is not a name they know, and Tesla barely rings a bell.

The finance community, on the other hand, is very aware of Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) and Musk

You should have a little bit more patience. Today is the day - August 12 - when all the plans will be made public and open sourced.

Citation: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/356776740409974785

Thanks for the actual date.. That would have been a great detail to put in the article.

Just tweeted that they pulled an allnighter and will be publishing a link @ 1:30PDT https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/366964441159438337

I know what you mean. Perhaps HN agrees. I submitted an article describing what this is and it got no where. Weird though, because any criticism of Musk usually gets karma slaughtered.

Voting based on opinion does little except consolidate the prevailing theory. I'm a big believer in voting based on the merits of the argument, not whether I believe in the conclusion. Well reasoned arguments I disagree with deserve a response if none present cover my objections, otherwise an up-vote of the response I agree with most.

It would be interesting if there were a bunch of HN clones for different topics around, with open data. I would love to see some analysis of voting trends based on topics over time, identifying "darling" topics and how criticism of them is treated, and if it's any different in any other communities. HN users often espouse that this is a place of more rational discourse (or that is was, which is a common meme). It would be interesting to see whether this actually bears any truth, which is a goal I think any rational person could get behind.

This is why I think upvoting on the HN front page is not a good idea. People upvote before they even read the article (if they read it at all).

I just opened the comments to see yours and know there is no need to read the article and to upvote the story.

Edit: asked PG about this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6199254 Maybe other people have good suggestions as well.

The last paragraph is a downer:

Mr Musk says he is so busy with SpaceX and Tesla that he will not immediately try to develop Hyperloop himself. Only if no-one else picks up the challenge will he consider attempting to make it a reality at a later time.

Hyped up article.

I wonder if the idea of such tubes is practical though. It's like a giant hi-tech metro tube with certainly only one or two stops. That's high maintenance stuff. More than one thousand km of infrastructure. A plane might be more expensive but its 100meter long tube is less to take care off.

OTOH today's metro infrastructure is quite huge too if you were to line it up.

You have to consider the total cost of ownership. The exercise goes like this. What is the total traveling population per year that would get from point A to point B that would ride planes if not for hyperloop (assuming it becomes reality). That gives you the number of planes that would be used per year. Need to consider per year, because a lot of traveling is seasonal. Then what is the cost to maintain those planes, operating costs like fuel and pilots, insurance costs for damages and risks, etc, etc.

I have no idea how the total cost of ownership would compare. But I wouldn't write off hyperloop just because it would be expensive. It may be possible to make it work. Given how much plane tickets cost, I can easily imagine people paying more money for something that's seemingly more convenient and safe than planes.

edit: The man figured out how to turn launching rockets into a profitable business. The man thinks it's possible to build a nation-wide charging station network that can charge all the cars his company builds for free. With this type of thinking, I think he takes cost feasibility seriously, so I'm curious what he has up his sleeve.

edit2: Maybe what I wrote above maybe sounds too much like hero worship. I'm not saying he has everything figured out. I'm just saying I'd be very on the fence and would not bet for him or against him, but most definitely not against him.

There is not wrong with admiring heros, and I personally feel that any entrepreneur who changes the world and helps humanity as much as Musk has in just 10 years deserves to be called a hero.

"Let's start a rocket company in effort to ensure the survivability of humanity." (something that only super-power are currently able to do)

"Let's start an electric car company (and solar panel company) in effort to reduce the dependency on fossil fuels." (since other car companies are barely trying)

Then to have the resources and perseverance to actually make these very difficult goals a reality is outstanding.

Gates is doing something similar with his Thorium reactor research. Hopefully that will be another game changer.

The Google co-founders have been doing similar projects for the past 10 years. Even if it does make them tons of money it's still admirable to give awesome software and hardware to the world at cost or free.

Gates' work in public health which has actually impacted the lives of people across the economic spectrum around the world. Musk and the Google Guys have some work to do before we can say that they've actually changed things for the better through their philanthropy for humanity as a whole. They have big plans, but its still a work in progress, and they don't deserve to be called heroes just for thinking big and spending money on interesting sample runs.

Though still think it's quite unfair to call Tesla and SpaceX "interesting sample runs".

Tesla's cars are prohibitively expensive for all but the most monied. As I've understood it so far SpaceX is a novelty to date that is supported almost entirely by NASA grants in the hope that it will eventually spur a true space industry. Both projects carry great potential, truly great potential. You don't deserve hero status for your potential, but how it is ultimately realized.

Get back to me when it's been announced and when someone who knows what they are talking about has taken a look at it.

