Quote:
Originally Posted by Daffy
Follow the money trail. Why would a corporation manufacture something that has less profit margin? Their only reason for existence is the bottom line...they have no allegiance to humanity, country, morals, or ethics. Only the bottom line matters. Doesn't require a conspiracy...just follow the money.
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I think that is a lot of it. I also think, that a lot of these wizz-bang inventions turn out to have significant problems to commercialization and marketing. I think the thermoacoustic refrigeration is probably a good example - it is too noisy for most people to want in their house. I suspect many of these things have some sort of problem like that - too expense, the technology to make millions of them doesn't exist, some fatal flaw.
There is also the whole issue of retooling - I have seen this often with materials. Someone will come along with a new material that has a slight improvement in an important property (I've seen this a lot with piezoelectric and other electronic materials). The 10% improvement in whatever sounds great on grant proposals or in talks, but ulitimately, it is not worthwhile to redesign all of you circuits or components to work with the new material. It is only where the new material allows you to do something you couldn't do before - such as make the electronics work at a higher temperature - that you get any interest, and then usually only for those niche markets.