>Not to be too "Jetsons" but as the aforementioned multi-billion
>dollar-funded industry jumps the hurdles it now faces (nano-scale
>physics I believe to be a major area of R&D), we could have
>material goods assembling themselves for cheap and manufacturing
>(like word processing, desktop publishing and studio recording of
>the last decade or two) become something done on a personal scale
>in our homes. Some of the XPARC brains envision replicating
>machines like microwave ovens or dishwashers now, using
>carbon-based feedstock in a water-heater type container as the
>building block. Outlandish? Any more so than how the common
>citizen of the previous century regarded (if they even considered)
>telecommunications, supersonic flight, laser surgery and the like.
>And our advancements (when not bogged down by trifling concerns of
>how to outwit competitors and return the largest profit on a huge
>investment) increase much more rapidly as we approach the end
>of this decade/century/millennium.
This was all covered years ago in Drexlers "Nanosystems" as well as
the "Nanopunk" novel "The Diamond Age" By Neal Stephanson.
Highly recommended reading...... ;)
Brian