(and by "someone who knows what they are talking about" I don't mean TechCrunch)

I wonder how much of Musk stepping slightly back from this is the realistic notion that he could spread himself too thin and how much is a realisation that Hyperloop could be less of a home run than first thought? Any tough proposal will have its critics or become mired in government/environmental hassle. If it was exceptional, I don't know that it would be released in this way (after a wait, freely, etc).

I'm also curious, if it is a strong concept, as to who will pick up the ball and run with it? People talked about electric vehicles and commercial space exploration for a long, long time before very few people did either as effectively as Musk has done.

One thing that I think he might've overstated is the ability to show up and leave without the waits seen at airports due to security. Even the Eurostar has a security line. Unless baggage was deposited/couriered to a departure point in advance and passengers showed up later?

If it is all the real deal, Sydney-Melbourne would be a good pairing. Ranks as the third highest route for passengers flown if Wikipedia is to be believed.

Taking the baggage separately is an interesting idea and possible solution to the security problems.

If the 'Loop is as I'm imagining it (based on scant details, granted) then the actual vehicle components are small, numerous and frequent. Given the short transit time it could be reasonably expected that people carry NO luggage whatsoever and could be quickly processed by a walk through a (potentially computer-operated) backscatter x-ray machine. Luggage runs could be carried in separate vehicles, spaced so that if anything were to 'go off' there would be loss of infrastructure but no loss of life.

Since Musk said that it was a people transportation concept everyone immediately jumped on that bandwagon. The hyperloop could be a concept that disrupts the cargo train market. I could see GE taking a look at this concept with the idea of improved cargo transport.

It's pitched as a better option than a bullet train so I think it's safe to assume the primary thrust is transporting people.

What would be the market for transporting cargo at the speed of sound, and why would anyone able to afford such a service prefer a train to a jet?

Even hand luggage would hold things up and I can't see this being a good option without at least hand luggage. Without it you'd rule out almost every commuter (handbags, laptops, etc).

And if the infrastructure is a tube, then damaged infrastructure would grind everything to a halt for some time.

Still, something more like a train would still avoid the headache of boarding and taxiing that you get with a flight.

Maybe I'm overcomplicating this: if the vehicles were small, well-spaced and able to stop in the event of a failure ahead of them then the impact that any one passenger could have is equivalent of getting in a car and causing a bad collision on a motorway.

Obviously a Very Bad Thing, but if we feel it necessary to protect against that then we might as well write off transport altogether!

Anyway, enough speculation from me - I'll patient wait for Elon to finish his breakfast and press 'go' on the release.(Very frustrating!)

Wouldn't an explosion in a tunnel two metres wide be likely to destroy the tunnel? In that case, it'd be more akin to destroying a motorway/bridge. Road's going to be out of action for a while.

The Eurostar is unique in terms of high speed rail in that it has any sort of security check, to the best of my knowledge. Anywhere else, even for international journeys, you merely turn up for the time the train is due to depart, as with any other train service. (In the Eurostar's defence, given a highest class ticket, you merely have to pass through the automated check-in gates ten minutes prior to arrival, and half an hour is the furthest deadline, for the lowest class tickets. I'm unaware of any major airport that expects you to be able to get from check-in to the gate in half an hour.)

Regardless, the Eurostar security is utter nonsense anyway — especially given you're allowed to take almost everything onboard! It makes a whole load of hassle for nothing. At least at airports they're actively stopping you from taking a fair amount of stuff… It seems like the right solution here is to drop the security, rather than anything more drastic! [Edit: oh, looking this up, they appear to have changed this. They now have most of the same restrictions as air flights do.]

Travelled on Eurostar a few weeks ago (London-Paris) and there were security queues at St Pancras plus an immigration gate. Almost missed the train.

Security queues with full luggage are a bit unwieldy when you also have a 1yo in a pram!

I'll just take the wise approach here of "wait and see". Way too much hype going on.

"The hype is reminiscent of the pre-launch publicity for the Segway."

Man, I'm sad I won't get to fly in a Concorde (or any supersonic by the looks of it) - 3 hours London to New York sounds pretty awesome...

Has there ever been this much fanfare and media speculation over the unveiling of an idea before? The hyperloop is not a product or research, its just an idea.

I can't think of an instance when this has happened in my lifetime. Kind of bizarre

people are tired of the current transportation systems and its about time we have something faster

What time are the details due? Anyone know?

Today: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/356776740409974785

I meant like 5pm EST. I'm aware it's today ;)

BTW, Elon will reveal the details at 1:30 PDT:

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/366964441159438337

I would love to see this announcement today on a livestream. The fanboy in me is thinking of this like the steve jobs keynotes from a few years back. "Oh and one more thing, it can bend space time"

+1 for everything about that Segway image.

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