Post #1694633
2026-04-06 13:13 UTC
@drmikepj Also, FOLLOW THE MONEY. Anyone with skin in the game must be suspected of serving their own interests. Some are true believers who are deluded or myopic, and many are hucksters.
When Elmo first started barking about Hyperloop, my first thought was, "How is this different from pneumatic rail?" So I looked into it, and.. it's not. It's the same concept, ginned up for modern times.
This is worth some explanation.
/2
Replies (1)
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@wesdym@mastodon.social 2026-04-06 13:19
@drmikepj 2/ Pneumatic rail is like that thing you might use at a bank drive-through, or that used to be common in large retail or business environments, with document carriers whizzing around through tubes by differential pressure -- scaled up to the size of a rail car with people on board. And it worked. But not so well as to justify keeping it, and by a century ago it was mostly abandoned. Is Elmo's better? Not really. /3